183. Is Thought Leadership Fluffy B.S.?

I’ve had a number of people tell me that the term “thought leadership” or “thought leader” is fluffy bullshit. Not that they were necessarily directing their comment towards me or my work, but rather, these people have just seen too many examples of influencers and creators on platforms like LinkedIn and Instagram talk about thought leadership or call themselves thought leaders.

But the people I was speaking to felt that these folks didn’t have the substance or qualifications to back up what they were saying. 

Some other examples of comments that have come up in my conversations include:

  • People call themselves a thought leader in a certain topic to sound smart. But thought leadership isn’t something you can just claim, it’s something people award to you.
  • I would never want to be associated with the term “thought leader” because it gives off the connotation that you just want recognition, and that you’re not actually trying to help people learn about the topic or share knowledge.
  • Too many people on LinkedIn with the “Top Voice” badges are supposed to be thought leaders but they’re just posting templated stuff and trying to dramatize their stories to get more engagement. It makes me question the value and legitimacy of titles like being a LinkedIn top voice and being called a thought leader.

As you can see, there are definitely a lot of people who are skeptical of this concept of thought leadership.

In This Episode:

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A non-conventional example of thought leadership and an alternative perspective on the concept of thought leadership

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Why “thought leadership” is seen as a fluffy buzzword

I can completely understand where the skepticism and unfavorable comments surrounding thought leadership come from.When I do a quick scroll on my own LinkedIn feed, I can easily find examples of posts that support why some people aren’t a fan of people calling themselves thought leaders or why people question the value of having something like a LinkedIn top voice badge.

So I totally get where people are coming from when they say that “thought leadership is just a buzzword”.

Honestly, every time I hear such comments about the notion of thought leadership, I do feel a sting of embarrassment. I can’t help but wonder if people think that I am someone who’s under qualified to share my own ideas and conceptualizations of thought leadership.

That said, despite my own mind drama and internal spinouts every time I have a conversation with someone who doesn’t view “thought leadership” in a favorable light, at the same time, I also become super curious about how these folks are defining thought leadership.

Because what I can sense is my definition of “thought leadership” is quite different from the people who see thought leadership in a not-as-positive light.

For me, thought leadership is using the thoughts already inside your head, and using it to do something good in this world. It is leading with your thoughts to create change and impact for others. It is being willing to go first and share what you believe in, what you know, sharing your lessons and insights, etc. Not because you want to gain popularity or garner respect, but because it matters to you to share it. 

As you can see, my definition of thought leadership isn’t predicated on the quantity or prestige of your credentials. It’s not about where you went to school or what fancy companies you’ve worked at or how many awards you’ve received. 

It’s not about the scale of your reach or “impact”. It doesn’t mean you have to be recognized at an international or national level, or that you have a best selling book or top ranking podcast or 100,000 subscribers on your YouTube channel. 

It’s also not about trying to curate a certain image of reputation. You’re not building thought leadership for the purpose of getting people to see you in a more positive light.

Instead, the way I see it, is that thought leadership is about whether you build a compelling body of work with the brilliant thoughts, ideas, stories, knowledge, opinions, perspectives, and so on that are inside your head, and actually turning everything inside your head into some sort of output that can benefit others.

A non-conventional example of thought leadership: Gregor Mendel’s body of work and thought leadership allowed modern day science to make quantum leaps, only after he passed.

I want to share with you a story about Gregor Mendel. And to those of you who have taken some sort of biology class back in school, you may recall learning about Mendelian genetics. Yes, that is the Mendel I want to talk about. The person who worked on pea plants and discovered the fundamental laws of inheritance.

So, I was reading a book called Innovators, which is written by Donald R Kirsch. And in chapter 2, the author wrote about Gregor Mendel.

I want to read out to you the first paragraph of the chapter:

“We all know someone who was enormously talented but whose family lacked the resources to provide the training needed for that person to utilize their gift. Likewise, we all know someone who is highly capable but whose temperaments prevent them from making it through an oral exam and convincing the examiners of his or her competence. And we all know someone who has something of value to offer but lacks the salesperson skill to market it to others. Gregor Mendel was all of these people. Yet amazingly, despite these hurdles, he is the only person in the modern era to have established a completely new scientific discipline.”

SO. FRICKING. BAD ASS.

Here are the relevant pieces of Mendel’s story that’s most relevant to the conversation. 

One:

Although Mendel knew his stuff, he was a very nervous and terrible test taker. As a result, he was not qualified to pursue a scientific career, and instead he worked at a monastery. But Mendel still wanted to do science. 

Two:

At the monastery, Mendel pitched the idea and asked if he could use science to increase crop yields, so that the other monks can then redirect their time to things that mattered to them, like biblical study, meditation, and prayer, rather than spending time growing food. Mendel was then granted a plot of land to conduct experiments.

Three:

Mendel was originally trained in physics, not biology. He approached his experiments with the thinking of a physicist. At the time, back in the 19th century, biologists tended to do more qualitative work whereas physicists were quantitative.

But the key thing to note here is that Mendel didn’t have any special training in biology or math. He also didn’t really know much about plants or agriculture, let alone concepts that we know of today, such as cell division, chromosomes, and so on.

For Mendel to have conducted experiments based on truly brilliant ideas and continue exploring those ideas time and time again, speaks volumes to his character and the determination that drove his work.

Four:

Despite his findings, which, today, we now recognize as fundamental to the field of genetics. Even though TODAY, we know that Mendel’s work was correct and highly revolutionary. At the time, no one cared. Literally. No one cared.

No reputable scientist at the time paid attention, and many looked down on his work. For example, people questioned why Mendel studied the pea plant, rather than the hawkweed, which is where most scientists at the time were focusing on.

Sadly, Mendel’s story didn’t exactly have the happiest of endings. After feeling extremely discouraged, he eventually quit trying to do science all together and worked in a church until he passed. This meant that during his lifetime, he probably saw himself as a scientific failure.

It wasn’t until 16 years after Mendel’s passing when suddenly, several up and coming scientists discovered Mendel’s work and recognized how important Mendel’s work was. It was at that point when Mendel’s work started coming to light and started to play a major role in modern molecular biology.

In hindsight, we can see that the reason why Mendel was rejected by his scientific colleagues was because, well, he didn’t have the scientific credentials.

As you can see, thought leadership can come in different forms.

In some cases, such as the case of Mendel, there are those who emerge from outside the typical leadership trajectory. They might not have formal credentials, authority, traditional backgrounds, education, or even the expected trait, yet they still exhibit thought leadership through their actions and body of work.

Even in the event where people don’t get it or support what you do, thought leaders still embody an intrinsic desire to make a positive impact in this world through sharing their thoughts and ideas and building a body of work that adds value to others.  

Sadly, Mendel did end up putting aside his scientific goals and pursuits due to countless rejections.

For me, my personal bias is that I would sincerely hope that anyone who is building their thought leadership will continue to stand behind their work, even if people around you are extremely discouraging or even condescending.

However, I still see Mendel as a thought leader because I think we can confidently say that he has built a compelling body of work with the brilliant thoughts inside his head.

To me, I think it is abundantly clear that Mendel was turning the thoughts inside his head into some sort of brilliant output that can benefit others. Even though the impact of his work and ideas was only recognized after he had passed, it was thanks to Mendel’s body of work and thought leadership that has allowed modern day science to make quantum leaps.

That’s why personally, I view thought leadership as something you embody through your actions and decisions, rather than waiting to “earn it” or “prove” to others that you have thought leadership.

Because during Mendel’s lifetime, he sure as hell was NOT recognized for his thought leadership or scientific contribution. Yet, he embodied the identity, characteristic, decision making and action taking of someone who is committed to building his thought leadership and body of work. That, to me, is something we can all learn from Gregor Mendel.

An alternative perspective on the concept of thought leadership

On a similar note, if we want more people to take pride in the body of work that they’re building, we’ve got to stop labeling certain individuals as more worthy of building thought leadership or being recognized for their thought leadership.

There’s room for all of us.

I’m not saying we shouldn’t recognize the folks who clearly deserve the recognition and I’m not saying that everyone and anyone can be recognized for their thought leadership.

Rather, I want to invite us to expand our definition of what thought leadership looks like and to have a broader perspective when it comes to what criteria we use to gauge whether someone has thought leadership or when we’re evaluating the impact of someone’s work. 

Otherwise, if we’re filtering folks based on their “pedigree” right from the get go, then what that inevitably does is we’ll discourage the folks who, right now at this point in time, don’t have that “pedigree” or the results to prove that they are competent.

But if given the right resources, support, and tools, they are more than capable of creating a highly impactful body of work centered around their thought leadership, which can therefore benefit lots of people all around the world.

Now, does this mean we shouldn’t strive to sharpen our skills, expand our breadth and depth of knowledge, or put ourselves in situations that require us to grow and do better and be better. NO!

Does this mean we should completely negate all forms of further education or training? NO!

Where it makes sense, please do put yourself in learning and development environments that will help you further develop your thought leadership or acquire other skills that will help you get your ideas and body of work out to more people who would benefit greatly from it. 

Personally, I see thought leadership as a journey. Because, frankly, in my opinion, you can’t become a thought leader overnight after enthusiastically saying something one time. 

Likewise, you don’t immediately earn this title just because you got XYZ achievement. You don’t become a thought leader just because you make X amount of money, or was featured in a really prestigious publication, or even after getting a doctorate.

But instead, my belief is that you have to first decide to build thought leadership, then actually build a body of work that is centered around that thought leadership so that people can consume that body of work from it and benefit greatly as a result. 

And where it makes sense, thought leaders put themselves in learning environments or growth situations that will ultimately stretch them, whether it be stretching in terms of skill set, knowledge, lived experience, or perspective.

Thought leaders are willing to put themselves in uncomfortable situations where they are required to level the hell up because they know that doing so will help them further develop their thought leadership and continue to build an even stronger, more compelling body of work that will impact people even more deeply.

This work matters. It matters to both you, the person building thought leadership, and it matters to your people, the recipient of your thought leadership.

Looping back to the question we opened the episode with, is thought leadership just fluffy BS? Well, I think you all know where I stand on this.

Now, I’d love to hear what your thoughts are. If you’re keen, please feel free to send me a message on either Instagram, LinkedIn, or via email. The links will be in the show notes below and I look forward to having a conversation with you around this topic.

Sounds good? Awesome. Let’s get to work.

Listen to the Episode

Additional Resources

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Other Episodes You’ll Enjoy

Episode 34. Thought Leadership as Coaches & Entrepreneurs

Episode 66. Client Spotlight: Thought Leadership & Being a Leader for Introverts with Jennifer Ho

Episode 157. Thought Leadership is NOT Just for the Top 1%

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