This is hardly a new idea and something many have been doing for years, be it speaking engagements, publishing a weblog, or by being that internal expert within a company, advocating new ways of doing things.
In the 90’s it seemed like any company that had some proprietary software or platform also had a small army of Evangelists, whose sole purpose was to advocate to others, mostly peers, to use their product.
I think the rise of use in the term Thought Leadership reflects interesting recent shifts in business strategy, the move to modern think tanks and the embracing of open public discussion.
The Modern Think Tank
A few years ago I was listening to, Science Friday, my favorite Friday activity, and they discussed Think Tanks of the 50’s and their decline in modern research.
That in today’s environment, thought leaders are being recruited to work within huge organizations. That much of their work and findings are kept private and safeguarded as Intellectual Property.
Since hearing that episode, weblogs have exploded creating many thought leaders in the process. From web design to genome research, many blogs capture the daily trials and tribulations of a given field. Though often targeting peers, they can provide excellent insight to the curious outsider.
Blogs can often leave out an important group: the corporate thought leaders who cannot discuss their daily findings.
Public Display of Information
Some of the most talented and greatest thinkers I have had the honor to work with do not publish a blog, and do not share information, because they work in a company that prevents them from discussing daily activities on a personal blog.
We’ve all heard stories of employees being fired for their blog. I’ve had a few close calls of my own, once where I got into some serious trouble with an employer by recounting my experiences with an outside agency, and another where I incurred a significant legal bill by fighting over usage of content.
Many employers’ blog policies are often unwritten: employees have to guess what is appropriate and what isn’t. You usually don’t find out you did anything wrong until it’s too late.
With the increase in thought leadership as a tactic to increase a company’s perception as an expert, we are starting to see companies embrace a more public attitude toward publishing what they know. Big companies like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft have embraced blogging, allowing employees to publish to a sanctioned space, as a method of creating or maintaining corporate thought leadership.
This is an important shift in business, being far less guarded in sharing of intellectual property or thinking in a field. Becoming a thought leader by embracing the exchange of information can help to propel your business.
Thought Leadership is still Leadership
Thought Leaders have a lot in common, having a public outlet for their thoughts, having something valuable to say, together with publishing on a regular basis is a sure fire way towards gaining an audience.
Though it can be difficult to determine who is a thought leader and who is just a pundit. In my mind you are on the verge of punditry if there is any ideological discussion or criticism of a problem without presenting solutions that are grounded in some experience.
It’s okay to have the occasional rant, but you have to balance it with the weight the sharing of your experience dealing with a similar situation.
Like I was saying, Thought Leadership, is still Leadership. You must be fair and balanced, you need to share experiences and foster the learning and development of others. It is okay to make definitive statements, but the risk you take is being able to admit when you are wrong and take responsibility for your actions.
But most importantly…
Trust has to be earned
You need to prove yourself to others. This can be in your past actions or in your writings. But you cannot say something is gospel without building the trust with your readers.
Getting Started as Thought Leader
You want to try to start being a thought leader? Here are some simple suggestions to paving the way.
Start a Blog
A weblog is a perfect venue for your thoughts and to begin to build an audience. There are many free or low cost services that make blogging ridiculously easy.
Start Small
Nothing happens overnight. Start with little goals that are easier to reach, instead of big ones that can be difficult to visualize. The road to thought leadership can be long with very few shortcuts. Start small and build up from there.
Create a Publishing Calendar
Write down and commit to a publishing calendar. Set a frequency that you will add content and stick to it. Start small, like once a month, and become more frequent over time.
Know Your Audience
Get to know who visits your site, what are they interested in. This will help to share valuable information to them and help build your audience.
Turn on Comments
Many companies are fearful of using comments as someone may publishing something inappropriate. This is a whole article by itself, but a couple things I can tell you from my experience in setting up corporate weblogs:
- The benefit of open communication always outweighs the risk of one bad apple.
- It almost never happens.
- Readers monitor themselves. If one person says something out of line, others defend or accuse. Comments are a conversation, not single statements.
- If you see a lot of “inappropriate” comments, it can start to tell you more about your business that you may wish to hear.
Write Guidelines
Whether you are a corporation or one person, write down an ethical playbook for your blog. Capture what is right and what is wrong. It may be obvious and commonsense, but write it down anyway. If you are a company, openly share them to allow others to contribute.
Stand By Your Principles
Once you have your guidelines, stand by and enforce your principles. Make sure that no one publishes to your weblog that doesn’t meet your ethical guidelines.
Hey, you missed a step in “getting started as a thought leader” ;)
Step 1. Think! Challenge assumptions and think about everything you do.
This may sound obvious, but it isn’t. I have genuinely been asked how I became recognised as an expert in various topics, and the real answer is not that I blogged them, but that I bothered to think about them in the first place…
Donna, I think you’ve got something there. I would say it goes without saying, but you’re right, it really begins with thinking and passion. Thanks for that.
I think we all got something here. We transformed into an industrial machine, like a bulldozer, we like to work hard, but we must realize we are human, we should think hard (or big). A big thinker is the way to go about it.
Nice article. There’s also a need for people to be writing original content in the blog world. There’s a tonne of tools I can use now to find what’s interesting content on the internet, and too many blogs fall into the “look at this” category.
By attempting to write something new and hopefully insightful regularly on your blog, you add something to the blogging community.
I’ve been trying to break out into a blog of my own… and discuss big ideas I’ve had and things I think about… I didn’t think people really cared.
I scribble countless thoughts and revelations that — in conversation people appreciate, but I guess I didn’t realize it might work online.
Thanks for this post.
The way of thinking determines almost everything. And original way of thinking is widely appreciated today, but being able to express yourself publicly from the pages of your own blog is one of the greatest achievements of our days. On the other hand, this possibility leads to an increased desire to be more and more ‘original’, ‘different’, but that still does not mean - ‘to be better’. I am afraid that there are many blogs that become popular just because of the ‘different’ way of presenting ideas and thoughts, while the originality of ideas is not always present there. So Thought Leaders must be searched only amongst those who have “something valuable to say”, as you outline above.
New ways of thinking… Formal education drive us to think based on previous knowledge. A simple change on this behaviour, trying to look at the subject in a different way (metaphors?), can bring new thoughts on ‘old subjects’.
Very interesting concept!
Trust is indeed critical to this argument. And it works both ways. While a “thought leader” should be responsible for his/her words, the courage to speaking out about new ideas needs to be fostered. If you are writing about an organization you work in, a culture of retribution can squash any initiative.
Additionally, if you are writing a personal blog fear of sounding stupid will stop you cold.
Also, don’t forget that good writing skills helps your message get across.
What about podcasting? I have a podcast that centers on deepthinking. I find it quite interesting yet have no official public blog.
Did someone say <a href=”http://buzzwordhell.com/thought-leader/” rel=”nofollow” >thought leader?</a>
“Thought Leadership” is a more directed form of the old concept of “Opinion Leader”, made more efficient by technical means. It used to be that every topic seemed to have an expert and you found out via the watercooler or lunchroom.
Nice post, well said. You guys have a nice way of summarizing things. And I wouldn’t condemn it to buzzword hell, just yet. There are a lot more deserving candidates…tipping point anyone (no offense to Malcolm Gladwell.)
Thanks Brian, very interesting article that I can relate to very easily.
I’m old and reflective enough to recognise that I’m a natural leader whether I like it or not (i.e. I never actively set out to be a leader) and I think with a skillset in web standards and accessibility this is coming through as this “thought leader” concept via the Internet as I educate / evangelise in ever-widening circles. Further out (up) than the team I’m in is a win to be honest. This year I’ve set myself a publishing calendar - but why did I choose weekly!? haha. Next series will be two-weekly or something. I might not get things right to satisfy ardent techies but I’m always willing to tweak stuff and shock horror change my opinion based on a misinterpreted or hitherto unknown factoid. I’m writing for novices and busy people rather than dissecting technical specs like a pathologist or something.
Now, if only people can learn their manners and lose their delusions of grandeur, I’d be even happier with how it’s (slowly) going.
Rambled a bit but thanks again.
Hi, My questions are: Since many companies make money exploiting their IP or company knowledge how can this knowledge or opinion-on-this-knowledge be common on the internet or wherever? Can you be a leader without this knowledge? and if “your troops” just want to make money? Am I wrong? John Dogood
Very interesting writeup. I am from India. I came across the term thought leadership today.
As per my information, we do not have concepts like career transition in India. I felt so strongly about it that gradually I ended up writing nineteen published articles on the subject which are there on my blog- http://mypyp.wordpress.com/
Does this make me a thought leader?
I really enjoyed the piece and the companion conversation. As a grad student, I’m required to publish blogs, but had no plan on how to execute one successfully. This story gives me much to think about.
The comment about originality in the blogging world completely is “spot-on” and should be considered critically by any blogger. Although individuality naturally creates an illusion of blog diversity, there is a fine line between compelling & informational and not.
Avenues like myspace have turned blogging into this “hey look at this… hey look at me…” mentality. Ugh.
I had very little idea as to what “Thought Leadership” is all about … but post reading your article i can confidently say i definitely know a lot more than what i used to know …. but still I can’t see the practicality behind the entire gamut …. I always thought such a space always existed in most of the organisation where free flow of ideas can happen … So what is so different about calling it as “Thought Leadership”???