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Dupont Company and Advocate Entrepreneurship Model
The common held belief is that most of the established and successful companies lack the sense of entrepreneurship. The reason behind this notion is that these establishments have grown overtime in a rather slow progression to become the success they are today. However, evaluating the history of these companies since their inception, the notion is refutable. Many of these companies have been managed and run by programs, which are entrepreneurial in nature. In the recent times, there have also been major players in the corporate world, such as Google, who have implemented initiatives concerning entrepreneurship to further advance themselves, motivate their top performers, maintain their position in the competitive cycle, as well as promote innovation.
E.I DuPont de Nemour and Company is one of the exemplary companies that have exhibited the entrepreneurship spirit in both its activities and management. It is an American company founded in 1802 and established as a gunpowder mill. Its founder was Eleuthere Irenee DuPont. From the beginning of the twentieth century, the company has been engrossed in other ventures such as manufacturing of polythene as well as CFC’S such as Freon, which is a refrigerant to more environmentally friendly refrigerants. According to an economic study conducted, the company is ranked third in the list of the largest chemical establishments in the world. This is attributed to its approach in entrepreneurship.
In this field, there are two key aspects, which are considered with regards to having direct control of management of a company. Firstly, the organizational ownership (Wolcott and Lippitz 20). It is determined by a selected group or throughout the organization. Secondly, there is resource authority. This is concerned with the source of funding. These two fundamental aspects generate four types of corporate entrepreneurship models (Wolcott and Lippitz 23). Out of these four, the advocate model is used by the Dupont Company.
The advocate model means that the company supports entrepreneurship, and the source of funding is the various business units (Wolcott and Lippitz 19). The organizational ownership, which is a determining factor in assigned and moderate funds, is provided for the subunit (MIT Sloan Staff 1). In this case, entrepreneurship activities started when the conglomerate’s CEO realized that, despite the fact that the company had improved in terms of returns, its growth has decreased dismally. This led to the development of the Market Driven Growth Initiative Program. Owing to the fact that entrepreneurship focuses on all aspects of industry, the company has provided the workers with aid in creating ideas and commercializing them, which is achieved at its best.
Some of the activities include the “business-builder”, a seminar aimed at assisting the workers to generate different business concepts as well as prioritizing them. The workers are then grouped into teams, which are assigned to develop intricate business strategy. Another 180 days are added to the contract to evaluate the flaws of the proposed strategy. It is then forwarded to the senior management for approval and later on, it is implemented by a business unit. In this case, scenario, the concept of strategic management is clearly outlined and seen as s driving force for entrepreneurship. The program developed at Dupont, is a management strategy, which is aimed at assisting workers within its ranks to develop ideas used in its various business units (MIT Sloan Staff 1). Internal corporate venturing is the right term for the programs as the ideas are from within the company (Kuratko 35). This promotes innovation, which is highly important to the corporation. It forms the basis of business and a source of success for the company in the competitive corporate world.
The ideas generated if successful in implementation, they
are likely to generate wealth, another aspect of strategic entrepreneurship. It
posses the attributes of strategic management as well as opportunity seeking
behaviors. A factor worth noting is that the ideas are managed within the
company thus consulting is not necessary. Secondly, the business units though
independent are still managed by the core unit. Thus, entrepreneurship creates
the much-needed leverage between the core company and the business units while
still promoting industry and innovation thus further fueling the overall growth
of the 200-year-old conglomerate.
Works cited
MIT Sloan Staff. “Four Models of Coroporate Entreprenueship”. MIT Sloan Management Review 1 Oct 2007. Print.
Kuratko, Donald F. Corporate Entrepreneurship. Hanover, Mass: Now, 2007. Print.
Wolcott, Robert C, and Michael J. Lippitz. Grow from Within: Mastering Corporate Entrepreneurship and Innovation. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. Print.