QUESTIONS FOR Simone Ahuja

Your latest book is all about disruption from within an organization. What does it mean to ‘disrupt it yourself’?

‘Disrupt it Yourself ’ is a play on the traditional DIY, or do it yourself. It underlines the importance of not waiting for others to solve your problems or disrupt your business. The fact is, a threat of disruption already exists within most established businesses — and added to that is the daily threat of disruption from new players and start-ups.

In my work, I emphasize the opportunity traditional organizations have to disrupt themselves, as well as their entire industries. I encourage them to harness the power of the people and the ingenuity that is already inside of their organization to create better, more relevant solutions for their end users. In the book, I recommend building a portfolio that includes a spectrum of innovation — from core to disruptive.

Describe the key differences between entrepreneurs and ‘intrapreneurs’.

Intrapreneurs are people who behave like entrepreneurs inside of a larger company. These internal disrupters might recognize a particular user need that isn’t being met, and they often understand how to create new pathways within the labyrinth of an established organization to get things done.

At their core, entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs share many similarities. Both manage ambiguity well and are comfortable with the kind of ‘messiness’ required to find creative solutions. They remain devoted to finding solutions even when things get challenging, and they are more risk tolerant than most of their peers.

In some cases entrepreneurs are brought in to an organization to infuse an entrepreneurial mindset through EIR (Entrepreneur-in-residence) programs. While they can bring in great ideas, they are often unable to create real change, because they don’t know how to navigate the specific system or enlist the right people. Interestingly, when the best intrapreneurs are not supported by their organizations, they often leave to start their own businesses. A high percentage of entrepreneurs got their ideas while they were working inside of another company.

How is the disrupt-it-yourself methodology different from entrepreneurship?

It used to be that intrapreneurship could only be executed by those who were high up in the organizational ranks—people who were senior enough to withstand any potential blowback. The DIY methodology both encourages, and is driven by, diverse people across the organization. A key characteristic of my version of DIY is to enlist a variety of people from different backgrounds and departments to help solve problems and come up with new solutions. Intrapreneurship is often about enhancing existing products and related services.

You are also the co-author of the international bestseller Jugaad Innovation. What exactly is it, and how does it relate to intrapreneurship?

Put simply, Jugaad Innovation is about creating high value at a low cost. It is a frugal, improvisational and inclusive approach to innovation that has been most prevalent in emerging markets, but is being increasingly applied in developed economies.

This approach to innovation is fundamental to disrupting it yourself because it’s all about having an asset-based mindset and asking, How can our existing resources, knowledge and ecosystems be leveraged? Jugaad and DIY are closely connected ideas because both are about placing a lot of small bets as a smart way to ‘learn your way forward’ and drive innovation while mitigating risk.

That raises the question of whether to fund or be frugal when it comes to innovation. Has there been a shift towards frugality?

Ever since the economic downturn of 2008/2009, frugality has been of particular interest to large organizations.

Start-ups and entrepreneurs have always been good at understanding the principles of frugality; keeping things frugal allows them to figure out what works and what doesn’t, and to move quickly. In large firms, having fewer resources often equals more autonomy and spurs more creativity by helping intrapreneurs stay laser-focused on the core problem to be solved.

One of your DIY principles is for organizations to become ‘permissionless’. What does that look like?

In the foreword of Disrupt It Yourself, Jim Loree, President and CEO of Stanley Black & Decker, wrote, “In order to truly disrupt within an organization, some of the rules have to be frankly, overruled.” I love the idea of creating a permissionless organization, where there is trust, people feel autonomous and supported — and as a result take the initiative to try things out. In order to flourish and be sustainable in a truly dynamic environment, that’s often what needs to happen. Intrapreneurs typically embrace this mindset; they aren’t afraid to create their own path within an organization. But to move from an ad hoc approach to innovation to a more disciplined and sustainable one, leadership needs to play its part.

Forward-looking managers can help to foster a disruptit-yourself mindset by creating space for experimentation and providing ‘air cover’ for risk taking. And an organization can foster a permissionless environment by creating new systems as well as reinforcing mechanisms such as newly defined metrics and incentives that support innovation.

Do you think allowing customers to lead the innovation process is risky? Or is it essential?

In some organizations there are groups that find it risky to allow customers to lead, because they feel as though they’re losing control. They get concerned with negative repercussions to the brand, or even that their compensation may be affected. Others worry that their customers don’t want to be disturbed. This is an old-school mentality. We have found that many customers are very eager to give feedback and share their thoughts.

Today, it’s essential to allow customers to lead parts of your innovation process, and the risk lies in not doing so. The great thing about getting close to your customers is that you can test out ideas at various stages, and even allow them to co-design products. We have found this to be

I love the idea of creating permissionless organizations where people feel both autonomous and supported.

a more effective approach to innovation than using assumptions made within the four walls of the organization.

What does it mean for organizations to ‘institutionalize’ intelligence?

One of the principles I discuss in the book is ‘ROI’. Traditionally, that means return on investment, but in this case, ROI is return on intelligence. As companies warm up to the idea of being more connected to their end users and customers, what often gets missed are the insights that are garnered along the way, even so-called ‘failures’. Nowadays, smart companies are reframing failures as learning. If a hypothesis is proven, that’s learning. If a hypothesis is disproven, that’s learning, too. When such lessons are shared, people can advance more quickly or make tweaks that may be beneficial.

When this happens, organizations can move from traditional metrics to new KPIS and move from rewarding business-as-usual to rewarding new insights. To institutionalize intelligence is to help people understand that intrapreneurship isn’t a novelty; it has become a core competency.

You recommend that companies embrace ‘hybridity’. Please explain what that means.

Hybridity means simultaneously growing your core business while also building the future of your business. Doing this isn’t easy, but it is imperative to creating sustainable growth. As companies innovate, they often enhance an original product or transition into a different-but-related idea. Or they may leverage the company name and existing business but use a new business model. But truly transformative innovation disrupts the old models altogether, and it often involves exponential technology such as AI, Blockchain and other platforms. Hybridity understands that the risk isn’t in trying something new, but rather in standing still.

Encouraging a spectrum of innovation (including disruption) within your own walls demands some discipline. But to be clear, adding discipline to disruption means providing support — not control. It’s not to say that there shouldn’t be any metrics at all, but big breakthroughs that transform an organization tend to not have too many guardrails — which is why these initiatives must be separated from the core organization. Both Jugaad Innovation and Disrupt it Yourself are systems that pave a pathway so that if people have an idea that is relevant to your end users, they can easily ‘hack their way forward’ without too much noise or resistance.

There still seems to be a mythology around both intrapreneurship and entrepreneurship. Which myths would you like to debunk?

There are so many! The first is that intrapreneurship, and innovation itself, demands so much creativity that there cannot be any discipline around it. The truth is that innovation is far too important to be done randomly, especially in an established organization.

Another myth is the lone-wolf approach to innovation, whereby intrapreneurs and entrepreneurs alike do their best work on solo projects. The fact is, those who know how to engage others in their projects and leverage their ecosystems are the most effective innovators. Furthermore, it is not just creative types that can be innovative. Different perspectives and varying talents can provide astute observations and help to propel a team forward to success.

It used to be that intrapreneurs enjoyed what I call ‘benign neglect’ in organizations. But management needs to be truly supportive and active in its innovation approach, and that includes encouraging intrapreneurship in part by creating space for it. Additionally, when we talk about building a culture of Disrupt It Yourself, we still need to look at metrics. Those metrics, however, need to be redefined. Innovation labs are not always the best places to house intrapreneurs. They’re absolutely useful, but intrapreneurs should be everywhere — seeded across the organization — because ideas can and should come from anywhere. Driving innovation from within is the single most important factor for a company’s success right now.

If a hypothesis is proven, that’s learning. If a hypothesis is disproven, that’s learning, too.

Simone Ahuja is the author of Disrupt-it-yourself: Eight Ways to Hack a Better Business — Before the Competition Does (Harpercollins Leadership, 2019) and co-author of the best-seller Jugaad Innovation: Think Frugal, Be Flexible, Generate Breakthrough Growth (Jossey-bass, 2012). She is the founder of Blood Orange, an innovation consulting group whose clients include 3M, Medtronic, P&G, Pepsico, Best Buy, PBS and Federal Reserve Banks.