What’s your biggest/best insight?
That’s a core question for thought leadership.
But many of us struggle with it.
Let me share what I’ve seen over 20 years.
I work with a lot of people who practice thought leadership.
Some do this work as an individual.
Some lead TL teams within orgs.
At the start of each project,
I ask for discovery documents.
Me: “Send me examples of your best insights.”
Client: “Ok”
Me: “I don’t care what format it’s in. It could be a book, a podcast, a TEDx, a whitepaper, or a 2×2 framework. Send me examples! Be sure to include your best ideas.”
Here’s the catch–
about 80% of the time,
the thought leadership practitioner doesn’t
share their best thinking on the first request.
They’re not hiding their best.
They just don’t see it.
They treat all insights equally.
Then, in the second or third call there’s an aha-moment.
“Oh, wait, I didn’t send you . . . ”
“You might want to look at . . . ”
And you know what — that’s almost certainly where the best thinking is located.
At first, I thought that I wasn’t framing my discovery request right.
Maybe I wasn’t being clear in my request?
But over time, I realized that most people who create thought leadership simply don’t know their best ideas.
Their “big” idea is often just one more idea that’s tucked in the intellectual junk drawer.
If you can’t identify your best insights, that’s a major problem — whether you are:
💡an individual creator of thought leadership
💡a head of thought leadership curating insights
💡a senior leader focused on growing the org
So, do you know what your best insight is?
How do you know?
Are you certain?
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I write about:
#thoughtleadership, #OrgTL, and #Marketing