There are people who wish for success but are unable to do through entrepreneurship. This is due to a lack of resources. Here is the good news for them. If you become an employee in the industry and became an intrapreneur, then congratulations! You are very much close to success.
Before that, you might be thinking that we have heard of entrepreneurs but not intrapreneurs. So, what is it? Well, here is the answer.
Intrapreneurs are entrepreneurs as an employee in the company. They make strategies, manage people, find solutions to the problems, motivate co-workers, expand and maintain their network, etc.
This looks similar to entrepreneurship but it is different. How? Let us understand it.
How Intrapreneur Differs from Entrepreneur
Factors Intrapreneur Entrepreneur
Freedom Since they are employees and works for industry, therefore enjoys less freedom They do not work for company, hence enjoys more freedom
Funding They do not need to raise funds as it is taken care by company They need to work on raising funds by either friends or investors.
Resources They get resources easily from the company They have to search, purchase or request to get resources which is little difficult.
Risks Their risks are shared with supervisors and co-workers. Their risks are completely on them and need to face it alone
Working They work for the company and organization. They work for themselves and takes work from outside resources.
Now, let us see the benefits of being an intrapreneur to get more motivation.
Benefits of Becoming Intrapreneur for Yourself
1. Your Interest, Enthusiasm, and Confidence will grow.
After proving yourself as an intrapreneur, you will find people respecting you, sitting around you, interested in knowing you. Also, they will admire you in front of others and yourself. All these great experiences will give very high and positive energy and make you feel good.
2. Your work capacity will grow.
As you are filled with energy, you will rarely get tired. Therefore, you will be able to work continuously as compared with others. Hence, this will increase your working capacity.
3. You may get out of bound promotions.
Since your working capacity is increased, you will give extra benefits to the company. So, the company will focus on you and as a reward, you will get a jump to higher ranks and positions. This not only increases respect, but you will also receive a very high salary.
4. You will have tons of opportunities for your career and yourself.
As an intrapreneur, you get to know almost all the people in the company. The company has a very large number of employees and they are from very different backgrounds. This will open your way to know very different things and getting involved in them.
How to become a successful intrapreneur?
1. Know your Company
This is the very first work you have to do as soon as you enter a company. First, do some research work by accessing the internet and visiting its official site. Then, understand the company’s mission and vision. After that study, some of the recent projects were carried out by the company.
Studying these projects will help you to understand the types of company resources. After doing this homework, enter the company and know your co-workers. Do this by interacting with them, knowing their views, experiences and introducing yourself. Do the same thing with trainers and superiors, but do it carefully and tactfully.
2. Know the Company’s Problems
After knowing and getting yourself known to various people in the company, go ahead to know problems faced by the company. So to know this, first know your superior’s and co-worker’s problems. Because knowing them will help you to know company’s problem.
Then brainstorm over them and find possible solutions. Then discuss it with co-workers and superiors. Don’t worry whether they will accept or not. Telling solutions to them is a big thing. Doing this will make them realize that you genuinely care about them.
3. Start giving positive and strong impacts on the company.
After getting co-workers and superiors’ support, knowing problems, and finding solutions, work on solving them. For that, start solving through your area of expertise. Don’t try to solve by first neglecting your expertise. This will reduce your performance to the company.
So, first give importance to solutions that can be given through your expertise, then go ahead with other solutions. After successfully solving, check that how much your solution has given benefits. So, while solving a problem, focus on what benefits you are giving.
4. Remove the fear of experimenting which may fail.
There is a reason why freshers or new employees fear to experiment. This is because of thinking like ‘Others will blame me for the mistake’, ‘A complain will be filed against me’, ‘My boss will scold me to be within your limits’, etc.
Really speaking, these things are like a cloud of smoke and will vanish away. The only thing you have to do is to stay consistent in innovating. Failures in experimenting are very natural. Also, you know that you are experimenting for the good of the company which it will surely realize someday.
That’s why keep experimenting. If it fails, find other ways of doing it. If required, start the experiment from the new side again and check the results.
5. Be a Democratic Leader
If you are a leader, don’t start bombarding like ‘We should do like this, ‘We should work like that, ‘We should search for this’. Please avoid this because the team will not like it. In this way, you are showing authority.
If you have a solution, keep it within yourself for a while. First, ask your members about how to solve this problem then listen to their solutions. If you feel that their solution matches yours, go ahead with it. If you think their solution partly matches, then give suggestions.
But if none of their solutions are correct, then explain the reason and then give your solutions.
6. Sometimes be an Informal Leader
Democratic leadership is the best one. Even though it does not make others do the work in a faster manner, but this leadership lasts a long. Now here is a thing. Being a democratic leader is necessary for intrapreneurship but not sufficient.
Because becoming a democratic leader without informal leadership will show you like the company’s servant. So to avoid this, you have to become an informal leader also.
For this, don’t only make time to understand the company’s problem but individual problems also. Don’t get too much involved in their problems, but understand some for which you can find some way to remove it. Also, give some out-of-box solutions irrespective of whether it is realistic or not.
Therefore intrapreneurs are in high demand for the company. They are unique, hardworking, and productive. They also receive unique rewards and respect. With courage and consistency, you can also become an intrapreneur and become successful. So, Best of Luck with this journey!