The Leadership Lectures: Kaihan Krippendorff

Driving Innovation from Within: Tools and Skills for the worker and company of the future

“Innovation” brings to our mind the maverick entrepreneur who quits their job, at unimaginable odds, to build a business on their own. But this entrepreneurial story is a myth. As a successful entrepreneur, author, consultant, and CEO, Kaihan Krippendorff argues that intrapreneurs – employees who incubate new businesses within corporations – have had a far greater impact on the world. Over 70% of society’s most transformative innovations over the past three decades, from e-mail and the Internet to DNA sequencing and MRI scans, were introduced by employees who took on the challenge of innovating from within. 

Drawing on five years of in-depth research of hundreds of successful internal entrepreneurs and thought leaders, Kaihan will share exclusive insights from his next book, Driving Innovation From Within: A Guide for Internal Entrepreneurs (Columbia University Press, 2019). Kaihan will unveil the most critical steps for unlocking employee-driven innovation. He will share specific tools, frameworks, and techniques used by successful innovators to navigate their ideas into the world and leaders to unlock the value of employees’ ideas. These skills will enable audience members to be better leaders, individual contributors, and be more desirable job candidates.

Kaihan Krippendorff is committed to helping organizations and individuals thrive in today’s era of fast-paced disruptive technological change. Kaihan is known for his ability to turn difficult concepts into easy-to-understand ideas that drive meaningful outcomes and actions. He is an internationally recognized thought-leader, battle-tested consultant, and sought-after keynote speaker on the topics of business strategy, growth, transformation and innovation.

Kaihan began his career as a strategy consultant with McKinsey & Company before founding the growth strategy and innovation consulting firm Outthinker. Growth strategies and innovations created through Outthinker have energized countless organizations, teams, and individuals all while generating over $2.5B in revenue for many of the world’s most recognizable Fortune 500 companies.

An accomplished author, Kaihan has written four books on business strategy, growth, and transformation, most recently Outthink the Competition (John Wiley & Sons). For his forthcoming book, The Employee Innovator: Driving Innovation From Within (Columbia University Press, 2019), Kaihan deeply researched and interviewed more than 150 internal innovators and leaders in nearly every conceivable industry.

Kaihan is a member of the prestigious Thinkers50 Class of 2019 Radar group – a “dream team of researchers, advisers, entrepreneurs, and organizational leaders” to follow and hear from in 2019.

Kaihan founded The Outthinker Network – an invitation-only group of high-level strategists and innovators for large $1B+ organizations. Quarterly roundtables are a unique opportunity for senior executives to take part in an intimate, candid, and forward-looking conversation with a network of peer professionals and the world’s most sought-after disruptive thinkers.

Regularly featured in key business media outlets, including BusinessWeek, Harvard Business Review, Forbes, Time, Fox Business, Fast Company, PBS, and Bloomberg Radio – Kaihan is an advisory board member for a blockchain-powered transportation platform, an international food processing/exporting company, and a B-corporation focused on sustainable products and lifestyle. 

Read The Center’s interview with Kaihan Krippendorff.