Page 37 - Grow from Within Mastering Corporate Entrepreneurship and Innovation

24 grow from within

• Spin-outs or joint ventures, whether simply technologies or
complete new business concepts, insofar as spin-outs or
joint ventures become separated from the company in
which they were developed.
• Acquisitions, in that new corporate entrepreneurial
ventures are conceived and fostered internally, not
brought in whole from the outside and kept separate.
However, “fill-in” acquisitions are often part of corporate
entrepreneurship programs.

Entrepreneurs: Nature versus Nurture

Entrepreneurs are born, not made. Or are they made, not born?
The argument becomes academic when your competitors figure
out how to enable corporate entrepreneurs from within. More-
over, while there are similarities between the classic entrepre-
neur and the Entrepreneurus corporatus species, the context and
capabilities provided by the established corporate parent, as well
as the constraints, are exceptionally different. Leadership, orga -
nization structure, management, objectives—they all require
modification if new business creation is to work within an estab-
lished company. This is not to say that corporate entrepreneurs
can’t learn a lot from independent entrepreneurs. They can.
Many of the skills are similar, but many are not in critical ways.
If you’ve ever been an independent entrepreneur, you know
the intense feeling of responsibility you have toward your
team, your partners, your investors, and your employees.
While good managers within the larger company context feel
this as well, there really is nothing like the feeling of having
your own resources on the line to ensure that you meet payroll.
When we write of independent entrepreneurs, we refer to
high-growth entrepreneurs, whom Professor Steven Rogers of the