How to Be a Leader in Your Field

http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/leader.html

(1) Pick an issue. You need an issue that the profession as a whole is not really thinking about, but which is going to be the center of attention in five years. 

(2) Having chosen your issue, start a project to study it. 

(3) Find relevant people and talk to them. First do your library work so you know any conventional wisdom that's out there. Then talk to some working professionals who are facing the issue, especially if they have spoken publicly about an aspect of it.

(4) Pull together what you've heard. Nobody is expecting you to solve the problems. Real working professionals do have to solve problems, of course, but right now the emphasis is more on questions than answers. 

(5) Circulate the result. Send copies to the people who helped you. Call it a draft or interim report if you want.

(6) Build on your work. Get invited to speak at meetings.


Leadership is process, and the whole point is that you're not figuring out all the answers yourself.

Another good way to start a brain trust is to organize a speaker series. Fearlessly assess your intellectual strengths and weaknesses, and then make professional friends whose intellectual strengths complement your own.

To succeed in your career, you need more than the skills that you got in school -- you need to be the world expert in something. Knowledge is global, it's growing exponentially, and nobody can pack all of the necessary knowledge into their head. So everyone's going to specialize.