Trailblazing and Thought Leadership

“The songs will be new in your throat. We are always
beginning. We are always beginning again.”

—Laurie Ann Guerero
 

Thought leadership is a combination of big and small ideas and the narrative on which they ride. We define big ideas not in terms of scale or flashiness but in terms of the degree to which the idea helps to create a new paradigm or mental model, which will in time, usher in change. Paradigm changes, big and small, are everywhere.  At a macro level, the bundle of paradigm changes associated with anti-racism, decolonization, and inequality are acts of rethinking who gets to set the terms of our global existence, whose art and culture is considered worthy, who writes the textbooks, etc. At a micro level, thinking about insects as everyday food, in cultures not already accustomed to eating insects, is a paradigm shift.

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But big ideas need research, as well as many small ideas, in order to coalesce. This is the story of the everyday, or long-haul creativity that requires the discipline of analysis, experimentation and creative-problem-solving to ensure that slowly, a new way of thinking and doing takes root. Finally, creating and sharing a narrative of what is possible and what it might take to get there, buoys both big and small ideas and establishes you as a trailblazer and thought leader.