He is credited with inventing the concept of intrapreneurship in a paper that he and his wife, Elizabeth Pinchot, wrote in 1978 titled "Intra-Corporate Entrepreneurship" while attending Tarrytown School for Entrepreneurs in New York.

[1][2] The Pinchots first book, Intrapreneuring: Why You Don't Have to Leave the Corporation to Become an Entrepreneur (1985) presented an expansion of the intrapreneurship concept and was noted in mainstream media as "stirring discussion within management".

[citation needed] In 2002, Gifford and his wife Elizabeth, along with Sherman Severin and Jill Bamburg, founded the Bainbridge Graduate Institute, now merged with Presidio Graduate School.

As an infant, he was nearly killed while being poisoned by military physician Murray Sanders.

[6] The younger Pinchot has been recognized for carrying on his grandfather's work in conservationism.