Microsoft is the only company I've heard of that has (or had) "Morale Budgets", completely within the control of the programmers. In the 90s, according to McConnell, Microsoft would go to any lengths to protect and improve morale.
I can't speak for Shell or Apple.
The point is that people are mixing correlation and causation. There's no reason to think that Valve's self-directed model is the cause of their success, just as there's no reason to think Google are successful because of how they manage their people. In all these cases the massive profitability is pretty much exogenous.
I also stand by what I said about Google and Microsoft. I know people give Michael Church a hard time here, but from my own friends I've heard anecdotes that confirm his sentiments regarding the amount of bullshit that goes down there. Sure, it's a good company and people are happy - as long as they play the politics game. I'm sure a company-wide "index of satisfaction" looks good on the HR handbook, but when your manager blacklists you without your knowledge and prevents your transfer or promotion, that's kind of shitty.
Same thing with Microsoft, which is known for its legendary corporate bureaucracy and political in-fighting. And Apple, which is by all accounts a very high-stress environment to work in.
I don't think communes are as rigorous about admission.
That or the people that have niched themselves into positions of unwritten-but-assumed authority have decided to hire quiet followers.
Just because someone calls an environment a 'flat system' doesn't make it true. There exists just as likely, a very defined system controlled by seniority.
An even bigger difference might be that the financial goals Valve has as a community are more clear than the goal of "build a good anarcho-syndicalist commune". In my experience communities that have a goal to pursue that's external to the existence of the community are the ones that last while those that don't tend to descend into high school-like popularity contests and fail because of that.
BTW, is there anything HN would recommend reading on 1960s-1970s communes and, especially, ways in which they failed?
Like in "The beatings will continue until morale improves"?
Microsoft has, of course, changed. But in the 90s it was probably the best place in the industry to actually work, if the articles and books written about that period are even vaguely accurate.
The interesting thing is that Valve has similar open space areas. You could substituate a photo of one for another. The big difference at Valve is that people have /self selected/ into the other people they are working with, and can move any time.
The ability to choose is worth any likely amount of "morale budget."
It's true that there are a few disgruntled ex-Googlers that may give you this impression.
But I don't believe you'll find many current Google employes who will agree with that.