This is an anonymous post from an Elpha member.

Do you need to be in senior or executive roles to be a thought leader?

Curtis40·Dec 06, 2022

Posted in:Management and Leadership Career Growth

Do you need to be in senior or executive roles in a particular field to pursue independent consulting? Can professionals in mid-career levels position themselves as thought leader in their field?

What are your thoughts on this?

Iynna·Dec 06, 2022

Being relatively senior usually implies more years of experience than someone junior, and usually more years means more reps. That said it is not condition sine qua non, meaning that I don't think you absolutely need to be a senior exec to be a thought leader. Being known as a thought leader is not something that's developed overnight in my opinion. I think people who are viewed as such in an industry or company, have cultivated a brand (either by being vocal about what they believe in the org or in writing), and they are known as such.

CLG·Dec 07, 2022

100% not. Being a thought leader is all in how you perceive yourself (and that's what creates how other perceive you). As to your question "Do you need to be in senior or executive roles in a particular field to pursue independent consulting?" Depends on the type of consulting you want to do. IME it's less about the roles and way more about your EXPERIENCE + EXPERTISE and how you communicate your value to the audience you want to help/hire you.

Morgan·Dec 08, 2022

No way; I'm a consultant (Sorta? It's complicated) for one company simply because they saw my blog, saw I had experience they didn't, and said "Come on in and wing it!" (And I succeeded and have done about 6+ projects since with them)I'm not a senior level, but I wrote and showed my learning process and how I work through things.

charlottefountaine·Dec 08, 2022

Yes - I follow Femke and she's been a design influencer / thought leader since she started her career in design - it's a real strength in fact that she's coming at things new and fresh. I also think when you're mid career doing thought leadership stuff and going freelance can be essentially promoting yourself, and putting yourself in a senior position. I'm also interested to see what others think of this!