16 WO RLD-CHANGING IDEAS >>
UNLEASHING THE INCUBATED BUSINESS >>
Businesses must exercise their “ unleash ” muscles and allow the imagination and experimentation needed to incubate a startup-like business within a bigger parent company . Companies can strengthen the flexible capabilities required to innovate quickly and enable employees ’ intrapreneurial spirit by implementing five simple rules .
> MANAGE RESOURCE ALLOCATION WITH AGILITY .
Rather than tying funding to budgets , we define specific milestones and stage gates of progress for each business and tie funding to achievement of these milestones . If a business fails to meet its milestones twice in a row , we initiate a conversation called “ Persevere , Pivot , or Perish ,” in which we attempt to course correct quickly . This process has already resulted in the closure of three businesses that were unable to provide viable solutions to large enough problems .
> MAKE IT A MUSCLE , NOT JUST AN ORGANIZATION .
Creating a rigid structure to house all incubation businesses tends to breed antibodies and pushback from other parts of the company . While we have several businesses housed within incubation , we also open up incubation processes and tools to any business housed anywhere within the company . This eases tensions and fosters more open innovation .
> SEPARATE TALENT FROM THE BUSINESS .
This may be controversial , but we discovered that it was critical to help talent understand that even if a business fails , they do not lose their jobs . This straightforward message encourages talent to be willing to label a failure as such and to proactively address challenges . It has proven to be critical for course correction and failing fast .
> ESTABLISH CLEAR CRITERIA FOR THE BUSINESSES YOU WANT TO INCUBATE .
We defined a set of simple questions that the founding team must answer before we begin the incubation process . “ Who is the target customer ?” is one of these questions . “ What is the burning pain point for this customer that must be urgently addressed ? How is our potential solution ten times better than existing alternatives ? What distinct HP capabilities are you leveraging ? Is there an entrepreneurial and domainexpert team working on this ?”
> CREATE COMMUNITY .
Intrapreneurship is challenging and often quixotic for the teams involved in new businesses . We work hard across the businesses to foster mutual support , idea exchange , and shared learning . Morale and a sense of community have benefited as a result .
COMPANIES CAN STRENGTHEN THE FLEXIBLE CAPABILITIES REQUIRED TO INNOVATE QUICKLY AND ENABLE EMPLOYEES ’ INTRAPRENEURIAL SPIRIT .”