Intrapreneurship and Corporate Venturing 405- The right to appoint oneself an intrapreneur. Intrapreneurs cannot wait for the corpo-
ration to discover them and put them in intrapreneurial positions. They must have
the right to initiate. - The right to stay with the venture. Corporations often force the originators of ideas
and projects to hand off their creations when they require additional resources and
expertise and become bigger and better developed. Intrapreneurs need the right to
see the project through. - The right to make decisions. Intrapreneurs need the right to make important decisions
that affect the future of the venture. Pushing decision making up the hierarchy
moves it away from people who know and care to people who don’t. - The right to appropriate corporate slack. In large bureaucracies, managers control
resources so tightly it is often impossible to redeploy them to more productive uses.
Intrapreneurs need discretion to use a percentage of their budgets, time, and phys-
ical resources to develop new ideas. - The right to start small. Large corporations have a home-run philosophy. They pre-
fer a few large, well-planned projects, but intrapreneurs need permission to create
smaller, experimental ventures and let natural selection produce the winners. - The right to fail. Intrapreneurship cannot be successful without risk, trial and error,
mistakes, and failures. False starts are part of the process. If intrapreneurs are pun-
ished for failure, they will leave the organization, and others will be reluctant ever
to take chances. - The right to take enough time to succeed. The corporation cannot set unrealistically
short deadlines for the success of intrapreneurial efforts. They must be patient with
their investment. - The right to cross borders. Intrapreneurs often cross organizational boundaries to put
together the resources and people needed for the project. Corporate managers resist
incursions on their turf. Intrapreneurs need passports and the freedom to travel. - The right to recruit team members. Intrapreneurs need the freedom to recruit for the
cross-functional teams they must assemble for the project. The team must be
autonomous, and members owe their first allegiance to the team, not to their for-
mer department. - The right to choose. Independent entrepreneurs can choose among many suppliers,
financial sources, customer groups, and personnel. The intrapreneur must not face
internal corporate monopolists who constrain the choices for procuring resources.
The intrapreneur needs the freedom to choose from external sources when they are
superior.
Rules from Intrapreneurs
The Innovator Solutions advice is aimed at top corporate executives. The freedom factors
are philosophical tenets. What practical advice can be offered to intrapreneurs in the
trenches? Suggestions from practicing intrapreneurs can help.
For innovators, here are some lessons from a recent conference hosted by Jump
Associates of San Mateo, California:^52