It's becoming fashionable

Breakfast yesterday with Lisa Solomon, whose new book with Chris Ertel is due out this autumn.  Lisa, one of the most enthusiastic management consultants I've met, has been working with her husband Glenn on the question of how intermediate-sized companies can rejuvenate innovation.   She showed me some fabulous cartoons that he has constructed -- shades of Intrapreneuring!

The question, of course, is how do companies stay innovative and responsive to changing conditions after their initial success.  Most don't.  Some do so for quite a while before becoming trapped by history or circumstance.  And some, seemingly, stay innovative for a very long time.

Apple, one of today's 'showpiece' companies, is touted primarily because of legendary Steve Jobs.  When he was 'off the scene' Apple struggled.  When he returned, it was a magical phoenix-like arising (well, okay, it did take him seven years before he could get consistent growth and profits).

Is it primarily the leader?  Well, at least in the Apple case, the legend is a bit different than the facts.  Jobs, clearly the emotional and intellectual leader for the early MacIntosh (and the Lisa before it) was fired, in large part due to the failed performance of those early products.  And when he returned, with the acquisition of the failed NeXt for its operating system (not its edgy hardware), it took him until the ninth year to 'right the ship'

If Meg Whitman gets eight more years to right the HP ship, I'll be stunned.

I know firsthand the same kind of 'what have you done for me lately' thinking, and I too was and am  one of those enamored by these ground-breaking products.   So I can unequivocally say, "No, the answer doesn't rest just with THE LEADER.  It rests instead with the culture, admittedly affected strongly by the leader, in terms of whether innovation is feared or embraced."  And this is deep, built throughout an organization, not just at the top.  The top is crucial, but the body must be aligned.  Then, and only then, can intrapreneurs flourish.  Intrapreneurship is not about 'fighting the system' except in rare circumstance -- it has to be in alignment in order to be systemic, repeatable, and enduring.