Since January of 1997, Terry Corby has been a Partner/Global Marketing Director of Marketing with a portfolio of responsibilities that today include global marketing leadership for Thought Leadership at Accenture. Additionally, Corby heads global marketing for two of Accenture's major service areas - the Strategy practice and the Human Performance practice. The term “thought leadership” caught our attention and we wanted to understand more about it and how Corby sees it being applied across Accenture’s worldwide client base.

    Terry Corby

“It may not be well known in all business areas, but it isn’t a new term,” Terry Corby says. “When I first took on the thought leadership responsibilities at Accenture, about three years ago, people would ask me to define the concept.  The resulting conversation would last a couple of hours.” Corby chuckles at the recollection of those greater in-depth discussions.

“Since then, I have learned to use a shortcut definition that gives people a more succinct answer. Here is how I define thought leadership: It is vision, research, and new thinking or ideas around current and future business or technology issues."

According to Corby, all professional services companies, as well as people in the legal profession use the term. Any company that has wanted to do consultancy or professional services will often invoke the term.

“As services and products become harder to differentiate among competing firms, ” Corby explains, “…companies outside the traditional users of thought leadership are increasingly using the term and the efforts associated with it to help identify the unique qualities of their products and services as well as to create a stronger bond with their customers.”

The emergence of thought leadership usually comes about through two possible activities: Research such as an outcome of academic research, or as a part of invention or innovation that companies carry out through their work with clients

“It might be helpful to explain how thought leadership emerges from research. A timely example could be, a client needs to actively manage the issues relating to the emerging of competition from non-traditional or emerging markets. Our research work, The Rise of the Multi-Polar World looks at how companies need to address the challenges of the new competitive environment. This research resonated so well with our clients that we are now launching a second phase of this research where we are able to provide deep insights into how CEOs of emerging market multi-nationals are approaching the challenges before them as they grow their companies. 
“Innovation or invention can make for powerful thought leadership,” Corby explains, “where  a new and possibly transferable solution is created in response to a client problem. Customers anticipate new thinking and innovation. They expect best practice and that you bring them the latest thinking from your experience working with other companies around the world. The best examples of innovation can indeed be considered as thought leadership.”
 
Corby points out that despite the relationship, thought leadership is not to be associated with the activities one generally associates with traditional marketing. 

“There is a creation of thought leadership as we just discussed. Another aspect is getting thought leadership into the market place, doing that calls upon a separate discipline and skill set.”

Getting Started
According to Corby, thought leadership can begin in an engagement with a business client in several ways. It can grow from the front end of the new product development process, where thought leadership can recommend practices, or come in the form of diagnostics to determine gaps. It can also be used to stimulate ideas among the client team to help them work through and identify potential solutions to their issues.

“Our Accenture High Performance Workforce Study is published annually and is now in its seventh year. Creating a study every year allows us to look at patterns and trends over time, which has provided us and clients with a valuable insight into the challenges of developing a high performance workforce.  We have created a front end diagnostic alongside the report that clients can use to begin the process of examining the issues in their own workforce compared to those in the report. This is a great way to bring thought leadership to life and help start a discussion.

Our work over the years in the Talent arena spurred us to write a book this year on the topic, The Talent Powered Organization where we introduce whole new ways of redefining Talent Management that are required to be successful in this important area for clients. Having a distinctive point of view is crucial to the success of any piece of thought leadership and this book is a good example of that.

Most often, the marketing of thought leadership is through published work, one-pagers to 300 page books, promoted through the media, events, the Internet, direct marketing, advertising and, of course, in conversation with clients. The resulting expertise over time and involvement in a subject area can produce people who are considered “Thought Leaders” – highly experienced topic leaders or subject matter experts in their unique area of study.

“Thought Leadership is an often misunderstood and even ridiculed term, but is a required tool in the business portfolio. It is certainly one important way to deliver ideas rather than pure sales messages. More importantly it is how our firm is able to work with our clients on the execution of these ideas.   

Who Are the Next Thought Leaders?

Corby believes that he was attracted to thought leadership because he entered the business world with a background on the creative side. Positions in film and television production encouraged people, such as Corby, to be open to new ideas; have an ability to problem solve on the fly; create impact and, in general, think creatively. By way of illustration, ten years ago Corby helped to start a non-profit enterprise in the UK called the Talent Foundation.  His title in the fledgling organization: Director of Possibilities.

“Actually, it was and is my belief that everyone in a leadership position should have that title!”

From his position at Accenture, Corby says that it is fairly easy to identify people who are capable of rising through the organization and into the thought leadership channel. He describes the following attributes as considerably “outside-the-box” thinkers.

“The people, who will eventually be thought leaders, tend today to have and articulate a distinctive point of view on their specialist subject. They tend to be motivated to write down the facts and reasoning that supports their point of view and are likely to try to push others to think beyond what is possible today... They enjoy being published!"

A Climate of Perseverance and Trust
Being in a global role requires speaking credibly about a vision well ahead of delivering any tangible results. His role in his company can be ambiguous in that, as Corby reports, it can sometimes seem like you own everything, and yet own nothing.

“A global role can sometimes mean you own the responsibility and accountability for success without owning all the pieces that will achieve it.”

Corby typically becomes involved in a project based on having a very strong and well connected network of different people from throughout all parts of the organization around the world.

“The fun part of my role is recognizing connections and pulling disparate things together that, when combined, can make for a larger and bolder vision and greater level of impact. To gain attention, thought leadership by its nature needs to be created and delivered in ever more innovative ways. To achieve this at scale means developing trusted relationships with a strong network of colleagues around the globe that can link efforts to deliver true global impact. When it works well, it’s the best feeling you can have.”

And Finally
As with any large organization, it is not possible to be involved in every engagement and every idea that is emerging. The challenge Corby faces is to make sure, to the extent possible, thought leadership is a success across Accenture’s 170,000 person workforce.

“With the size of our company, that is a lot of flowers blooming and it is not possible to be directly or even indirectly involved with everything that is going on. However, what’s important is to focus your efforts on what you want to be known for in the marketplace?  For us, it is about delivering high performance for our clients."  

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