Becoming A Thought Leader: RainToday Interviews Michael W. McLaughlin

As part of RainToday's research on thought leadership in professional services, RainToday.com interviewed Michael W. McLaughlin, seasoned management consultant, industry leader, and acclaimed author. He illustrated the commitment involved in putting your ideas out in the marketplace, and the upside and potential downside of taking that leap. Tracing both his own path and the environment of thought leadership inside consulting firms, Michael W. McLaughlin shares his story and his advice around becoming a thought leader in professional services.

About Michael W. McLaughlin

Current Position:	Michael W. McLaughlin is Publisher of two highly-regarded resource websites for consultants: Management Consulting News and The Guerrilla Consultant.
In The Public Eye:	Michael is co-author with Jay Conrad Levinson of Guerrilla Marketing for Consultants: Breakthrough Tactics for Winning Profitable Clients, considered "the new classic of consulting success".
Also Known As:	A 22-year veteran with Deloitte Consulting, Michael has served as Principal and as Managing Partner for Deloitte Consulting Chicago, where he was responsible for a practice of 800 consultants. He is also a professional member of the National Speakers Association.
Websites:	http://www.managementconsultingnews.com http://www.guerrillaconsulting.com

RainToday: Does it surprise you that you're considered a "thought leader" by practitioners in your field? In other words, do you consider yourself an "Intentional Achiever" of thought leadership, or an "Accidental Tourist"?

Michael W. McLaughlin: Probably somewhere in the middle. I don't think it's completely accidental. People don't write books without something in mind. With the book that I wrote, and some of things that I've done over the last three or four years, I'm clearly trying to do some things in the industry. But I also wouldn't say that that's all I'm doing. While I'm publishing and writing and speaking and so forth, I'm still consulting all the time with clients on my area of expertise. So, I do both. They both feed each other, which is not an accident.

RainToday: People define the "beginning" of their path to thought leadership in different terms… How old were you? Where were you working, what were you doing?

Michael W. McLaughlin: I was probably 28 when I first started to think about how important it would be, if you were in the consulting business, to be visible in the industry someplace – whether it was in the area you practice in, or something you're interested in, whatever the case may be.

Probably two to three years later, I started to speak to client groups and others. It was all related to the work I was doing as a consultant – education, training, or just general speaking to client groups. At that time, I was working mostly in area distribution and manufacturing, so I was talking about that.

Then I started to go to industry associations a couple years later on the same topics, and it just sort of built from there. But it wasn't a central part of my marketing strategy. At that point in time, I was more focused on building business within my existing clients with Deloitte, so it wasn't a big part of what I was doing. It was something I would do a couple times a year.

I started to publish articles a couple years later. I found that writing and speaking tended to generate lots of leads and activities for me, and I enjoyed it. I just sort of ratcheted it up over time, and then I added the PR piece. So a few years later I was working with PR people around trying to find ways to be placed in the media around subjects that were relevant for what I was doing. I've done that, and I continue to do that.

Then I built the first consulting website I had. Through that activity, which was sort of a constant writing, publishing, preparing, researching, everything else that you do to pull that stuff together, I found that I was interested in the subject, and I was interested in writing more.

I really enjoyed writing and speaking. The more I did it, the easier it was to do. And the better I got at it, the simpler it was to get people to want me to come and do things for them. That all came together when I met Jay Levinson about three or four years ago, with the notion that there was a book (and some other things) underneath what I was doing. At that point, I decided to try my hand at writing a book. I gave it a shot.

So it was a slow progression for me. I didn't start out saying, "I definitely want to do this, to be an author."

I found that, as a consultant in the firm I was in, the longer I was there, the more important that set of activities became. The way that we work in Deloitte, the business development activities become more and more important the longer you're there.

If you're just starting, your goal is to learn as much about the consulting business as you can, and to become a good consultant. Over time you're doing that. Plus, you're doing business development. To do business development properly, to be successful, you've got to be out in the marketplace with your thoughts and your ideas. The people who are most successful are the ones who do that. It didn't take me long to figure that out, because I had lots of people around me doing it too. I found out I enjoyed it! And so it just sort of took on a life of its own.

• Deloitte's influence on his path towards thought leadership
• Milestones in his progress towards where he is in his career today
• How to know when you have become a thought leader... if that's possible
• What would have caused him to be less, or more, successful
• The biggest surprises he's encountered along his path
• His advice to consultants and other professional service providers who aspire to be thought leaders
• And more!