00:00 Welcome to own your impact. The podcast designed to help you transform your expertise into a platform of purpose and influence. I'm your host, Macy Robison, and I'm here to help you uncover your authentic voice, create actionable frameworks and build a scalable platform that turns your ideas into meaningful impact. 00:21 So I have a confession to make. For years, I had this belief that the secret sauce of successful thought leadership was just having a really slick, proprietary framework, you know, like beautiful diagrams with clever acronyms that look amazing on slides and in books. So I pushed my clients to create these visual models because I was convinced that was the mark of quote, unquote, real thought leadership. Here's what I realized. I was only partially right. 00:46 So frameworks do matter, but they're just one piece of a much more powerful puzzle. Today we're diving into that puzzle. We're diving into the second component of the resident thought leadership system, content, specifically how to build your transformational intellectual property. It creates that genuine impact you're looking for. If you've been wondering, like I have over the years, why some thought leaders ideas stick and others fade, or how to structure your expertise so it transforms instead of just informs this episode is for you. By the time we're done, you'll understand the four essential components of transformational IP. Why starting with frameworks sometimes leads to failure, and exactly how to begin excavating your wisdom into a system that serves others powerfully. So if you're ready to move beyond random content creation to building strategic intellectual property that becomes your legacy, let's dive in. 01:39 So here's why frameworks alone are not enough. Like I said for years, I thought the thing that set successful thought leaders apart was having a proprietary framework that was the common thread that I could see among the thought leadership platforms that I reverse engineered so I encouraged my clients to create graphic representations of their ideas, to build acronyms for their processes to package their wisdom into proprietary models with catchy names, because I thought that was what we needed to do. And like I said earlier, I was partially correct, because frameworks do matter, but frameworks without a foundation are just forgettable shapes on a slide. Acronyms without authentic wisdom behind them are just random letters that no one remembers a week later, maybe even an hour later. And most importantly, intellectual property that's disconnected from your core resonance feels inauthentic, and it really just fails to create impact. The most powerful intellectual property isn't created at all, in my opinion, it's excavated from your lived experience, and it's structured in such a way that it serves others. The most transformational IP you can create usually emerges from all the challenges that you've overcome, the things that make the mess you've navigated become the message that you share. That's why transformational IP and core resonance are so deeply connected, and why we cover them first, that intellectual property that IP naturally extends from your authentic self. 03:02 As I've continued to work with thought leaders, I've discovered that those proprietary frameworks that I thought were everything two things were going on, they were becoming a catch all phrase for everything that was taught, and the actual things that our frameworks were a small part of what was needed. I'll say more, but just know, impactful thought leaders create transformational IP that actually encompasses four distinct categories. Now we're going to talk about all four, and I'll say up front, you don't need to have something you teach in every single one of these categories, but I have found that if the thought leader and you know their name, they probably have two of these four categories in their body of intellectual property. 03:45 So let's break it down. There are four P's to remember here principles. Principles are foundational truths that answer the why. So think of these principles as the fundamental beliefs that guide thinking and action. These principles that you teach, they emerge from your experience, your values, your beliefs, your deep understanding, and they provide guidance for people across diverse contexts. Think of them literally, as the foundation of a building. They support everything else. They're the why behind what you teach. They're universally applicable to different situations. So for example, Simon Sinek core principle, one of his is, people don't buy what you do. They buy why you do it. That's a foundational belief that guides all of his teaching, about finding your why, about leadership, about communication. So there are things he teaches that come from that principle, but the principle itself is the foundation. 04:35 So the second P is practices. Practices are the repeatable actions that address what to do when you think of the difference between principles and practices. Practices are specific actions or methods that are used to embody and apply principles in real world situations. So they take those abstract principles and turn them into tangible, repeatable actions that create consistent. Results. You can think of practices as the daily habits that implement your principles. They're flexible enough still to adapt across different contexts, and they're consistent enough to create reliable results. Here's a great example. Mel Robbins is so good at practices. Her five second rule, when she counts down from 54321, if there's something I don't want to do. I count from 54321, and I do it anyway. Her High Five habit, that is an outstanding practice. Her new book, The let them theory, when something feels out of your control, when someone is thinking about you, something that you don't want them to think, say, let them and then let me. Those are all simple, actionable practices that anyone can implement to overcome hesitation, to take action, to move on a principle. 05:43 So number one, principles, number two, practices, number three, processes. Processes are sequential steps that explain how to do something. So they're the step by step procedures or sequences that are designed to achieve specific outcomes consistently. Processes provide clear guidance for implementing practices in a structured, reliable way. Think of them as recipes. They have a clear beginning, middle end. They spell out exactly what to do in order to achieve a specific result. So if you think of processes, a flywheel is a great process, or agile, where you have to go step by step through something is a great process, often made up of small practices, but something that you do step by step by step. And finally, number four, proprietary frameworks. These are the visual models that teach you how to think. 06:32 So there's your processes, which is linear, and then proprietary frameworks. These are unique conceptual structures that take ideas, principles, usually, and put them in a cohesive, memorable system. They provide a big picture view that distills complex concepts into manageable components. So if you think of frameworks as like a map that show how different elements relate to each other, they create shared vocabulary. They create mental models that help people understand complex ideas quickly. A couple good examples of this. Alex Osterwalder, Business Model Canvas. That's a great, proprietary framework. It's not linear. You can start anywhere on the canvas and work your way through it, but it's just a conceptual, visual model to help you understand how a business runs another one. Donald Miller's story brand framework, the brand script that organizes effective messaging into a clear visual model based on the hero's journey, based on storytelling principles. And that framework is a really great map or lens or model to look at the overall story you're telling. You can start in the middle just to figure it out. You can pull it apart. It's just a really great conceptual map for understanding how you create a clear foundational message. 07:52 So these four components, principles, practices, processes, proprietary frameworks, create a comprehensive approach to your transformational IP, to your content, and they help guide people, not just in understanding your ideas, but in implementing them. So let's take a look at some successful that later. I've already mentioned both of these folks, but just to kind of really dial in, drill down on this idea. So Donald Miller and story brand. Don has built his entire organization around this proprietary framework, the story brand, brand script, the SB seven framework. It helps businesses clarify their message. If you look deeper though, all four of the components are infused into what story brand teaches and what Don teaches. So some principles that we have when you confuse, you lose your customer should be the hero. Those are principles that we repeat, that we teach, that are in the books, that are just infused in everything. They're the foundation from those principles. If we believe, when you confuse, you lose a practice that can rise from that is something like so you need to have a clear website header that passes the grunt test. That's something you can create, or you need to craft a compelling one liner so that you can not stumble over your words when you introduce yourself. Processes, the marketing relationship triangle, the story brand, sales funnel. There are several processes that are part of the books and the IP, the body of IP, and then the framework, the proprietary framework, is the story brand script itself, where messaging elements are organized into a coherent story, so that has all four components and has really created a robust thought leadership system of content and transformational IP that has a framework, yes, a proprietary framework, but principles, practices, processes and the proprietary framework are all there. 09:42 Now you don't have to have all four so let's look at Mel Robbins, because honestly, it was Mel that made me think that I was missing something. If you look at Mel, she's got a massive following, right? Like she's such a good speaker, I would say that that is her expression mode is speaking. And if you look at what she does with her. Business. She has a monster podcast. She's one of the highest paid speakers in the world. She does so much with her voice, and she's really great at communicating powerful principles and practices. I think that's really the two that she leans into the most. I couldn't think of very many processes that she has, and I couldn't think of a proprietary framework that's not to say she couldn't or wouldn't develop one, but because she relies so much on her podcast, her voice, her books, though, I think her voice is her primary mode of expression. She really is okay to just have principles and practices. So one of her principles, hesitation is the gap between an impulse and overthinking. And then the five second rule is to take action. The high five habit, the let them theory, all of those straightforward practices that she repeats again and again and again. Those are grounded in clear principles, and they're delivered with her very signature no nonsense style. So even though she doesn't have complicated frameworks or acronyms or processes, her principles and practices are so clear and so actionable, they create tremendous impact. We need to have at least two of those four principles, practices, processes, proprietary framework. 11:07 In addition to having those four types of intellectual property, we also have to share them again and again and again and infuse them into everything we do, just like our core resonance gets infused into everything we do. So here's an example of why that matters so much, why the sharing is just as important as the knowing what it is you teach. Early in my career, I worked with an author, speaker, thinkers, 50 honoree, Whitney Johnson. Whitney had developed extraordinary IP. She had a really strong framework, the S curve of learning. It was very powerful. And then she had seven accelerants of personal disruption, which was another framework, because they were in linear order, but you could take them out of order to apply them both together. Were really groundbreaking in terms of helping people understand how to apply the theory of disruption to their own growth. And she had comprehensive tools to measure and implement both of these frameworks. She had all the categories of transformational IP we had principles that she would teach, like quotes that came up over and over again. She had practices, she had processes and she had proprietary frameworks. But her platform wasn't growing as it could have been growing. And in my opinion, and this is how we fixed it. The problem wasn't the intellectual property itself. It was that she wasn't consistently sharing it in a way that amplified her natural resonance, her core resonance. She's just magic in person. So instead of figuring, instead of us figuring out how to take her IP and connect it that way, she was doing a good job doing what she thought she was supposed to do, which was commenting on what other thought leaders were discussing on LinkedIn. She was jumping in on trends. She was trying to post on hot topics. She was doing what we thought she should be doing in terms of creating a bunch of content. It felt like it was diluting her distinctive voice in the process. So really, not having developed this system yet, we tried something different. We shifted her approach and started consistently sharing her proprietary IP. We focused on podcast conversations which were magnetic, because it was a conversation she was drawing people into. She was enthusiastic, and was excited to hear people's ideas and share her ideas, her keynote topics, her social media. We shifted everything around her core, IP her LinkedIn following exploded, and her platform expanded dramatically. One of the things we did, for example, when COVID hit, was realizing that her voice was so important and having conversations with people was so magnetic for her. She went on LinkedIn live every weekday for at least almost two months, I think, just to talk about the disruptive time we were in, how we could use these seven accelerants of disruption to give ourselves a solid foundation in this time of chaos and change. And she became known to a very distinct audience for something very specific, very transformative, something that was uniquely hers, and her platform exploded in my mind, looking back, retrospect, hindsight, being 2020, the transformation really started when we took her content strategy and aligned it with her core resonance and her transformational IP, all of them together. So having that IP isn't enough, having that core resonance figured out isn't enough. You have to bring them together, share consistently and repeatedly, and let those components reinforce one another. 14:25 If you don't have transformational IP yet, how do you start developing it? Here are some practical steps. First, start with principles. Get a piece of paper out. Start brainstorming, identify the foundational things you believe, things that guide your approach, and just write everything down. It doesn't even have to be related to the work that you do. But what are the truths that you believe? What are the things that you've discovered through experience? What are the beliefs that consistently inform your decisions and actions? Then move to practices and document any practices that you have, they don't have to be connected to the principles yet. But what specific actions have you. Found that consistently create results for people. What methods do you use to implement your principles in various situations? Third, look for patterns. Where do you see natural sequences emerging in how you implement your practices? These patterns reveal processes that can be pulled together and codified and organized. And then consider visual organization. Is there a way to make a process visual? Are there relationships that exist that we could clarify through a more conceptual, proprietary framework, and then fifth, start testing, start refining. You really understand the power of your transformational IP when you start teaching it and start seeing how people respond, getting feedback on what resonates and what creates confusion, leaning into different stories and analogies, and figuring out how to communicate these principles, practices, processes and proprietary frameworks, and then you can simplify and clarify based on the feedback that you get. Now, don't feel a bunch of pressure to go out and develop all four of these components at once, because not every thought leadership platform requires all four start with what feels most natural to you, as far as principles go, connect it to your core residents, connected to your audience's needs, and then go from there, principles and practices might be enough for now. 16:15 Here's the thing I want you to remember. Transformational IP is the thing that gives structure to your wisdom. It gives it a container. It makes it portable. It allows people to take it into their lives with them. It makes what you're teaching accessible, and it makes it so much easier to implement. And when that's aligned with your core resonance, when the content and the core resonance work together, it creates a powerful foundation for your thought leadership platform. Random content might build awareness, but transformational intellectual property that's aligned with your core resonance builds authority. When you develop that transformational IP, you become known for something specific and valuable, just like a singer with a signature song, people know you for the specific signature thing that you teach. So in the next episode, we'll explore the next part of the resonant thought leader system, your central platform. Because if your IP is your signature song, you need to be singing it on a stage, a stage that you own completely, where your audience can experience your core resonance and your content. But that platform can only be as strong as intellectual property showcases, so start brainstorming those principles now, and I have something to help you with that as a thank you for diving into this with me today, I have a freebie. If you haven't downloaded it yet, go to my website and download my free resident thought leader starter kit. We have in that kit, the principle extraction exercise that I talked a little bit about today, the brainstorming your principles in this kit. It's all organized, laid out, ready for you to go space for you to write and start to fill out and think about and brainstorm the principles that you teach again and again. This isn't just about capturing random thoughts. It's about pulling out profound insights you've gained through your experience, and then transforming them into clear, actionable principles that other people can learn from. And then what makes this kit powerful is it shows how these principles become the building blocks of your larger thought leadership system. Got the visual of how they all work together in that kit. So while you're working on pulling out your key principles, you'll discover how they connect to everything else, how they can be amplified through your platform and ultimately contribute to your business model. So head on over to Macy Robison, M, A, C, y, r, O, B, i s o n.com, and download your free starter kit. As you work through that principle extraction exercise, I'd love to hear what you uncover. Connect with me on social media. I'm at Macy Robison everywhere, R, O, B, i, s, O, N, and share your principle using own your impact, or tag me on LinkedIn, and be sure you subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss our next episode on building your central platform. That's where we're going to explore how to create that digital home base that showcases the valuable IP you're developing and gives people a space to connect with you. 19:02 Thank you for joining me on own. Your impact. Remember, there are people out there right now who need exactly what you know, exactly how you'll say it. Your voice matters, your expertise matters. And most importantly, the transformation you can help others create matters. If today's episode resonated with you, I'd love for you to become part of our growing community of thought leaders who are committed to creating meaningful impact. Subscribe to the podcast, leave a review and share this episode with someone you know who is ready to amplify their voice. And if you're ready to dive deeper, visit Macy robison.com for additional resources, frameworks and tools to help you build your thought leadership platform with intention and purpose, and remember, your ideas don't need more luck, your ideas don't need more volume. Your ideas need a system, and I'm here every week to help you build it. I'm Macy Robison, and this is own your impact.