Intrapreneurship

Definition: An intrapreneurship is a phenomenon of

empowering the employees within the organization, by valuing
their ideas and converting them into a profit-making model for
the business.

The organization would bear the associated risk and loss if the
intrapreneur’s project failed.

Characteristics of Intrapreneurship
Intrapreneurs are often falsely conceptualized as entrepreneurs.
Yes, they are entrepreneurs, but in the skin of employees.

Let us now read below the features of intrapreneurship to go

through this concept in details.
 Diversification: Intrapreneurship promotes teams with
people of different gender, age groups, culture and fields.

 Innovative Approach: It is a creative initiative for the

progress of both the employee and the company.

 Restoration Concept: An intrapreneur adds value to an

existing company by improving the products, services,
methods or perceptions.

 Mutual Benefit: Through intrapreneurship, an employee

achieves empowerment and self-actualisation; and the
company also grows remarkably.

 Calculated Risk: The risk involved in an intrapreneur’s

project is well analyzed and planned before it is onboard.

 No Investment by Intrapreneur: The intrapreneur is the

brain behind the idea but need not put even a penny into the
project. The company funds it at every stage of business.

 Profit-Sharing Agreement: In many organizations, a

profit-sharing agreement is signed mutually between the
company and the employee.
 Importance of Intrapreneurship
The present-day market is highly volatile. Constant improvement
and creative inputs have become quite essential for companies to
stay in the competition.

Intrapreneurs have the solution to many such problems. Let us

now see how can intrapreneurship help:

 Penetrate New Markets: An intrapreneur’s idea

sometimes lead to availing of the business opportunities
prevailing in the new or existing market.

 Employee Empowerment: The company can strengthen

its bond with the workforce by granting them authority along
with responsibility.
  Optimum Human Resource Utilization:
Intrapreneurship provides an opportunity to the employees
for outperforming their key responsibility area.

 Economic Stability: It is also undertaken to address

market instability and economic downturns through rapid
innovation.

 Innovative Growth: Idea generation is the basis of

development. Thus, to nurture an entity well, intrapreneurs
play a significant role in the business.

Intrapreneurship Process

To understand the basic functioning of the intrapreneurship in

any organization, the whole process is summerised into the
following steps:
Step 1: The first step is to encourage the workers to put forward
their views and opinions. Also, the employees should be made
familiar with the person or authority in front of whom he/she can
present the idea.

Step 2: The next is analyzing the compatibility of the idea with the
organizational need, mission, objectives, values, vision, consumer
demand, etc.

Step 3: Now is the time to inspect the idea from different

perspectives to seek any scope of betterment.

Step 4: This step is quite crucial as it aims at getting the approval

on idea implementation from all the related parties like team,
associates, investors and even customers (in case of industrial
buyers).

Step 5: The final feasibility test of any new project can be done by
identifying the SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and
threats) for both, the idea and the person himself or herself.

Step 6: After the idea is well tested for compatibility, applicability

and feasibility, it is modified and crafted such that it becomes
workable for the organization.
 Advantages of Intrapreneurship
In intrapreneurship, companies grow because of and with their
valuable human resource. Some of its benefits are:

 Initiates Idea Sharing: An intrapreneur may provide a

different perspective than that of the management. This idea
can act as a robust input for the company.

 Identifies Employee Potential: An employee has a lot of

capabilities which can be explored by bringing out the
intrapreneur within him/her.

 Provides Competitive Edge: Intrapreneurs are considered

to be a highly efficient workforce who have excellent problem
solving and competitive skills.
  Develops Leadership: Intrapreneurs emerge as leaders
when they are given a proper chance and thus, can set
examples for other employees too.

 Ensures Employee Engagement: It is a pragmatic way of

keeping the employees immersed in their work, thinking
innovative solutions to every problem and evolving as
intrapreneurs.

 Brings a Positive Change: Innovative ideas and analytical

thinking is mostly assertive for the company’s development
and progress.

Hurdles in Intrapreneurship
When an organization head towards adopting intrapreneurship as
a part of its corporate culture, the following barriers may arise on
the way of making such improvements:
  Multiple CEOs: If a company has more than one CEO with
different mindsets, then the employee may not get equal
support from each one of them, for intrapreneurship practice.

 Cultural Issues: Many of the other employees who do not

take intrapreneurship seriously or keep themselves away from
such practice may raise problems.

 Talent Acquisition Problems: Identifying an intrapreneur

within an employee is a challenging task for the human
resource department.

 Adverse Market Response: The consumers sometimes

feel that the innovated product fail to meet their
requirements.

 Lack or Shift of Suitable Resource: An intrapreneur

leaving the organization or the company unable to appoint
one, may lead to its failure.

Example
Happy meal, as we all know, is a kids centric meal box from McDonald’s is an
intrapreneurship idea.

Dick Brams, one of the regional managers of the brand at St. Louis, developed an
idea of serving the kids with a complete meal. He came with an innovation of
making a box of food and beverage items in small quantities, in the year 1977.
When he presented the whole thing in front of the management, his idea was
instantly taken into consideration. The company thus introduced the ‘Happy
Meal Box’ in the year 1979, which was a great success.

What happens when companies suppress Intrapreneurship?

Let us understand the extent of the disaster that may take place
on not taking intrapreneurs seriously. The failure of Eastman
Kodak is the most prominent example of this.

When Steven Sasson was working as an electrical engineer (or

say an intrapreneur) at Kodak, he developed the world’s
first digital camera in the year 1975.

He demonstrated the product in front of different departments of

Kodak, from managers to bosses. However, the idea was firmly
rejected by all, saying that it could ruin the company’s
monopoly.

This was the most prominent early bird chance missed by

Kodak. The company faced bankruptcy in the year 2012, after the
emergence of some popular digital camera brands like Nikon and
Canon.

All this was a result of not being innovative and discouraging

intrapreneurship.