Says Who?
September 16, 2021
Brands don’t have ideas; people do. Find your coworkers with the best ideas. Those are your thought leaders. Then teach them to share their ideas and their work.
Browse our ideas on thought leadership and book development — how to reflect on your work, shape and simplify your ideas, and share what you know authentically — and reflections from our work as book ghostwriters.
Brands don’t have ideas; people do. Find your coworkers with the best ideas. Those are your thought leaders. Then teach them to share their ideas and their work.
Thought leaders are inspiring humans who push us to think in new ways. So how do we recapture that human magic without veering into corporate jargon?
It’s easy to add more content to the pile. Instead, step back and figure out your unique angle. What are you adding to the conversation? What do you have to say?
Do you understand your unique perspective — your “onlyness”? I’ve been inspired to ask people NEW questions to help them develop their next big idea.
I research and prep before the call, but once we’re talking, I try my best to BE QUIET, listen, and work toward those magic words, “What I hear you saying is…”
Who powers your ideas? Who are the people you go to when you need to refine your ideas and inspire new thinking? Maybe you need an “idea club” or a thought leadership power circle. Here’s how I’m building mine.
If your thought leadership is about creating big change, you probably need a new vocabulary to talk about it. Are you using old words and ways of thinking? You have the power and influence to talk differently about your work, starting today.
Do thought leaders have a moral responsibility? I’ve been thinking about the complete 180 that happened at Basecamp. The public outcry isn’t an example of “cancel culture” — it’s holding leaders accountable to the ideas they built their business on.
The pandemic has taught me how to prioritize and focus. As you look ahead, how could you choose ONE important priority to focus on — and even upgrade?
To make your content stand out, you have to answer: “So what?” You can do that in two ways: think bigger…or think smaller.
Turn your big ideas into a book proposal or manuscript.
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