Your Brand is your Thought Leadership
Leaders make News; Thought Leaders, History.
Leaders are very many; but thought leaders indeed, are a rare and distinguished breed. They may hail from the most unexpected echelons of life, and yet get immortalized as Icons; Icons who changed the world.
Thought Leaders think, do and inspire action. This celebrates the beginning of their legacy of thought leadership. A true thought leader is someone who envisions the day after tomorrow, today; and evangelizes the world towards it. Change is the soul of thought leadership; your thought leadership is the soul of your brand; devoid of which your professional journey is set on a compass that just doesn’t point north!
THINK: Brand your ‘Thought Leadership’
Your personal brand is your thought leadership. Period. Adopt these 5 traits of the ideal thought leader and empower the Brand YOU to build and brand your thought leadership:
1.Passionate Perseverance: Passion prevails profession. But when the twain meet: Thought Leadership is born. Following your passion, with relentless perseverance is the hallmark of a true thought leader.
2.Ideation fixation: When you are in love with your work: It rains Ideas. Ideas that empower you to create, claim and dominate that one big idea that becomes your Brand. Get drenched in the idea deluge till that big idea peeks out and bestows some warm sunshine on you.
3.Super-Human Self Conviction: Every big idea is first ridiculed, opposed and rejected before being celebrated. As a thought leader, self-belief is your super power. “I guarantee there’ll be tough times, I guarantee at some point, you will crave a way out, BUT I also guarantee that if you do not uphold this insane self conviction paradigm, then you will regret it for the rest of your life; because you do know in your heart, this is what you are meant to do!”
4.Inspiring Change: Does your idea inspire a change in the world? Brilliant! Now be the change. Thought Leaders aren’t preachers; but doers. ‘Think, Do, Inspire action’ is the mantra for you.
5.Eternal Commitment: Your thought leadership is the raison d’être of Brand YOU. Staying true and committed to this purpose of your life is critical to your brand, even after being hailed as the brand of change.
DO: Live ‘it’ up
So your thought leadership compass points north for the Brand YOU; but is it exactly where your tribe also wishes to go? The second strategy to adopt while living your leadership is leading the world to the place they wish to go to-and not where you wish to take them! The Golden Rule of Thought Leadership is to know the answer to the singular most important question in your tribe’s mind: ‘What’s in it for me?’
Live your brand by leading the world to a place they aspire to be in; live your thought leadership by being the change you are evangelizing. Do the DO that not only inspires your tribe to be more, but also empowers them to do more.
INSPIRE: Grow ‘that’ thought
The third and the best kept secret of the most iconic thought leaders is ‘Focused Growth’-they do more of less- the ideology being, ‘Focus on the focus of your brand’s thought leadership; then every single day again focus on how to leverage this focus to continually dominate and own your brand’s thought leadership.’ Simply put, build a singular Idea Tree of your Thought Leadership: an idea tree that focuses only on your core competence and thus empowers you to pursue excellence; that inspires you to out-love your competition and thus influences your industry dominance. Grow your brand by nurturing this idea tree and watching it grow by igniting ideas and inspiring new thought leaders in the world. Inspire today to Influence tomorrow.
Build, Live and Grow your Thought Leadership; this is the soul of the Brand You.
