Is Your Thought Leadership Strategy Failing? This Might Be the Reason Why — Plus 3 Ways to Turn It Around What we all understood thought leadership to be is no longer.
By Brook Zimmatore Edited by Kara McIntyre
Key Takeaways
- A recent industry shift reveals that while 90% of executives deem thought leadership crucial for authority, a mere 20% find their efforts effective, signaling a critical need for strategic realignment.
- Insights from my personal interviews with 72 C-suite interviews uncovered the craving for purpose-driven thought leadership that serves tangible company needs, aligns with servant leadership and directly fosters organizational growth.
- A reframed definition of executive thought leadership emphasizes a deep connection with frontline needs, expert communication and the creation of impactful media content tailored to drive measurable business outcomes.
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The very publication you are reading this article in is full of thought leadership. Have a look around — you will find executives and contributing writers taking the reader on a journey of discovery (hopefully), bringing news, trends, metrics and actionable strategies for every possible topic.
But to what end?
I have been in the vertical of executive brand management for 12 years. During that time, I have seen thought leadership campaigns that accomplish nothing and single articles that shape an industry. At the beginning of this year, I noticed a change. I could only describe it as a global "numbing" to the endless droning of thought leadership content. Perhaps it was generative AI causing a saturation of content in the market, or maybe the B2B and B2C audience had just become exhausted. Neither of these turned out to be the reason.
The Harris Poll on the ROI of Thought Leadership suggests that marketing leaders see a gap between the importance of thought leadership and its effectiveness. The report states, "9 in 10 executives believe thought leadership is critical to building authority, but only 20% are effective." That's not a gap, that's an abyss.
Related: How to Enhance Your Brand Through Thought Leadership
In the past few months, I engaged in a curiosity project and interviewed 72 C-suite executives about their thought leadership initiatives. It was from these conversations that I realized there's a major disconnect between what executive thought leadership was and what it needs to be.
Here are the results of these 72 interviews:
- 83% of executives feel thought leadership doesn't seem to have a finite purpose or measurable impact.
- 92% of the executives want thought leadership to attract new customers, talent or investment, directly influencing growth.
After some reflection, I came up with a new definition of executive thought leadership:
"Thought leadership is defined as the publishing of media content, to an external or internal audience, from an executive who is an expert in a specific field to support front-line needs, thereby directly improving organizational results and growth."
This model has a lot more in common with servant leadership than anything PR-related. It identifies strain points in each department and supports the individuals executing this work. Put another way, executive thought leadership has become far more intentional.
If we break down the definition, we now have a clear strategy and program for thought leadership.
1. An executive who is an expert in a specific field. Who are these executives? Are they an expert in the field they are speaking to?
In many cases, this will be the CEO or founder. But not always. In a healthcare company, it could be the chief medical officer; if the goals are around talent and culture, it could be a chief human resources officer; for technology companies, perhaps the chief technology officer is the best person to speak to the topics.
2. Supporting front-line needs. Which divisions of the company need support? People, sales, finance, operations?
People on the ground have much more data than the executive. So, as a first step to gaining clarity on what needs to be addressed:
- Ask your teams about the biggest demands they are hearing from customers, stakeholders and partners. Focus on what is causing them the most stress.
- Collect data from everywhere, including external and internal stakeholders, employees and customers.
- Tabulate your findings to identify the most common denominators and a funnel of low- to high-volume problems.
- Create a topical roadmap that answers each of these problems.
Example: A founder whose primary task is building a strong internship program. Ask: "What do the interns want to know when you onboard them? Is there something that would help them understand the organization faster — an article, case studies, white papers, technical documents, onboarding collateral, a playbook or a visual guide?"
By creating more targeted thought leadership content, executives can then drive measurable outcomes and support organizational initiatives.
Related: How to Develop Stronger and More Engaging Thought Leadership
3. Creating the media content for external or internal audiences. What type of content will solve the problems identified and result in growth? Who is the audience?
Take a leaf out of former Amazon boss Jeff Bezos's book and use his concept of the six-pager to distill complex information into narrative form. Develop collateral that solves specific problems by:
Identifying who you want to absorb your thought leadership content:- To ensure you have the right audience ask: If they saw this and took action, would it solve the problems of your divisions or your growth goals?
- Breaking down their primary pain points (you can find these in step 2);
- Working out all the solutions, insights, benefits, industry metrics/statistics related to the problem;
- Turning this material into a six-page (minimum) executive essay;
- Repurposing it into dozens (if not hundreds) of social campaigns, white papers, media articles, blog articles, newsletters, downloadables and funnel pages.
We have to unthink what we believed was thought leadership. The industry has been saturated with PR or "sales-y" thought leadership and it does not change any metric in the company. The new model — intentional thought leadership — is completely chained to a desired end goal. The only way to achieve those end goals is to listen to the employees in your company. If that means speaking to 10 or 1,000 people, then that is how you are going to create your executive thought leadership campaign.
Related: How Do You Amplify Thought Leadership Content?
A new age of thought leadership
Imagine your account executives armed with the perfect media asset from the CEO, one published in a mainstream publication and one that directly speaks to the challenges of the prospective client.
Such thought leadership gives support from the top and creates a cohesive and consistent message throughout the entire organization. It is a vital resource tool that will steer every single department in the company.
