Abstract
PurposeA major part of knowledge management for knowledge-intensive firms such as professional service firms is the increasing focus on thought leadership. Despite being a well-known term, it is poorly defined and analysed in the academic and practitioner literature. The aim of this article is to answer three questions. First, what is thought leadership? Second, what tensions exist when seeking to create thought leadership in knowledge-based organisations? Third, what further research is needed about thought leadership? The authors call for cross-disciplinary and academic–practitioner approaches to understanding the field of thought leadership.Design/methodology/approachThe authors review the academic and practitioner literature on thought leadership to provide a rich oversight of how it is defined and can be understood by separating inputs, creation processes and outcomes. The authors also draw on qualitative data from 12 in-depth interviews with senior leaders of professional service firms.FindingsThrough analysing and building on previous understandings of the concept, the authors redefine thought leadership as follows: “Knowledge from a trusted, eminent and authoritative source that is actionable and provides valuable solutions for stakeholders”. The authors find and explore nine tensions that developing thought leadership creates and propose a framework for understanding how to engage with thought leadership at the industry/macro, organisational/meso and individual/micro levels. The authors propose a research agenda based on testing propositions derived from new theories to explain thought leadership, including leadership, reducing risk, signalling quality and managing social networks, as well as examining the suggested ways to resolve different tensions.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, they are the first to separate out thought leadership from its inputs, creation processes and outcomes. The authors show new organisational paradoxes within thought leadership and show how they can play out at different levels of analysis when implementing a thought leadership strategy. This work on thought leadership is set in a relatively under-explored context for knowledge management researchers, namely, knowledge-intensive professional service firms.
Highlights
Thought leadership is a well-known and yet, surprisingly, a poorly understood concept
It is not surprising that some scholars and practitioners consider it as yet another management fad (Hall, 2019; Kellaway, 2007; Spicer, 2017)
We enhance the definition of thought leadership based on a systematic review, and highlight its inputs, processes and outcomes. This provides greater clarity around the thought leadership concept by explaining what it is and what it is not, and we provide a convenient framework for other knowledge management scholars to use
Summary
Thought leadership is a well-known and yet, surprisingly, a poorly understood concept. It has attracted growing attention from certain knowledge-intensive firms, namely, professional service firms (PSFs) who are creating large volumes of practitioner material distributed through magazines, white papers, blogs, podcasts and videos. 69% of these organisations have a specific head of thought leadership. Harvey is Professor of Management and Associate Dean at the University of Exeter Business School, Exeter, UK. Vince-Wayne Mitchell is Professor of Marketing and Head of Discipline at the University of Sydney Business School, Sydney, Australia. Eric Knight is Professor of Strategic Management and Executive Dean at Macquarie Business School, Sydney, Australia
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