Author: Ishita Singh

The business world continues to change and disrupt. We the individuals, are the key that connects strategy to implementation.

While organizations refer to this initiative by varied names, essentially, it’s how the change happens, and the work gets done.

Providing thought leadership is an opportunity for an organization to elevate the current position within an industry and manifest the competencies and reliability to demonstrate the experience, engage the voices and furnish real value to the customers. Thought Leadership is not only a mindset but also a competency that keeps organizations focused.

Suppose you are driving from New-York to Los-Angeles, you cannot see the whole journey, but you tackle it as you go- fold by fold. A Customer journeys is almost same! The purpose of providing thought leadership to your customer goes beyond brand awareness. The objective is to institute a richer and more relevant connections with the customer. The thought leadership should challenge, motivate and interest every individual, both inside and outside the organization.

Offering thought leadership as a part of services is like playing a game of charades- act it out, don’t say it out! Organizations objective should be to help the customer and that’s why it’s paramount to prove one’s authenticity as a thought leader in the chosen field. Thought leadership is an ability of an organization to influence an industry, they challenge the status-quo and ignite the strong drifts that others follow.

Thought leaders provide a unique role in offering acumen on a specific topics, issues, or trends and prove themselves to be a go-to resource. The organization with a successful thought leadership strategy attains business goals and makes it a core of the communication plan.

With thought leaders in action, the customers establish a trusting relationship the organization, look up to them as advisors that understands the problems at hand and knows how to resolve them. The end result, both the customer and the organization achieve more than bargained for. And hence, it’s more important now than ever for the organizations to be viewed as an industry leader and trusted partners.

So, the big question is can organizations create Thought Leaders?

To answer that question, lets understand what a thought leader is- it’s an individual whose vision on a subject are commanding and prominent. Said that, someone within the organization who can guide the business to higher success owning to the one’s clarity and decisiveness.

For organizations to create Thought leaders is not impossible, need to tap on the talent, experience and passion of an individual and help them enhance few skills like, becoming a coach and mentoring teams internally and eventually providing those enablers to customers.

Alas! thought leadership is not easy to quantify and has no metrics to measure the effects, also investing in reputation building may not generate the same results in short-term. Nonetheless, harnessing thought leadership can produce significant long-term payoffs and scale the brand.