There must be something very seductive and sexy about being an entrepreneur or being an early employee—especially a member of a company’s founding team—of a start-up venture. Why do I say that? Every week about 4-5 of my clients, of all ages, bring this up as they complain about their stalled career, their prospects at their company, and about their overbearing and micromanaging boss.
They desperately want to launch a start-up and go on to become a Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) or Andrew Mason (Groupon) in short order. Don’t get me wrong; not all those, who come to me seeking advice, are Millennials. Some of them are in their mid 40s, who have come to realize that their career is stalled, and the only way out for them is to become their own boss and to get rich in the process!
How naïve!
Most do not realize that being frustrated with your current job or your boss is not a necessary and sufficient reason to start a company. Nor is it a requirement! Most do not also realize that nearly 90% or more of the start-ups just do not go anywhere after their launch, and end of going out of business.
So, what do I tell them?
My advice to most clients is to first have a very compelling idea for a business to even start to noodle with it before taking it to the “launch state.” Keeping your day job is critical until you have reached some key milestones in your venture before you can take the risk of quitting your day job. During this state you are doing two jobs, not an easy thing to manage!
When they are sufficiently disheartened, I suggest to them that they could pursue a low-risk approach and still have the best of both worlds: entrepreneurial adventure and “job security.” When they are intrigued by this idea I tell them how they could do something different at their current company—through intrapreneurship—to put their career in high gear.
Here’s is what I tell them:
- Stop doing your job by merely taking orders. Identify one or two initiatives right where you are that could dramatically change how your company creates value. For example, if you are in customer support, identify what changes you could make to the entire customer support infrastructure to dramatically improve customer experience. This is not as hard as it may seem. You can ask those (customers) calling and get some ideas.
- Develop a plan to improve what you think will create the greatest value for the company and validate that idea with those within your immediate area of work. Socialize the idea before you present that plan to your boss and to her boss.
- Get your immediate chain of command involved in how the change could be implemented and get them to champion the initiative. Let them sponsor your idea and champion it.
- Once you get the initiative approved show leadership and achieve your objectives. Set up measurements to show how things have changed for the better by carefully setting up the right metrics that are agreed-to beforehand.
- Before you launch the change initiative be specific about how its success is going to translate into something that will benefit you: a promotion, a raise, a sponsorship for an advanced degree, etc.
Corporate intrapreneurship is one of the most overlooked and underutilized avenues for career growth and self-fulfillment available, especially in today’s fragile economy. During my current stint as a career coach I have worked with hundreds of clients, who went on to become successful intrapreneurs by taking charge of their career using this approach, and who felt rewarded and fulfilled by what they went to achieve without taking unwarranted risk. When I was working in the corporate world I did the same to advance my own career.
So, what is stopping you?
Good luck!