What am I supposed to do?

I received this response from a classmate this week, in regards to her limitations on doing anything intrapreneurial: 

"I for one do not work for a company that embraces any sort of group idea sharing or for that matter any type of social intrapreneur thought.  Our company is follows practices from the 1970's with regards to employee rewards, satisfaction, and communication.  What also amazes me about working for this company is that..... well besides the fact that I still have a a phone that is one step up from a rotary phone.... is that for the size of our company why does this company continue to live and work in the dark ages? 

The HR department well they do not communicate with you, in fact I only just spoke to the HR manager last week after working for a year in a department which is located about 15 steps from my office. Don't get me wrong, I like working there but it's very frustrating to employees when they are not heard nor vested in their company. 

So, what should one person do to start the ball rolling?"

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Getting the ball rolling can be hard under your circumstances. The key to intrapreneurial attitudes is having managerial support and encouragement to think outside the box. Sounds like this is your challenge.

In your case, ask big questions, but apply the answers on a small scale: What behavior changes am I seeking on the part of my targeted beneficiaries? Whose minds do you want to change, and how? Start with yours, then become contagious. Gain management support by going the extra mile.

In my opinion, intrapreneurial attitudes should be leveraged on many levels. Start with that HR business partner 15 steps away, and talk about small, but effective employee enrichment programs, and volunteer to organize or assist with one. I'm not sure how large your company is, but the holidays are coming up. Perfect time to implement small things that help employees have a great time. Happier employees = more productivity. One event can lead to others. This is what I consider the really small scale version of social intrapreneurship that starts with the company's own employees.

To go bigger, think about what your company could do with it's current capabilities that could benefit a larger part of the community. It takes a lot of work, but building strategies for helping communities by capitalizing on local businesses core capabilities is a way to be transformational in society. This is the core of social intrapreneurship. For example, I work for a leading consumer and office products company, which owns several of the most recognizable school brands. We have the means to partner with local organizations to supply school supplies to local teachers. We have employees that took on this initiative, and successfully gathered thousands of pieces of product for donation this year, simply from organizing a give-away in our building. This is a good start to paving a path for social intrapreneurship, because if taken to another level, it could lead to a steady stream of supplies being provided to local teachers over a long period of time, which transforms the initiative from one focused upon charity, to one focused on long-term provision. Teachers then help promote our products, which drives additional business for the company. It benefits the community and the bottom line.

To go even bigger with social intrapreneurship, you identify a need within your community, or within a community that your company operates, and innovate products or practices so that the community benefits from that innovation. An example of intrapreneurship could be sticky notes. 3M wasn't trying to make sticky notes, they were going for something totally different, but sometimes accidents turn in to extremely successful innovations. An example of social intrapreneurship is the same sort of thing, but it's intentional, and benefits society as well as the company.