“Do you think corporations have it in their DNA to spawn home grown entrepreneurs?” I asked a friend during one of our regular cafe chats. She looked at me as if I had lost my senses or, at the least, my humor.
“It’s an oxymoron—definitely not in the corporation’s best interest,” she said between bites of a gooey pastry.
“Corporations are afraid of empowering employees – what if they leave to start they own companies? Heaven forbid one of these nimble survivors would one day compete with the parent company!”
The Entrepreneurial Playing Field
Even the best ingredients don’t make a tasty stew. But the combination of the right recipe for the right audience, prepared and presented by a skilled professional, can make the difference between food that feeds the gut and food that feeds the soul.
Corporate survival in a global marketplace may depend less on a full belly and more on creating cultures that hunger for innovation. If you were to ask half a dozen people the difference between a start-up company and an established one, you would likely hear some (or all) of the following: All of this sounds rather doable in any size company, so why do corporations struggle when rolling out entrepreneurship on a grand scale?
It’s the Trust Factor
What is Empowerment?
The word empower is actually a mid-17th century legal term meaning “to invest with authority, authorize”, only later becoming associated with a meaning of enabling or permitting an action.
Think about a time when you felt empowered. How did it make you feel? How did you act? Can you remember how it happened? Did someone present an opportunity that you seized? Or did you step outside your comfort zone to pursue an opportunity that everyone around you seemed to be missing?
Empowerment is about self-confidence and a capacity for handling what life and business throws our way. It comes from experience – whether the outcome is successful or not – and experience comes from taking action.
“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
Entrepreneurial spirit, or a disciplined pursuit of passion, is what makes our heart’s hum and keeps us intellectually challenged. When projects and people come together to overcome challenges and roadblocks in meeting – and exceeding – expectations, it will forever replace the desire to settle for second best.
“A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimension.” –
Oliver Wendell Holmes
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