Your Expertise.
A Distinctive Point of View.

Transcript from the episode recording, with speaker names added and paragraphs formatted for readability. Automated transcription may contain errors; the audio is the original record.

Brad Hauck 00:14

You know that point in your career where you just stop doing the work and start being known for it? That's the line between a practitioner and a thought leader. And crossing it changes everything for your business. Your mindset shifts, your brand shifts, and even the kind of opportunities that find you start to really look different. Today we're going to be talking about what really changes when you become the go-to person in your field. Not just the fluffy personal branding stuff, but the real shifts that separate the people doing good work from the ones shaping the conversations we have.

Good morning, Dixie.

Dixie Carlton 00:46

Good morning, Brad. I love the sound of that. How do I get onto that stage? Yes, I want to be a thought leader too.

Brad Hauck 00:53

Yeah, it's funny. I have a lot of hate relationship with the term thought leader because of some of the connotations it's gone through over the years. But I like where it comes from and I like what it's trying to say, and that is being the person is the go-to person in that field about that topic and having unique thoughts and ideas about that that you can bring to the world.

Dixie Carlton 01:14

Yes. And I love the concept most of the time, but I don't like the term. I think too that it's something that as a conversation started, we need to go right to the whole crux of it. And that is that, as Keith Abraham says, you can't go there till you grow there. You can't just suddenly wake up one morning and say, Oh, I'm going to be a thought leader. You actually have to grow through a lot of changes and a lot of development and a lot of iteration of what you do to become someone who becomes aware of what it is that it means to be a thought leader.

Brad Hauck 01:50

Yeah. And I think today we're going to look at a couple of things that will lead people in the direction of that, because you can say I'd like to be a thought leader, and you can start to put individual thoughts together. But there is certain steps that I feel that probably you need to cross. And some of them you won't like because they force you to compromise on certain things. But the first thing I think understanding is that people stop paying you for skills and they start paying you for how you think. So when you're hands-on in your work, people hire you for what you do.

But once you move into thought leadership, they follow you for how you really see things and how you put it in a way that they can apply in their lives. And your ideas and your take on your industry, your way of explaining it becomes the value that you bring to the conversation.

Dixie Carlton 02:33

Yes. And this is all about branding and reputation. And it's also about understanding what some of the special skills are, the special things are that you can do to get yourself into that position. It's like playing a masterful game of chess in so many ways.

Brad Hauck 02:51

Yeah, you've got to really plot out what you're doing, but it does mean coming off the tools. And that's probably the hardest thing in many people's cases. I like doing technical work. I love nutting through someone's website and fixing up all the technical aspects of SEO and then doing some content creation and doing planning with them. But that's all that's the doing side of things. And thought leaders, while they've done that, really have moved on from that. They now have people that do that. Or they work with people who do that and refer the work to those people.

Dixie Carlton 03:22

Yes.

Brad Hauck 03:23

And it really is a huge step. It's really hard to let go if you like being hands-on. And trying to get the balance right can be difficult.

Dixie Carlton 03:32

I love being hands-on as well. The coaching side of what I do and some of the technical side of what I do is the most enjoyable part. But letting go of that or training someone else to be able to do that in your place. So you're still the director of the show, but that you are relying on other people within your team to do what they need to do to support what you're doing. I think that comes often down to the concept of developing good frameworks about what you have to offer. Not just systemizing things, but actually developing specific frameworks that enable other people to see the value that you bring to the specific thing you do.

So that you can not only teach that or license someone else to use those frameworks, but that you are pouring your IP into something that makes sense for other people to use and to recognize in terms of what your own serious level expertise is in that space.

Brad Hauck 04:29

Yeah. And I think sometimes these decisions, they're business decisions in the sense that how you start your business is often how you continue your business. So if you start off on the tools doing all the work, then it's very hard to bring people in to replace yourself because you only have that feeling for I'm the only one that can really do this right. Which is what goes on in your head, but not true, as we all know. Everybody can do it just as good as you and probably better, I've found anyway. But I have my way of doing it and I like to see it done a certain way, and that comes down to training staff and doing that.

So some people will start their business where they talk about a particular topic and then they have other people that do the work and then they just hire people in as they get busier. Most people start off as the technician side, if we like to look at the umyth and do the doer in the business, and then they try to grow out of being the doer, and that's where they run into problems.

Dixie Carlton 05:24

Yeah. Although I I I'm gonna challenge you on one concept of what you just said, that was that most people can do what you do. I think when you get to a point where you are a thought leader and you are at the head of your industry, it is not as simple as saying that anybody else could do what you do with the right frameworks or the right training. And that is where you become someone who is paid more for being the person who does that, rather than having one of your people do that. There's a lot of examples that we could probably come up with that the person who is also doing what the other people do, that's great.

But if you want the boss, you're gonna pay the premium for that.

Brad Hauck 06:08

Oh, yeah. I suppose what I'm saying is that a lot of the busy work that we do can be laid out as a set of checklists, and you can teach someone to do it. It's what you learned, it's what you developed, but it's not like you can't actually get someone else to do it. And I personally have a hard time of letting that go. It's my ways, and it's annoying.

Dixie Carlton 06:30

I remember when Steve Jobs was stepping down, there was a lot of talk about who is possibly going to be able to take Apple to the next levels and continue this legacy. And of course, there is always someone that can step in. But when you are a thought leader or you are the expert, the go-to person, you also have to recognize that there are parts of what you do that are unique to you and finding those very, very special people that you can collaborate with to pass on your legacy. I'm seeing it with authors, for example, where you get someone like one of the top whoever writes Jake Reacher, for example.

You know, those big guys, James Patterson is now writing collaboratively with other people, but applying his name to the books.

Brad Hauck 07:16

Yeah, Clive Castle has been doing that for a long time.

Dixie Carlton 07:19

Yeah, so there's that. You still want to buy the book that's got James Patterson's name on it, not the person who also co-wrote with it. And I think that brings me to a really interesting point where you are able to collaborate with people very powerfully if your name is such that you can bring those top guns in to work with. And that makes a difference too for the people that you're trying to deliver a service to. If you have surrounded yourself with really great people who can also contribute to that delivery, then the people that you're serving can actually feel that they're buying not just you, but a whole team.

And that can be a confidence builder too.

Brad Hauck 08:02

Exactly. And I think this brings us to the next point that I've got, which is that you need to actually let go of the tools and lead with ideas. And that's a change in the fundamental way you think. It's about creating ideas and putting ideas out there rather than creating necessarily systems and tools and work. You're moving to another level where we're talking, I suppose, philosophy, talking about things rather than how to do things. And it really is a mindset shift. And I've seen some people who are very, very good at it, and they're exceptionally clear in their ideas, and they stay in that discussing the idea sort of element rather than discussing how we're going to do that.

They might have that as well, but they don't, as a speaker, drop into that when they're on stage or in the content that they produce. It's not a how, it's an idea discussion.

Dixie Carlton 08:57

Yeah, you're right. I think that there are so many moving parts to this. How do you get started on making some decisions around stepping into that space?

Brad Hauck 09:09

No, I think it comes down to where do you want to play? And sometimes Braddy McLean always said play a bigger game. And we've always loved that. And I think that's what it comes down to. Do you want to keep playing in the mud and getting dirty and doing the hard work, or do you want to move into the suits and the clean room sort of stuff where you're actually out of that level that in leadership, for example, where you move, in my case being a firefighter, you move off being on a truck and grabbing the hoses to standing outside the fire and running all the people on the trucks?

It's it's the same with thought leadership in that way. You're taking a step away, a step up to have all that other stuff going on underneath you. And you're coming up with the ideas, the plans, the all that sort of stuff, but you're not actually doing, but you're really bringing that to people on stage.

Dixie Carlton 09:58

So coming back to doing it on stage, how do you promote yourself and differentiate yourself as being the thought leader versus the person who can roll their sleeves up and get the jobs done when you are talking about being a presenter, a leader from on stage, sharing the ideas?

Brad Hauck 10:18

That brings me to another point I have down here. So it's a good thing I make all these points before we get together. And this good one from my perspective. I've always found this one to be really interesting. It was taught to me very early on, and I've always had a hard time working on it. And that is that safe opinions don't get you noticed. There's an old theory that says if you sit on the fence, no one cares. But if you go, I hate it, or I love it, lots of people will fall into love it camp, lots of people fall in the hate it camp, but no one cares if you say, I like this and I dislike that.

It's very wishy-washy, was the way it was put to me. So choosing a side is a very powerful way to get noticed because suddenly you cut through. For example, from a news perspective, you might put a statement out there that says, wooden fences are no good. You should only use steel because steel lasts forever or something. And then all the wooden fence people are going to hate that because they like wooden fences. They don't want to use steel, steel uses too much electricity to make or whatever. But that one side or the other, working away from the safe side of things, playing it safe so no one points their finger at you, is when you start to move into thought leadership, in my opinion.

Dixie Carlton 11:32

I completely agree. And I think you have to be brave enough, if you want to own that space, to maybe be a little controversial. Like we have a system when we're doing books, for example, that we will send out for peer reviews. And one of the questions we ask the reviewers is was there anything contentious or controversial that you felt was tickled or mentioned in this content? And we're always looking for ways for authors to be able to stand out as being able to say something slightly different. There are gazillions, like tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of books about leadership, for example.

So finding something new or interesting or different that makes people want to pick it up and find out more about what you have to say about leadership, for example, means sometimes stepping into that contentious space. So how do you choose to do that? And it does take a certain amount of bravery to become someone who's willing to have the rotten tomatoes thrown at you, just along with the the roses. Because it's not an easy thing to do. And in this day and age, for example, there's an awful lot of people who will cancel you if you say the wrong thing or step out of line.

So it's a it's a lot harder now than what it even used to be.

Brad Hauck 12:53

Yeah.

Dixie Carlton 12:53

Get into that controversial space, but far more necessary if you're going to stand.

Brad Hauck 12:58

Exactly. Obviously, with any argument taken aside, you must have something to back that up. So you must have your theories, your thoughts on why it is that way. So, for example, if I was to say something like, Not everyone can be a leader, that would be quite controversial because you'd be saying to people, you'll never ever lead somebody, which is my brain then goes, but that's not true. So you have these arguments in your own head then, and that's where you end up back in the middle again. So you've got to really say something that you're willing to stand by and back with facts or good reasoning, one or the other, and be willing to know that some people are going to hate you for it.

That's how I feel about it. I know that sounds terrible, and it's not true. I've seen plenty of thought leaders who people don't hate, but I just feel like sometimes you really have to accept the fact that you're going to get, as you said, cancelled or get that hate because that's the nature of the world today, especially with social media and all those sorts of things. It doesn't matter what you say. If you say the sky is blue, someone will say it's yellow. It's that simple, and they will argue black and blue that you're wrong.

Dixie Carlton 14:08

Absolutely. Look at Taylor Swift and J.K. Rowland, both willing to stand firmly in what they believe in and good people. And you say one thing slightly controversial, and all of a sudden you have got a very big divide. And Taylor Swift, I love it, she wrote about, is gonna love you. But it doesn't make it easy. And when you haven't come from a background where you've been groomed or or developed into understanding that level of rejection, it can make it a very rocky, rocky road to traverse.

Brad Hauck 14:39

Yeah, and the other side, which you just mentioned, for example, is you can be seen as a leader in a field and everybody loves you, and then you have a personal opinion that a lot of people don't agree with, and it will can destroy all the work you've done. And that's I think that's part of dealing with it. You've got to be prepared. You either say nothing or you draw a line in the sand and you go, I won't go above that, I won't go below that sort of thing. And it's certainly something I've stressed about a few times.

I've chosen sides along the way in my thinking, but haven't gone too controversial, and that may just be my own nature. But I do know I have strong opinions too. So it's but it is really hard to step out of one thing and up into thought leadership. And I know that's the way forward. I want to look more into futurism and thought leadership in that area where things are going, because it's something that really interests me. But again, you've got to pick a lane, pick a side, and and be prepared to run with it and live with the consequences, as my brain says.

Dixie Carlton 15:44

Yes, that's so true. So, what would you give as the top piece of advice for someone who is sitting perhaps on the precipice of stepping into being a recognized thought leader versus someone who has just in the past been a speaker, been a leader, being someone that people recognize and understand and know who they are, but is now hovering on that. Do I take that next step forward? What would you advise them?

Brad Hauck 16:12

I think you need to stop solving problems and you need to start leading conversations. And this is a great way of thinking of it, because rather than looking at everything as a problem that needs to be solved, start looking at the conversations that are happening and start leading those conversations with your thoughts. So putting your thoughts about other things. So, for example, news jacking is a beautiful example of a place you could start. You can take a news article, and I've seen a few of my friends who are speakers do this, and then write their opinion about that as a thought leader in that area.

And it's something that anyone can do. It's really simple to find an article you don't agree with and write about it and then post it, or do a video about it. But practitioners fix what's broken, whereas thought leaders are going to be shaping the future, and they're shaping the future through their thoughts. So they're moving away from answering questions to actually asking questions about things. So you're you're yeah, there's that change from answering to asking, I think is where I think it's at.

Dixie Carlton 17:10

That's really deep.

Brad Hauck 17:12

I guess shaping your industry rather than just going along and saying things, you'll see in every industry there's people that shape the industry. And if you take a minute just to look at them, use some AI and go and do some research into these people and find out, say to them, what's their controversial point of view? Which side are they on? AI is very good at finding that stuff. So it can be quite interesting to put that in and let it go and do some deep research for you to find out how people are setting up their side that they're working on.

Uh, personally, that's where you see it in podcasts, for example. We are having our opinions, being thought leaders in the area of working with experts in speaking and authoring and those sorts of things. But you've got medias and events and all sorts of stuff going on. YouTube's full of people who you could consider thought leaders in their own right within that topic. And there's lots of examples that you can learn from.

Dixie Carlton 18:08

Can I ask you a strange question about this topic? Do you think once you've become a thought leader that there's ever any going backwards and returning to being the practitioner?

Brad Hauck 18:23

I think it's a mistake if you do, because it's so hard to break out into that level, you're gonna have to put a lot of work in. But I can understand when times change, like for example, during COVID, where everything changed and money stopped flowing because we weren't getting people on stage and all those sorts of things. Maybe, yeah, there is times where you've got to flow back in. The biggest trap I see is people fall back into their old ways and then they can't get back out again. And I know we're all guilty of this along the way at some stage where we've fallen back on our roots, and I'm as guilty as the next person at that.

And to step back out of it again can take a lot of courage and a lot of effort and a lot of belief in yourself for surrounding yourself with people who believe in you, who will give you opportunities and things like that, makes a big difference too.

Dixie Carlton 19:13

You're completely right. Really interesting.

Brad Hauck 19:17

It's a really interesting topic.

Dixie Carlton 19:19

Do you consider yourself to be a thought leader in the industry yet?

Brad Hauck 19:23

No, I don't. I think I've had some thoughts. Random ones. I do have some thoughts, but I I I am looking at more how do I take this into something that's, I suppose, changing the way other people think about it, rather than, oh, there's this thing that's happened. Let me tell you about it. I want to change people's opinions on things. For example, using AI. I love AI. It has a place in every business. And so I want to change people's ideas on how that fits into their life, that it's not the end of the world and that there is opportunity there.

But I've got to make sure that I stay off the tools, even though I love teaching people how to use it. Yeah. It's just that, yeah, trying to get that roadmap underway and and making sure that you do it. What about yourself?

Dixie Carlton 20:11

I think I'm very firmly on the precipice. I may according to some people already be there. There's a few things that have shifted in the last 12 months or so for me that have helped contribute to that shift. And so I am starting to feel that that emergence, if not like. And I think it has taken some time to really be willing to I might have referred to myself in the past as being a pioneer of self-publishing. I think now in the non-fiction self-publishing slash speaker market, I am probably becoming a recognized thought leader in some areas there.

So I keep building on that, which is it's a fascinating position to be in, and it's an unusual question to have to answer. And of course, you have to be mindful of whether or not ego plays too much into it to consider yourself as one versus whether someone else would call you one. But I also know that because I work with so many people who are recognized thought leaders and experts in their industry, and because sometimes really playing that up and not so much spin doctoring, that's not quite the right term, but but playing that up and recognizing it and showcasing it is a part of what I do for authors.

If you're an author who has very good quality, high ideas and is willing to stand on your convictions about what it is that you are an expert on, then yes, I would consider you to be a thought leader. And there's several that I can think of fairly quickly that I've worked with in the last three to four years who fall into that category. Uh so I recognize who they are when I'm working with them. I think they can be objective enough to say that yes, I'm pretty close. But yeah, it's an interesting thing to think about and a great objective as a speaker or an author to reach for that level of recognition.

Brad Hauck 22:14

One of the steps I've taken on my YouTube channel, where I'm focused on creating courses, microcourses and training courses and teaching people how to do that. I've started shooting videos where it's just talking head. It's me talking about a topic and giving five points on why you should do this or how you can solve this problem. So it's more about the actual thoughts behind stuff, my reasoning for why you should do this, rather than click here, click here, click here. And so there is little things you can do. Start just to move yourself that way.

So you've changed the content you're presenting, you're changing what you're putting out there. And one of the things I really love about doing that, for example, is I'm now taking like the latest video, which is about 12 minutes long. I'm fitting it into Opus Clip. But because it's all talking heads, it can pull 20 or 30 short reels for me from that, which are all great little talking points, which is what thought leaders do. Even just making that switch to talking head rather than how to could be your first step.

Dixie Carlton 23:17

Exactly. So what was that program again? Opus?

Brad Hauck 23:21

Oh uh, opus.pro, yeah. And there's another one called Minvo and M-I-N-VO, and they both just take a large video and using AI cut it into clips for you and you can even schedule it onto YouTube and all your channels now. So I just press a button, it does all the cuts and schedule, press the button again.

Dixie Carlton 23:41

I'll test it. There was another another program that you mentioned earlier about the news items that you can select and comment on. What was that?

Brad Hauck 23:50

Yeah, so I use a range of different AIs, but like Jen Spark, it'll go away and get me news items, and then I can find ones that it's found that relate to my topic, and I can then comment on those and write it up like an article. You can take chunks of that like you would as a reporter, where Joe said this and Mary said that. And here's what I feel. Yeah.

Dixie Carlton 24:10

Yeah. Fantastic.

Brad Hauck 24:12

You do that all the time.

Dixie Carlton 24:15

Yeah, hate moments. Yeah. Hey, that was a really interesting conversation. I uh you've certainly got me thinking about a few aspects of that, which I think I will uh continue to mull over for the next few hours or days or weeks. But uh yes, thank you.

Brad Hauck 24:30

Yeah, look, we encourage everybody to think about it. Becoming a thought leader could be where you need to head, or maybe where you are wanting to head. So hopefully we've given you a few tips today. Thanks for tuning into the experts journey. If you picked up some useful tips, please take a moment to subscribe and share it with other people, other speakers or experts. And it really helps us reach more people. And don't forget to check out our books on Amazon, Dixie's Start with the Draft, How to Easily Plan and Write a Nonfiction Book and Authority Island.

And my book, Microcourse Profits, Build a Seven Figure Income with Bite Size Courses. Both are packed with practical tools to help you grow your business faster. We'll catch you next time.

Dixie Carlton 25:08

Thanks, Brad. That was a great conversation.