Look around your company. Are you surrounded by “entrepreneurs”? Is your team comprised of people who take ownership of any project or task that comes across their desk or inbox? Do they embrace challenges, possess the process, and take responsibility – for successes and failures alike?

Some may come away thinking that “corporate entrepreneur” and “employee” are contradictory. They believe that “entrepreneurs” take the ultimate risk – ditching the security of the day-job, as it were, and facing the personal, financial and psychological challenges of business ownership.

That’s one definition. Another would be “corporate entrepreneurship.” This realm is inhabited by people who – though they receive a paycheck signed by someone else – see the organization (or at least their small domain within it) as their turf. This is the most valued of employee.

Innovation and corporate entrepreneurship are inextricably intertwined and fuel well-reasoned risk taking. Especially in large organizations traditionally risk averse, innovation drives leaders and teams to become more corporate enterprising. This process encourages growth from within, which helps set the stage for leadership continuity.

As a business leader, you must build an environment that tolerates such entrepreneurial thinking. It’s the leader’s job to encourage such entrepreneurial thinking – to exude and build trust, to embrace the risk to fail, and to inspire people to take well-reasoned chances.

In the book, “Grow From Within: Mastering Corporate Entrepreneurship,” co-author Robert Wolcott discusses how companies can enable and support “internal entrepreneurs” to achieve innovation-led growth. Such entrepreneurial thinking drove IBM to realize some $15 billion in new annual revenues from 22 Emerging Business Opportunities, and Whirlpool to realize $4 billion in revenues from companywide innovation efforts – “despite global recession and the steep drop in housing markets,” notes one review.

The authors reveal four models of corporate entrepreneurship laid out on an axis of organizational ownership (on the horizontal) and Resource Authority (on the vertical). Each possesses unique and specific characteristics. The Opportunist (bottom left), takes no deliberate approach to entrepreneurship; the Advocate (bottom right) evangelizes for it; the Enabler (upper left) provides funding and executive attention, and the Producer (upper right) establishes full service groups with mandates for corporate entrepreneurship

Applying Robert’s Rules of Innovation , the Advocate, Enabler and Producer can thrive in this environment for each has corporate support. They have executive support, from Inspiration  to Net Reward, needed for innovation borne of corporate entrepreneurship to thrive.

Yet for corporate entrepreneurship to thrive, it needs more. It requires the structure and culture. Assuming the right people are in place, leadership must provide divisional and business unit autonomy. How can you lead your organization to a climate of corporate entrepreneurship?

-          Like Innovation, Define what “entrepreneurship” means. The phrase “Corporate Entrepreneurship” must mean the same thing organization-wide. Moreover, leadership must delineate objectives and point the way as part of its vision and mission.

-          Incubate and nurture. Corporate entrepreneurship doesn’t flourish without guidance. It starts small – and grows through encouragement. Begin with small projects heavily supported by leadership. Those success stories should be heavily communicated as such. They then will become the lead project to pull the rest of the group or other entrepreneurial-minded teams along.

-          Create a reward system. Risk and reward, when properly aligned, can foster accountability. Rewards – whether in the form of praise from immediate managers, attention from leadership, or the chance to lead future projects or task forces – are powerful motivators. They also can help solidify the creation of stronger corporate entrepreneurs.

So look around your organization. Are you surrounded by employees – or entrepreneurs? The difference may be not only the way they think, but they way they’re being nurtured.

By Robert Brands with Jeff Zbar

Robert Brands is the founder of InnovationCoach.com, and the author of “Robert’s Rules of Innovation”: A 10-Step Program for Corporate Survival, with Martin Kleinman, published March, 2010 by Wiley (www.robertsrulesofinnovation.com).

Every organization that grows by creating new products or services or aspires to out-class the competition needs a Chief Innovation Officer, or CIO.

In Robert’s Rules of Innovation, “Inspiration” is the first and most important of the 10 imperatives. Inspiration drives everything else – from ideation to new product development to risk-taking itself.

Yet the selection of the CIO, and the definition of his or her tasks in seeing that these challenges are skillfully mastered, can make the difference between innovative success and failure.

What does the CIO do? He or she…
1. Shows support from the top. Ideally, this position is held by the organization’s chief executive or president – someone who leads by example and “walks the talk.” Alternatively, and in a larger organization, he or she may be a “Crown Prince” – someone hand-picked by the executive leadership to oversee the task of inspiring greatness from within the team. It’s important that if the CIO is not the CEO or president, that he or she has the blessing of the senior executive. Otherwise, his or her ideas, inspirations or suggestions might be rebuffed.

2. Communicates Overarching Goals and Progress. The imperative should be to overcommunicate and under-promise. Such communication keeps the organization focused on the vision, successes and failures.

3. Builds a “Communication Corridor.” This practice of two-way traffic enables ideas to flow freely for equal consideration and sharing throughout a trusting enterprise. The open-door policy gives every participant a voice and motivation to say what needs to be said – even if they believe the project at hand is a losing proposition. Fear of retribution should never discourage people from speaking their minds.

4. Connects the Silos. Better yet, he or she demolishes them. Knock down the barriers that keep silos apart by creating cross-functional teams.

5. Commissions Cross-Group Stakeholders. These “champions across projects” should have the authority and budgets to test, learn and lead multiple groups through the process and assure ownership across groups is achieved. Bullies need not apply. These champions should encourage buy-in so innovation isn’t stymied or blocked.

This isn’t just for Fortune 500 corporations. Smaller organizations have more to gain from installing a CIO. This helps send the message that the position — and the commitment behind it — are vital to the organization’s long-term growth.

Whatever the size of the organization, inspiration is only valid if it’s derived from the vision, mission or strategy of the company — and driven by an executive empowered to see it through.

As a perfect and current example, the Fifth Annual Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Meeting attracted top CEOs and world leaders this week in New York; this year’s theme heavily focusing on Innovation as a top priority and driver towards worldwide economic recovery and growth. Setting the tone, President Barack Obama opened on Tuesday with a speech, mentioning “We need new businesses to unleash new innovations. We need new collaborations to advance prosperity.” Those words were spoken just a day following the White House’s release of a white paper that outlined a national innovation strategy.

Founded as a nonprofit, nonpartisan sector of the William J. Clinton Foundation, this year’s organization event held 960 guests from 84 countries. The key themes included harnessing innovation, strengthening infrastructure, building human capital, and financing an equitable future. Climate change, women’s rights, and health care are some of the topics guests were to assess in brainstorming targeted and profitable ways to improve each situation.

A panel on “Approaches to Innovation” was moderated by a BusinessWeek editor, and organized by John Kao, founder of the Institute of Large Scale Innovation at consultancy Deloitte offered an “innovation boot camp” to attendees. Kao stated that Innovation is “not just creativity. It is specifically about creativity that has value.”

When Inspiring Innovation, key elements in defining the desired culture within your organization and perpetuating Innovation within your organization include:

Understanding the goal and what it will take to reach it. Whether it’s a new product per year or a dollar amount in sales, setting goals and knowing what it will take to reach it helps your company plan out the resources and budgets needed. Identifying key players and leaders within your organization is crucial to building your innovation team, as their roles and attitudes will trickle down and affect their teams as well, and your leaders can make or break the innovation process.

As a leader, you must create motivation and proactively push for a successful Innovation program. Leadership by example creates both material and emotional support for your team to push towards the goal. Stay simple and focused on constant communication in regards to Innovation visions. Allow for open communication to be a two-way street and knock down barriers keeping silos apart by creating teams that are cross functional amongst departments that don’t usually interact. In doing so, creativity, cooperation and change will remain at an all-time high.