What is intrapreneurship?
Intrapreneurship is the concept that an employee of a large corporation is given the freedom and funding to research and launch new ideas relevant to the company. It is important to a company to be not only up to date in its respective industry but to also be innovative and ahead of its competitors or it could lose relevance in the market, and allowing intrapreneurship is a good way to achieve those goals.
Such a practice is good for your business. Allowing your employees to contribute ideas and new projects to your business can only benefit you. To begin, it will help you to keep your employees. Each of us has had a job in which we felt under appreciated—where we felt like our talents were untapped. Validating your employees by encouraging their input and ideas and letting them head up the implementation of their ideas essentially retains your most valuable resource—your employees.
Don’t give your competitors an edge
Those frustrated with their jobs who feel they are not being allowed to use their capabilities are likely to look for work elsewhere, perhaps with a competitor—a competitor who will allow intrapreneurship. You are giving your competition an edge in various ways by not tapping into your staff’s talent and industry knowledge.
As a company, you need to keep moving forward continually producing the next big thing, and while you successfully entrapreneured your business to where it is today, you cannot be stagnant. Get to know your employees, find out their talents, and set them free to pitch ideas. Support them in their efforts to make your business more productive. Happy employees who feel productive, appreciated, and validated are employees who continually produce top rate work. Their contributions to your business will keep you ahead of your industry, will give you a competitive edge, and will make your company a desirable place to work.
Kristyl Barron holds a BA in English Education from the University of Central Oklahoma and an MHR in Counseling/Organizational Management from the University of Oklahoma. Barron has been writing professionally since 2008, and projects include a memoir entitled Give Your Brother Back His Barbie and an in progress motivational book called Aspies Among Us.
