Q4 Bacon & Business Follow-Up: Harnessing Intrapreneurship & Entrepreneurship for Innovation & Growth

Successful businesses face a critical challenge: How do you protect today's profits while building tomorrow's innovations? Our November 12, 2025, panel discussion on intrapreneurship revealed how companies can harness their existing employees as internal innovators, creating new value without abandoning what already works. The session featured insights from Louis Gump of TechCXO, entrepreneur and technology innovator Meg Ramsey, and Bradley attorney Jeff Cunningham, who explored how to balance current operations with future growth.

The conversation introduces McKinsey's Three Horizons framework — a practical approach to managing innovation by simultaneously defending your core business, building adjacent opportunities, and experimenting with transformational ventures. Rather than choosing between stability and innovation, companies can, and should, work on all three horizons at once, allocating resources strategically across immediate revenue generators, near-future opportunities, and long-term bets.

The discussion goes beyond theory to address the real obstacles that kill innovation inside established companies. Learn how to identify your hidden intrapreneurs (the "frustrated fixers" already trying to solve problems), align incentives so innovation doesn't threaten existing business units, and avoid the founder bottleneck that limits growth to one person's capacity. The panelists shared specific tactics for creating an environment where ambitious employees can pursue bold ideas without leaving your company — turning intrapreneurship into both a growth engine and a powerful retention tool.