On Types of Thought Leadership

By Deane Barker 2 min read
AI Summary

This post categorizes four types of thought leadership: innovative, research-based, commentary, and personal experience. The author highlights how each type can effectively engage audiences and build credibility within various industries.

Original Location
This content was originally posted to LinkedIn. Link to Original Content

I’m working on a theory (theories?) for The Ineffable Concept of Thought Leadership™ (that phrase coming to a T-shirt near you…)

There are different… levels of it.

In reverse order of usefulness:

Clearly, I’m pretty dismissive of that first category. I know a lot of these people (so do you). They have not done the work.

As for me, I’m hoping I straddle the second two categories. I’m more heavily weighted on the second, but so are most people, because these three levels really correlate to how hard the content is to generate –

To make some pithy, inspiration quote (Level 1) takes zero effort. Copy and paste. For longer “life lesson” posts, there are PR firms (and AI) that will write them for you. Anyone can do this – buy a premium LinkedIn membership, hire a PR company, and call yourself a “thought leader,” I guess.

(Consider: if you have to tell people you’re a “thought leader,” then… are you?)

To create something deeper and more theoretical (Level 2) requires expansive knowledge and experience of your industry, and the perspective to thread disparate bits of information and theory together. Fewer people can do this.

To write something experiential (Level 3), you have to actually DO THE WORK. And you have to do it enough that you observe something most other people don’t. This involves some amount of professional rigor. Even fewer people can do this.

In professional circles – and on LinkedIn especially – I feel like not enough people want to actually do the work. They just want to talk about it.

So, is that the key to thought leadership? …uniqueness? …scarcity? True thought leadership is scare. It’s rare.

And it’s rare because you have to have a body of work from which it naturally springs forth.

There’s no way to fake that body of work. You just have to do it.