Intrapreneurship: Initiation (MGMT90285)

Existing companies are under unyielding pressure to discover new ways to grow and become more innovative. To cope with this pressure, companies may revert to intrapreneurship (i.e., corporate entrepreneurship) – engaging in activities that are in unfamiliar ("far from core") areas in which success is uncertain. To do so, organizations need to embrace an entrepreneurial mindset and adopt entrepreneurial approaches. While more and more companies acknowledge the need for corporate entrepreneurship to remain competitive, how to do it is often poorly understood and managed, and inherently resisted. This subject will address both why and when organizations engage in corporate entrepreneurship and the challenges of making an established organization entrepreneurial. This subject will also discuss different forms of corporate entrepreneurship: the organizational “toolkit” available.

The subject will discuss these topics both from the perspective of the organization at large and the perspective of the change agent, the ‘entrepreneur in residence’ who needs to manage themselves, their manager(s), and their peers to navigate the larger corporate system and structures. The subject will particularly focus on how to identify opportunities for change and new ways to grow when engaged in corporate entrepreneurship.

This subject will give you tools, methods and logic that will enable you to participate in or lead successful efforts in corporate entrepreneurship – in particular efforts to identify entrepreneurial opportunities.