Founder
About … Bob is a pioneer in the theory and practice of thought leadership — well before the concept became widely adopted and loosely interpreted. He brings decades of experience in helping business-to-business companies become widely recognized and richly rewarded for their expertise and has authored numerous books and articles on the best practices of thought leadership. Bob has a BA degree in Communication Studies from Penn State University.
Background … Since the late 1980s, Bob has advised B2B companies on the best ways and means of competing with and profiting from thought leadership. Bob honed his thought leadership craft while at management consulting firm CSC Index (1987-1997). There, he played a key part role in the team that brought the blockbuster consulting service of “business reengineering” to prominence. Bob later co-founded thought leadership strategy firm Bloom Group with Bernie Thiel, a professional services industry veteran. After Bernie departed, Bob relaunched the firm, expanding his client base to include leading management consulting, IT, software, training and development, architecture services firms. Bob started his career as a business journalist for eight years at the Orange County Register (Calif.), InformationWeek, and Miramar Publications.
Top Accomplishments … Business process re-engineering elevated CSC Index’s annual revenue from $40 million to more than $200 million in six years … lead author on one of the first books on thought leadership marketing (Thoughts on Thought Leadership), a compendium of Bloom Group’s writings from 1998 to 2008 … recently published an award-winning definitive guide to thought leadership excellence, Competing on Thought Leadership … helped clients develop and publish dozens of articles in Harvard Business Review, Forbes, MIT Sloan Management Review, Financial Times, Bloomberg BusinessWeek, etc. … assisted clients on two bestselling books, Monetizing Innovation and Mighty Midsized Companies … conducted the first research on thought leadership best practices in 2005 … developed the first seminars on thought leadership (with the Association of Management Consulting Firms) in the 2010s, before co-launching “Profiting from Thought Leadership” with Rattleback in 2016 … lead researcher on six thought leadership marketing studies over the last ten years.
Hot Buttons … research study development … argument framing … creating and executing thought leadership strategies … building compelling content … attracting and engaging a large but targeted audience to that content … converting blockbuster ideas into op-ed articles in prestigious publications and best-selling books … thought leadership education and training.
PTL 2022 Focus … Bob will lead several sessions where he’ll share the research methods behind some of the biggest management concepts of the last three decades and opportunities to improve on those methods and draw on his experience, and our 2022 research, on problems in the “supply side” of thought leadership.
Register for This Year’s Conference