January 2013 Thought Leader of the month: Paul Levy

Throughout 2013 I will be posting my thought leader of the month. It will be a personal view, of course, and I aim to recognise those I follow and whose thoughts I appreciate.

My January 2013 Thought Leader of the Month is Paul Levy.

·       Paul hosts the blog “Not running a hospital;” and he is also active on Twitter.  He’s a former CEO of a large Boston hospital and he has things to say – and he says so eloquently and with authenticity. I follow his thought leadership, even though it is USA centric and I am UK based, because he’s not afraid of speaking up when necessary, of praising when deserved and criticising constructively when required. He shares a variety of thoughts, from science, statistics, service redesign, stories and personal stuff too. This means it's easier to understand his perspective. He’s rounded and it’s easier to trust him because you get to understand his perspective. He messed up once at work, at he made an apology public on his blog - that's the authenticity that attracts me as a follower.

There are five articles in my thought leadership series:

1. What or who is a thought leader
2. Being a thought leader
3. Organisations as thought leaders; some healthcare examples
4. Medical Thought Leadership
5. Thought Leadership 2.0

You can vote / suggest February's Thought Leader by tweeting #hcthtldr

Thought Leadership 2.0

Graphic from Indiangroup.com

I came across the 2.0 version of thought leadership from the article by Maria Tabaka in Inc.  She has posited that social media has opened the way for a new form of thought leadership where

“[…] the Internet allows ordinary people with extraordinary ideas to lead and make a difference. Do you have what it takes?”

I've been saying for some years that the Roger's Diffusion of Innovations version of an opinion leader is well out of date (the book was first published in 1984). Many peer reviewed papers continue to reference this outmoded version of opinion leadership, without considering how social media and other technology based platforms has changed the opinion and thought leadership landscape.

Maria's advice on being a 2.0 thought leader is straightforward; you have to work at it.

“Begin by becoming a true expert in your arena. Do your research, and then do more research. Learn to speak about your ideas with passion; become a story-teller. Your passionate disposition will recruit followers and other leaders who respect and appreciate your insight. These folks will spread the word!

Step onto the stage, speak to live audiences, upload videos that teach and inspire, write, write, and write some more. Guest blog, invite others to blog as your guest. Author that book that has been burning to get out. Promote yourself to podcasters and broadcasters who speak to the same or a similar audience.

I like the way Maria focuses on the need to keep doing research. This is a theme from many of the publications about being a thought leader. To be out there, you need to be out there with something, some new content. You need something to be passionate about. Thought leadership is about going to depth, about sticking with a concept or idea and bringing it to life.  It’s not about spouting forth on the latest craze you’ve read about.

Thought Leadership 2.0 is about using social media to best effect.  It’s more than hanging on Twitter. Here’s a checklist of some activities a TL 2.) may be involved in. How many can you tick off.

• Active on Twitter; engage in conversation, retweet others (without making them your own), share useful information and links
• Participate in LinkedIn groups; specifically those groups within your thought leadership domain
• Host a Facebook Page, or two
• Maintain a personal blog and update it on a regular basis
• Guest blog for other influential sites / people / organisations
• Host your own podcast / video series
• Guest on others’ podcasts or video
• Use other social media sites such as Foursquare, Google+ etc

Yes, it’s hard work, but TL 2.0 is about extending your reach and cementing your passion in the reality of virtual relationships.

Previous articles in this series include:

1. What or who is a thought leader
2. Being a thought leader
3. Organisations as thought leaders; some healthcare examples
4. Medical Thought Leadership

Medical Thought leadership

I’m unconvinced whether there is “A Medical Thought Leader” role. Rather, I think there are a number of thought leadership roles for clinical professionals.

·    Clinical area thought leader; this is a professional who is thinking ahead, sharing their views, perhaps innovating in their clinical speciality.  They will be accessing and reviewing both the peer-reviewed and the greyer literature. They balance their thinking with a decent amount of talking about their hopes, dreams, fears and ideas for their speciality.

·    Techie clinical professional thought leader; this is a growing role where professionals are inhabiting the space which used to be reserved for IT geeks. They are writing apps, participating in Hackathon days, and developing idea and strategies for revolutionising healthcare.  They are mostly very active on many social media platforms.

·     Healthcare services clinical profession thought leader; that’s a bit of a mouthful but it means what it says. These are professionals whose interest lies in reconceiving the delivery of healthcare services. Some of these sit on the committees and Boards of their local services so they can use their influence. Others stay on the outside, shouting at or encouraging others.

Previous articles in this series include:

1. What or who is a thought leader
2. Being a thought leader
3. Organisations as thought leaders; some healthcare examples

Being a thought leader

This is the second article in the series. The first article was "What or who is a thought leader".

Gandi had a saying that you need to "Be the change you want to be". So if you want to be a thought leader, you need to be one. Obvious, yes? No, it isn't. I know some people who call themselves a fisherman but fish only once a decade, or they say they are a writer of novels, but they've yet to do more than the first chapter. To be a thought leader takes effort and invest in being one.

Leadersdirect  point out the need to invest in your own knowledge if you want to have followers and be considered as a thought leader:

"To be a thought leader, you need to immerse yourself in your professional domain and search for new things to say that add value to your organization's objectives."

Fastcompany  has an excellent article on the golden rules for being a thought leader from an organisational perspective:

1.       Don’t sell anything except ideas

2.       Always give it away

3.       Have a unique perspective

4.       Focus on one thing at a time

5.       Address a specific audience

6.       Admit what you don’t know

7.       Make your audience feel smarter

8.       Hire thought leaders

The same article also covers the need to thought leaders to be thoughtful, and patient, leaders.

Thought leaders are not people who lie on the sofa dreaming up new ideas (well, not all of the time, anyway).

TheCEOOnline  has a great article on the 9 essential skills for thought leadership, and the graphic below is from them. I recommend you read the whole article and use it to assess your own position as a thought leader.

Who or what is a thought leader?

This is the first in a series of posts about thought leadership.  I started by thinking about the "what" of thought leadership. It's a concept - what does it mean?

Wikipedia suggests that

"The term was coined in 1994 by Joel Kurtzman, editor-in-chief of the Booz Allen Hamilton magazine, Strategy & Business. "Thought leader" was used to designate interview subjects for that magazine who had business ideas that merited attention."

Forbes has an excellent blogpost on the topic and helpfully distinguish between what a thought leader is, and isn't. They have parts to the definition of a thought leader:

“Definition—Part One

A thought leader is an individual or firm that prospects, clients, referral sources, intermediaries and even competitors recognize as one of the foremost authorities in selected areas of specialization, resulting in its being the go-to individual or organization for said expertise.”

To me, this suggests a thought leader is someone who is recognised as such by their followers. Obvious when you think about it.

“Definition—Part Two

A thought leader is an individual or firm that significantly profits from being recognized as such.”

Ouch, this wasn’t quite so obvious, but it makes sense. Behind every thought leader is an intention, a purpose and a bias.

Leadertoday.org suggests that 

"Thought leaders are people who have an influence on how people think about an issue or situation. Through their development of models, theories or ideas, they end up with a following that stems largely from the apparent truth and/or usefulness of their ideas."

That makes sense and I like the bit about influence, and specifically that this influence is balanced with “truth” and usefulness of ideas. Though I suspect truth and usefulness are dependent on a point of view which means some people will not agree with a thought leader’s ideas. So a thought leader can be a leader for some and a non-leader for others; it all depends on the followership’s point of view.

Leadersdirect  have a good description of what a thought leader is. They mention

“Kouzes and Posner base their view of leadership on the metaphor of a journey. Their leaders sell the tickets for the journey AND help followers reach the destination. By contrast, thought leadership merely sells the tickets for the journey, leaving it to others to get to the destination on their own or with the help of managers, coaches, facilitators and catalysts.”

I like the way this separates thought leadership from organisational leadership, though I do wonder whether “regular” leaders can also be thought leaders, and vice versa.  I also wonder how many “tickets” are sold to journeys that are never taken.

The next quote from Leadersdirect I really like as it democratises thought leadership. You don’t have to be in a specific position to be a thought leader. It is about “distributed thought leadership”.

"Whenever you advocate a new idea to your colleagues or boss, you show thought leadership. It isn't necessary to have inspirational influencing skills, which is necessary for senior executives because they need to win over the entire organization and beat off their internal competitors for top jobs. Also, to initiate organization-wide change, it helps to be inspirational. But a thought leader can focus on smaller scale changes - ideas for a new product or changes to an existing one. Thought leaders can persuade others using logic, evidence or an actual demonstration of a prototype to win support."

In summary, a thought leader is:

• anyone who chooses to influence on a specific topic
• who doesn't have the responsibility to implement the ideas
• who is recognised by others as having influence on a specific topic
• who has something to gain from hereir influence

Do you agree? Anything to add?

#thtldr