1. Read over this true story and decide if such an approach can be feasible in every industry. Provide substantiation for your answer by seeking out articles on line that discuss other firms attempts at team projects.
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3. Robert F. Hettinger, a venture manager with Signode Industries, Inc., in Glenview, Illinois, smiles as he recounts the strategy initiated by Jack Campbell, director of corporate development. "He strongly believed," Hettinger says, "that you have to kiss a lot of frogs in order to find a prince. Most ideas in raw form aren't winners—you really have to work them out before success sets in."
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5. Signode, a $750 million-a-year manufacturer of plastic and steel strapping for packaging and materials handling, wanted to chart new directions to become a $1 billion-plus in the next ten years. In pursuit of this goal, Signode set out to devise an aggressive strategy for growth: developing "new legs" for the company to stand on. It formed a corporate development group to pursue markets outside the company's core businesses but within the framework of its corporate strengths.
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7. Before launching the first of its innovation teams, Signode's top management identified the firm's global business strengths and broad areas with potential for new product lines: warehousing/shipping; packaging; plastics for nonpackaging, fastening, and joining systems; and product identification and control systems. Each new business opportunity suggested by an innovation team was to have the potential to generate $50 million in business within five years. In addition, each opportunity had to build on one of Signode's strengths: industrial customer base and marketing expertise, systems sales and service capabilities, containment and reinforcement technology, steel and plastic process technology, machine and design capabilities, and productivity and distribution know-how.
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9. The criteria were based on business-to-business selling only; Signode did not want to market directly to retailers or consumers. The basic technology to be employed in the new business had to already exist and had to have a strong likelihood of attaining a major market share within a niche. Finally, the initial investment in the new opportunity had to be $30 million or less.
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11. Based on these criteria, Signode began to build its "V-Team" (innovation team) approach to intrapreneurship. It took three months to select the first team members. The six initial teams had three common traits: high risk-taking ability, creativity, and the ability to deal with ambiguity. All were multidisciplinary volunteers who would work full-time on developing new consumer-product packaging businesses. The team members came from such backgrounds as design engineering, marketing, sales, and product development. They set up shop in rented office space five miles from the firm's headquarters. "We put them off-campus in order to make an entrepreneurial environment," Hettinger recalls.
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13. The first innovation team recommendation, complete with a business plan, was to produce plastic trays for frozen entrees that could be used in either regular or microwave ovens. The business potential for this product was estimated to be in excess of $50 million a year within five years.
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15. Signode launched a total of six teams in two years. All team volunteers passed a rigorous selection process. Typically, the employees were borrowed from operating divisions; after their team's work was finished, they either returned to their old positions or took positions with the newly formed business unit and further championed the new ideas.
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17. According to Hettinger, the I-Team experience rekindled enthusiasm and affected morale overall. In every case, an I-Team member became a better contributor to Signode. Most important, their V-Team approach became a strategy for members to invent the future rather than waiting for things to happen.