Who says you have to go at it on your own if you want an entrepreneurial experience? Some organisations now allow employees to behave like an entrepreneur by offering intrapreneurship. The responsibilities assigned can range from taking a new product line out to market to testing out their own ideas, seeking capital and even managing the entire project as an autonomous business.
For example…
Did you know that the humble post-it note was the result of an intrapreneurship by an employee at 3M? When the company allowed its employees to spend fifteen percent of their time on their own projects, scientist Spencer Silver invented an adhesive that would achieve a “friendly” amount of stickiness; just enough so that another employee could use it as a bookmark without it falling out. Subsequently, this is how the Post-It note was born!