That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind,” Neil Armstrong said as he made man’s first strides across the lunar landscape. Somewhat less famously on the same mission, he and Buzz Aldrin installed seismographic equipment with lightweight, high-temperature cable manufactured by W L Gore. Still breaking new frontiers, the firm is the first to top the 100 Best Companies To Work For list for two years running.

Despite its long relationship with Nasa, as well as a multitude of other uses for its products, from bagpipes to dental floss, the company is probably most well-known for Gore-Tex, its breathable, water-resistant fabric that blesses a host of outdoors wear. At the core of all products (here comes the science bit) is a versatile polymer, the sexily named polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE).

American husband-and-wife team Bill and Vieve Gore set up shop in their Delaware home in 1958 to develop its properties, moving out to larger premises three years later. In 1969 their son Bob, a chemical engineer, discovered that PTFE expands, the premise upon which Gore-Tex is based.

With innovation and diversity at the heart of the business, Gore adopts an equally original approach to company culture. There are no directors, line managers, operatives or secretaries. Everyone who works at the three sites in Scotland (two in Livingston and one in Dundee) is an “associate” and is accountable to each other, even to the extent that team-mates influence each others’ pay.

“You’ve got to be a team player at Gore,” says lab engineer Dave Thompson. “Your team rates your contribution on a scale of one to six, and that’s one of the things salaries are based on.” Thompson is one of more than a quarter of the 429-strong workforce with more than 15 years’ service (19), although he took a while settling in. “I’d come from the construction industry, where you had to ask your gaffer about things.” The freedom to manage your own responsibilities is an asset for the three-quarters of associates who are happy with their work-life balance.

Head of UK associates John Kennedy is often quoted as saying “It’s not a hippie commune”, and is quick to dispel any such misconceptions. Everyone chooses a sponsor who helps them develop, and they also have a leader who would traditionally be titled manager. Plant production leader John Housego explains: “I was voted into this job. That was a really special moment.”

According to our findings, this approach works: nine in every 10 employees think their manager trusts their judgment, just a fraction fewer feel he or she talks openly with them, a similar proportion feel their manager cares about them, and 84% say the principles of the firm would not alter if the leader changed — all are the highest scores for these questions among the 100 best companies.

Further accelerating Gore to its No 1 position are the exceptionally high “my company” scores: 92% believe they make a valuable contribution to the firm’s success, and 93% would miss it if they left.

Excellent benefits underpin the progressive style. All associates receive stock in the private company worth annually about 10% of salary, and it pays double their 5% pension contribution. There is free private healthcare and a heavily subsidised canteen. Most impressive, though, is 26 weeks’ fully paid maternity leave, with a further six months off unpaid, throughout which holiday accrues.

Clare McNab, responsible for the inside sales of seals and fibres, recently had a year’s maternity leave. “I came back and had to take 30 days’ holiday between August and December, which is really good when you’re a new mum,” she says. She now works four days a week, but her salary has not altered. “I do the same amount of work in four days.”

Vieve Gore outlived her husband and died in January at 91, but the legacy of their firm remains watertight, just like the products.

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