Why every thought leader needs a subject matter back story...

If you want to be taken seriously as a thought leader, there’s a question you’re going to need to have an extremely good answer to…

Let me explain…

As thought leaders, a huge part of our responsibility is to bring people into our world; to spark interest in our subjects.

The more complex our topic, the more challenging our task.

That’s why it’s so important we have a Subject Matter Back Story in our content palette.

Stories are a tool to help us make sense of the world…
Subject matter back stories help us make sense of our subject.

Most of us are very good at sharing our Origin Story; how we ended up doing what we do. Rarely do I see someone clearly able to articulate how their subject came to be.

Cue Marilyn Waring.

She’s a 72 year old former politician turned activist. In her TED talk, she shares the back story of Gross Domestic Product and in doing so, changes the way we think about GDP for good.

P.s. It only takes her 135 seconds. Enjoy 🍿.

Three things you can learn from Marilyn’s Back Story:

1. Create curiosity from your first sentence 🪝
   ‘The GDP, most of you will have heard of it, many of you won’t have any idea what it actually means… [Pause].’
   
   Notice how it gets everyone in the room interested - even the experts - who are now questioning whether they know it as well as they think they do.
   

2. Keep it simple 🧠
   ‘On one side of the boundary…,
   On the other side of the boundary…’
   
   What was ‘inside vs outside’ the boundary created a sense of tension. Tension is what makes a story interesting, find the tension in your backstory.
   
   e.g. good vs evil | expectation vs reality | will they vs won’t they
   

3. Take us on a journey from macro to micro 🔻 

   In other words, start by answering the question: What does this mean for us as a collective?
   
   Finish by answering the question: What does this mean for us as individuals?

   
   Deep down, all our audience really wants to know is what does this mean for me?

Bring the Subject Matter Back Story into your podcasts, keynotes and panels and it will be an absolute game changer.

Go get ‘em!

Alex