Thought Leadership is a compelling idea. It implies that your organization has such compelling knowledge and insights that your customers & prospects all want to engage with you… it’s great work if you can get it, but most organizations have not done the level of thinking required to earn the thought leader role (even if they have, fresh insights rarely last). A thought catalyst approach is different in that it supports a strategy of engagement, alignment and agility. THINKevents offer a range of proven, repeatable ways to earn the ‘thought catalyst’ role.
WHAT is a THINKevent?
Simply put, these are facilitated experiences that surface insights and build leadership alignment on how new risks and opportunities are emerging and what to do about it (and why).
They range from intimate internal workshops to multi-company experiences to an extended series of ‘hot-topic’ workshops spanning an entire ecosystem. Leadership teams who participate in THINKevents benefit from reduced noise and heightened alignment on how emerging risks and opportunities are unfolding, and what they should do about it (and why).
IT’S ALL ABOUT ALIGNMENT
In every organization across every industry, it would seem that every person has their own idea of what needs to be fixed and why. Lack of alignment combined with rapid change can quickly turn into a complete inability to move forward with conviction, and that is absolutely NOT OK.. particularly when it ripples across an entire ecosystem (like healthcare).
NOT BUSINESS AS USUAL
What is needed, now more than ever, is a safe space for unconstrained thinking and alignment building about how best to move forward with conviction in the AI era, but typical industry events don’t help. That’s why this NOT your typical industry event:
… individuals, not organizations… first-off, THINKsummit attendees come as individuals, not as a representative of an organization. This removes the need to ‘tow the party line’ and expands the opportunity to explore fresh ideas & perspectives without any expectation that they are supposed to ‘know’ the answer. The goal is simple… open the door for expansive discussion in an environment that is designed to be:
. non-polarizing… the optics of sharing & dialogue remove the pressure to agree or disagree (expansive thinking rules)
. non-judgmental… stress-tests previously unconscious assumptions & bias (risk-free way to evolve thinking)
. non-proprietary… relationship building based on shared experiences, insights and ideas.
… participant hosts rather than big corporate sponsors
THINKevents are underwritten by the participants, not the vendors. Whether it’s a single organization or a consortia of participants, these organizations view the topic as a strategic priority, and have a genuine desire to find fresh insights and ideas to make meaningful change. There are numerous benefits for hosts:
… stress-test their existing assumptions & beliefs (learn & evolve their collective thinking)
… build relationships with change makers in their space (potential downstream commercial benefit)
… earn reputation as a thought catalyst (gain genuine insight into emerging, risks and opportunities)What is the benefit of being a host?
Where does Rampworth fit in all of this?
As a small strategy firm, we have no claim to be a big-5 thought leader… instead, our role is as a neutral facilitator and alignment builder. We came to this naturally, because, as a value strategy firm, we have literally been ‘in the room’ for hundreds of discussions on emerging risks and opportunities. Somewhere along the way we came to the realization that many of the wicked problems impact everyone in the ecosystem, and that many non-competing organizations have complementary perspectives on what to do (and why). THINKsummits came from our desire to deliver safe and collaborative experiences that helped bridge fresh thinking across silos, and, of course, these experiences were constantly improvedshaped by feedback from participants along the way.
WHY THIS MATTERS NOW (MORE THAN EVER)
In every organization across every industry, it would seem that every person has their own idea of what needs to be fixed and why. Lack of alignment combined with rapid change is paralyzing and that is NOT OK. What’s needed, now more than ever, is a safe space for unconstrained thinking and alignment building about how best to move forward with conviction in the AI era.
3 PROVEN APPROACHES
INTERNAL INSIGHTS & ALIGNMENT … one way we approach this is to focus on building an aligned view on what disruptive forces are emerging that might impact your success and what to do about that (and why). For this we use our proven FORCEcasting approach, a proven one-day workshop for crystalizing what you believe to be true & why (learn more here).
INDUSTRY EVENTS … another proven approach is something we call THINKsummit. An intimate, one-day event, where leaders from multiple non-competing organizations come to explore fresh thinking on how to make positive change in an area/topic that they consider to be a strategic priority. These events provide a forum for unconstrained discussion & learning, supported by a series of topic-specific briefings followed by facilitated discussion, all culminating in sharable artefacts capturing key insights and ideas for action. (you can learn more here)
INSIGHT SERIES … a series of internal and group events focused on a strategically important topic.
Leadership teams from numerous non-competing organizations all benefit from stress-testing internal assumptions (in private) while also benefiting from collective assumptions and insights (this archived site provides a glimpse into a previous series)
