Thought Leadership in Action: Making Big Ideas Accessible | Lisa DeFrank-Cole

 

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Turning Research into Actionable Thought Leadership

Dr. Lisa DeFrank-Cole shares her journey from a coal mining town to academia, highlighting the importance of synthesizing leadership research to make it accessible for future generations. She discusses the challenges of bridging academia and real-world leadership, and the need for proactive thought leadership to amplify ideas beyond the classroom.

Where do big ideas come from, and how do we make them accessible to the next generation? Thought leadership isn’t just about creating new ideas—it’s about synthesizing insights and making them available to those who need them most. In this episode of Leveraging Thought Leadership, we explore the fascinating journey of Dr. Lisa DeFrank-Cole, professor and director of Leadership Studies at West Virginia University. From growing up in a coal mining town to becoming an author and academic leader, Lisa’s story is one of perseverance, curiosity, and impact.

Lisa shares how she identified a critical gap in leadership education—women in leadership—and turned it into an award-winning textbook Women and Leadership: Journey Towards Equity that’s now shaping classrooms across the country. She dives into the importance of synthesizing research to make complex ideas more digestible and highlights the role of educators in bridging the gap between academia and real-world application.

We also explore the challenges of taking thought leadership beyond the classroom. Lisa discusses the need for visibility, the power of speaking up, and the reality that simply writing a book isn’t enough. Thought leadership requires patience, persistence, and proactive engagement to truly make an impact.

If you’ve ever wondered how to turn your ideas into something tangible and enterprise-ready, this conversation will give you valuable insights. Ready to learn how to connect ideas with the audiences who need them most?

Three Key Takeaways

Thought leadership requires synthesis, not just creation. Making complex ideas accessible to a broader audience is crucial for driving real impact and fostering new generations of leaders.

Bridging the gap between academia and practice takes effort. Sharing insights beyond the classroom requires proactive engagement, visibility, and a willingness to step outside traditional academic circles.

Opportunities arise when you speak up. Whether it’s writing a book or seeking new platforms, voicing ideas to the right people can open unexpected doors and create meaningful change.

Lisa found opportunities by speaking up. Take a look at this infographic for ideas on Discovering Thought Leadership Opportunities in the Digital Age.

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Transcript

Bill Sherman Where does the work of synthesis fit into thought leadership? We often oversimplify while leadership is the creation and dissemination of big new ideas. Yet there’s a need to synthesize the many conversations in a field of study and make these insights available to beginners. Because if there’s no synthesis, then experts talk amongst themselves in a closed loop conversation. Today we explore the thought leadership journey of Dr. Lisa de Frank Cole, professor and director of leadership Studies at West Virginia University and coauthor of the award-winning textbook Women in Leadership Journey towards Equity. Lisa’s path from a coalmining community to academia underscores the power of perseverance and curiosity. We talk about her work as a synthesizer of research and how she makes ideas accessible to the next generation of learners and leaders. I’m Bill Sherman, and you’re listening to Leveraging Thought Leadership. Ready? Let’s begin. Welcome to the show, Lisa.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Hi, Bill. It’s great to be here.

Bill Sherman So I want to talk about a couple of things and I want to start with your journey to academia, specifically where you started and where you grew up. Can you paint the picture for the audience there?

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Yeah, it’s a really interesting journey. I grew up in Appalachia in southwestern Pennsylvania, near a coal mine. My mother grew up in this same coal mining community. It’s called Almond, and it was named after the person who owned the mine. And when my mother grew up there, it was a deep mine. So her dad dug coal underground. He was over six feet tall and the seam of coal was about five feet tall. So he was on his hands and knees most of the time when I grew up in almond. It was a strip mine or a surface mine. So what that means is they take off the top layer of the ground and they’re able to go and access the coal with heavy equipment. So no more crawling on hands and knees. And so as a first generation low income college graduate and growing up in rural poverty, this was a really big deal to think about going to college. And because I’m the youngest of four children, my mother encouraged me, but also my siblings encouraged me to go. And there was always doubt about whether or not we would be able to afford for me to go. And thankfully, due to federal and state level financial aid and scholarships and a lot of student loans, I was able to make my way to college and loved it, so much so that I wanted to go on to graduate school and then was able.

Bill Sherman And then you stayed basically, right, and.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Then turned around. I worked in state government for a little while and then returned and was able to become a full professor at West Virginia University.

Bill Sherman So. One other piece of level set for our audience. Talk about how you got into the field that you do in academia.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole So I’m a professor of leadership. And when I was a college student, there were no classes on leadership per se. It really wasn’t a field. And in the late 80s, early 90s, there started cropping up departments of leadership and actual full on majors and then graduate programs. What have you. But when I was a student, as I said, they weren’t there. So my interest was in higher education. That is what I saw as the pathway that gave me opportunities. And I really liked the feel of being on a college campus. So I pursued a program in higher education administration, and that is what my doctoral degree is in. And so I’ve taken what I’ve learned about administration and leadership Theory is leadership’s theory, regardless of the specific field in which you’re learning it. So I took what I was learning out of higher education administration and applied it to this new and developing program at West Virginia University, which was the Leadership Studies Program. So I think I’ve always been interested in leadership. And I was really pleased when I found this program that I, being a professor, was never my goal. I just I thought I would be an administrator. But when this program was presented to me and said, Well, you know, you have this background, would you consider teaching here? And I’m like, Sure. I think I would like that a lot. And so it was kind of a happenstance, accidental kind of moving from one thing to another and the opportunity presented itself. And so I was in the right place at the right time.

Bill Sherman So, Lisa, you wound up recognizing a gap in the textbooks based on what you were teaching and a need for a textbook on women in leadership. Can you tell us about that?

Lisa DeFrank-Cole So my I have a coauthor, Sheryl Tan, and I wrote the textbook on women and leadership. And when I was doing my doctoral dissertation in higher Education administration, I was very interested in the presidency. And then more than 20 years ago, as now, we don’t see as many women serving in senior leadership positions at colleges and universities. There’s only about a third of college and university presidents who are women across the country. So I was very interested in that. So I did a study about the differences and male and female perceptions of leadership at the presidential level. And so I think that kind of got me started in this academic type of pursuit about women in leadership. And I just kept chiseling away at it. A little study here, a program here, leadership development there. And I’m like, wow, I could actually dig into this subject and do more with it. And through I wouldn’t call myself a research professor. And so research is not something I do a lot of. I do some I do mainly teaching and administration in my unit. But it compelled me, like doing some of these smaller studies compelled me. And I became so interested that I taught a class at West Virginia University called Women in Leadership since I worked in the Leadership Studies program. And I didn’t have a textbook to use. There wasn’t one. And my college.

Bill Sherman Only so many articles that you can have students go photocopy and read. Right? Or here’s the creeps.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Yeah, exactly. And I don’t know about you, Bill, when you were a student, but I always liked having a textbook. It kind of gave me the layout of where we were going for as a.

Bill Sherman Certainly for undergraduate, my experience was different in grad school because my textbooks, I was doing graduate work in theater and then English literature. And so the textbooks are the actual books themselves.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Right, Right. Yeah. But as an undergrad, Yeah.

Bill Sherman Absolutely. Yeah.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Different. Expect a roadmap. Yeah. And so it was such a wonderful experience. And do we have time? Could I tell you the story about how that kind of put together? So my colleague, my coauthor, Cheryl Tan, and I, we had done some work with Sage Publishing and they’re a large academic publisher and we were doing some video type work with them. And at the end of this video process, the man who worked at Sage, he says, you know, is there anything else you’d like to share? This has been a really good experience. And I said, you know what? What would really be need? You know what would be great if Sage actually published a textbook on women in leadership? Both Cheryl and I have taught a class on women in leadership and cobbled together articles and information from other sources, but there’s just not a definitive textbook as there is kind of in just mainstream leadership. There was kind of a go to textbook that Sage had published. So he says, Do you all want to write that textbook? I was like, What? Us, Right? That textbook. And. It really caught us off guard. I wasn’t thinking that I would have been one of the people to write a textbook. Again, from a lot of levels, from where we started, as you talked about growing up in a coal mining community, you know, basically the distance of a football field away from a surface mine to not being sure if I would be able to make it through college. It did take me six years as an undergrad before I graduated, so I struggled. But ultimately I loved it and I thought, Wow, you know, there aren’t a lot of people who write textbooks who have a background like mine. And so on a lot of levels, as I said, this feeling of getting to contribute to the leadership literature in this way was just a phenomenal feeling. And so this man, Michael Carmichael, he says, you know, I actually know the editor of that textbook that you’re talking about on leadership. Would you like me to do an introduction for you? And I said, Yeah, you know, my colleague and I are like, Sure. So good is his word. The next day he copies us in on an email and said, You know, Hey, I met Maggie and, you know, she’d be interested in talking to you. So we set up a meeting, a zoom meeting with Maggie and. She said, submit a proposal. We submitted a proposal. Lined out these chapters. I mean, this was totally unexpected. And she’s like, you know, we were actually looking for someone to write a book, a textbook on women in leadership and. A few years later, we were holding it in our hands. And that has it’s just been one of the most professional accomplishments about which I’m most proud.

Bill Sherman Thank you actually, for sharing that story. One of the things that I want to underline on that is. The moment where you said, Hey, let me mention this to the right person at the end of a long day together. Right. And what I’ve heard from other academics as well as other authors who are not academics. Sometimes the act of mentioning the idea for the book creates the opportunity, regardless of your qualifications. And I know some people who raise their hand to do a book and they’re like, That’s a good idea. Someone should do it. How about you? And in your case, you had the qualifications. You had the challenge of being the professor who was trying to teach a topic that didn’t have a textbook. And you’re going. There are other people out there like me. There’s a need for this, right? So part of thought leadership is that ability to speak up and define the need in front of the people who need to hear it. And you’ve also talked about something else that I want to explore. You said, I don’t do a lot of primary research myself, but you described yourself as a synthesizer of research. How do you see yourself and what does a synthesizer researcher do?

Lisa DeFrank-Cole My husband really enjoys science fiction, science fiction. And one of his favorite authors is Isaac Asimov. And. He was a professor and he didn’t do a lot of research, but yet he and Carl Sagan, another well-known name, these folks explained they were seen as great explainers of concepts that may be more difficult for people to understand. And I think I found more joy in explaining the ideas behind women and leadership to people and citing researchers who actually would dig in and do the research rather than doing the behind-the-scenes research myself. I’ve done some of it. But I really liked sharing it more than I like doing the actual research itself, so. Like looking at other people who have done this type of work in the past. I thought, well, you know, not every professor has to do the actual nuts and bolts original research, primary research themselves. We need both. We need people to do that research and we need people to explain it. And so I saw this textbook as a way to explain more of the research that was already out there and just kind of put it into to one place and into multiple chapters.

Bill Sherman If you’re enjoying this episode of Leveraging Thought Leadership, please make sure to subscribe. If you’d like to help spread the word about our podcast. Please leave a five-star review at ratethispodcast.com/ltl and share it with your friends. We’re available on Apple Podcasts and on all major listening apps as well as ThoughtLeadershipLeverage.com/podcasts.

Bill Sherman There’s a couple of pieces there. It’s a different there are different skill sets involved. There’s also different areas of interest of what brings you joy. Some people have great joy coming up with research hypotheses and figuring out what the methods should be and then testing those. Others people thrill on the data analysis. And there’s also this great need, especially when you talk about the academic practitioner divide and even passing on knowledge to be able to evaluate which research studies are the most reliable. Which ones are the most relevant, and to be able to take a body of research work and synthesize that into a textbook that provides a foundation for people who want to start their journey into the topic but may not have the same level of understanding of the topic. To know how this study was actually overturned by further research. What we thought was significant was actually just random error. Right?

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Yeah. Yeah. No, thank you for. For bringing that up. I, I want to, like, say. Absolutely. When it comes to different people, have different skill sets and different think things, bring them joy. And women in leadership was, like, brand new. It I would use textbooks that would have a chapter on women in leadership or gender and leadership. And I thought, you know, there’s really a lot more to the study of leadership beyond the theories or the styles or the approaches to leadership. And I wanted to get at more of that nuance. And to be completely honest with you. I learned a boatload when writing this textbook that I never knew, like, for example, the influence of the Native Americans on our governmental systems and that the Native Americans, the Iroquois Confederacy specifically had women as clan mothers who would select the chief of for the tribe, and they would decide where the money would go. And when a woman would get married, the man would move in. And these kind of heterosexual marriages move in with the woman’s family. And our forefathers actually would visit with members of the Iroquois Confederacy in northern New York, and they would take ideas that would then lead to the system of government that we see in the United States today. But I never knew that. And what frustrated me a little bit is that we took some pieces that were very, very good, but we left behind those pieces that enabled and empowered women like the clan. Mothers were empowered. They had more authority and more autonomy than women in, you know, the late 1700s, early 1800s. The clear mothers and women in the Iroquois Confederacy had more than the American U.S. women had. And that was because we also borrowed from the laws of England. And those were saying that you had to own property in order to be a voter. So therefore, women didn’t really own property. A woman would go from her father’s home under the wing or coverture means kind of under the wing of her husband. And therefore she didn’t have she was more attuned to a child, a piece of his property. And so we borrowed pieces from Native Americans, but then also from the laws of England. But we left women out. The pieces that disenfranchized women were utilized more than the laws that could have enfranchised them. So through all of this, I learned so much that I just never knew.

Bill Sherman And it sounds like the process of synthesizing and creating the textbook with your coauthor gave you permission to explore. Absolutely. Thanks.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Absolutely. And so, you know, we started off, you know, why write a textbook about women in leadership and then these historical foundations. We are not just where we are today and in 2024, just accidentally. Well, here we are, you know, on planet Earth having this conversation. Where we are is predicated on where we’ve been. And so we thought it was very important to talk about some of the historical factors that have led us in the United States, particularly women in the United States, to be where we are as it relates to leadership. And so, yeah, it was this permission to dig in. And not only, you know, the federalist system in the United States, but looking at women throughout history who have done amazing things. I am disappointed in myself in some regards that I grew up with the feeling or with the idea, with the notion that women didn’t do much. Me, a professor of leadership who wrote a textbook about women in leadership. I grew up thinking that women didn’t have much to contribute to the leadership conversations. But that’s because I was reading books and textbooks particularly, and historical accounts of men. And there really were a lot of women. I mean, I had heard of Rosa Parks and, you know, Eleanor Roosevelt. But every day women have done so many amazing things. And getting the opportunity to dig into some of those stories and profile women in our textbook. Every chapter has a couple of profiles. That was really fun, and it shored up my understanding that women have always been leaders. It’s just we didn’t talk about them. We didn’t we didn’t really put them in the history books, like we would shine a spotlight on other types of leaders.

Bill Sherman And I want to dive into another type of leadership. Okay. And I want to explore the intersection of two types of leadership. One being women in leadership. And the other is the practice of thought leadership that is bringing ideas into the world and making them accessible to the people who need to hear them, as well as knowing the next step. Where would how would you see connections between your work in women and leadership? And women practicing thought leadership from your research. Is there anything that you could advise or suggest for a woman who wants her ideas to be heard more clearly to make an impact at scale? Change the conversation.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole It’s interesting you ask that question, though, because that’s something that I’m trying to do right now in my own life. I am quite content being a professor of leadership whose research area or whose area of interest is women and leadership. And what I’m realizing is there’s not enough discussion in the mainstream media and literature from people like me, from people who actually study women in leadership and have been students of this area for 20 years or more. And what I’m finding is how I’m trying to do it is like today getting out, being one podcast and trying to share this information with a larger audience outside of academe. I go and I teach and I have 25 wonderful students show up in a college classroom. I really haven’t had to recruit them or twist their arm or publicize to get these students to come and show up. But what I’m recognizing is it’s a different skill set that you mentioned skill sets earlier. It’s a different skill set to try to take this message. Into the mainstream media and literature, writing journals, newspapers, what have you. TV, podcasts, radio. And I want to do that. And I’m recognizing that one piece can lead to something else. And I’m hoping to speak to more corporations or corporate retreats or other forums where folks may want some research based understanding of women in leadership, but given to them in a very easily digestible manner. I, you know, can talk the talk if I needed to about the statistics of women in leadership. But I also want to break things down for people so it’s not hard to understand. I never enjoyed when. People would use jargon in in a from a field that they are familiar with. But I didn’t understand. And I think we need more of that leveling of the bridge between academe and the everyday populations. We need more discussions where we listen to each other and hear each other. And so that’s what I’m trying to do. So I don’t have the exact answer of what is the best way to do it. I’m trying to figure that out because I absolutely want to do more of it and share some of those benefits that women bring as leaders.

Bill Sherman So a few things that I would add. I think you touched on earlier a point that bears repeating that you said, hey, growing up I didn’t have examples of women as leaders or, you know, think that women were able to contribute much. I think and you probably can cite the literature better than I could. There’s a there’s a connection between that mindset growing up and then behaviors of an adult when an opportunity comes by, whether that’s to lead within your organization or to be the one who speaks or the one who writes. It’s that process of being willing to raise your hand and create the opportunity, much like you talked about, or you said after a long day of video recording. So we’ve got this idea. What do you think? The ability to put the idea in front of the people who can open doors or make possibilities happen. That’s part of that proactive practice of thought leadership that becomes essential, whether it’s raising your hand for being a guest on a podcast or saying, Yeah, I can speak to this general business audience.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole It’s, I think, having patience and delayed gratification. If we keep doing the things that we enjoy doing, and I really enjoy writing about talking about doing some research about women in leadership, I feel like over time that will add up to a critical mass and hopefully I’ll be able to share that body of knowledge with other people. So it takes patience. It doesn’t happen overnight. Just because Cheryl and I had a women in leadership textbook get published and it came out in 2022. I remember at the time thinking, well, I mean, lots of people are going to be really interested in knowing about this book. And I’m like, you know, my phone was not ringing off the hook or my email wasn’t blowing up.

Bill Sherman And there were no rainbows and unicorns, you know, on your publication date, you know, what’s the bet?

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Yeah. Well, exactly. There were no rainbows and unicorns. And that’s what led me to think that. Wait a minute. What is it that it takes? And some of it is the recognition that even though Coca-Cola may be one of the most recognizable brands in the world, they have to advertise and they still advertise and continually, continuously advertise and get their message out there. And as a faculty member, that was a very different mindset. When people just show up in your classroom and you’ve not had to advertise much and you know, you’re just kind of doing your thing too, then think about, wait a minute, how do I share this information with people who aren’t at a college or university? It’s a different thinking process about how to do it. And so it took some patience. It did take kind of raising my hand, a willingness to want to do that. And then figuring out what are the venues. Is it disingenuous to kind of advertise oneself? Shouldn’t they just show up automatically if you’re if you’re good enough? Won’t people just if you build it, they will come.

Bill Sherman That’s exactly where I was going to go. I thought, leadership doesn’t work well on the Field of Dreams model, where you wind up standing out in a cornfield going, Where is everybody? I wrote a book or I’m delivering my keynote. Why don’t I have an audience?

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Right, Right. And so that’s what’s new to me is this idea of if you build it, they will come. It doesn’t really work quite that way. You have to do something. You have to build something. So I would consider, you know, our textbook and two edited books to be kind of the building of something, the credibility building and being, you know, in academe for a long time, many, many years. But so I have something built. But to get it out there to two people who aren’t in the university. Yeah, it’s a different mindset. So yeah, so I’m trying to figure that out. And thank you for helping me kind of get the message out.

Bill Sherman Absolutely. And I want to continue this thread a little bit longer in terms of thought leadership as a practice and a journey rather than a destination. I’m going to hand you the magic wand, and it’s five years from now. What challenge would you use the magic wand to overcome? And what does success look like either for reaching an audience or for yourself?

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Thanks for asking the question. I haven’t thought about it quite that way, but it’s a thrill to kind of look into that magic crystal ball and wave my magic wand. I think it’s being called upon to do those speaking engagements, whether it is on television, on the radio, on podcasts, through the mainstream literature, whether it’s newspapers or magazines and people saying, listen, different Cole is an authority on this topic of women in leadership and that I’m booked all the time, that I’m booked to kind of give this information to people in many different ways, in many different digestible forms, because we all learn differently and some people like to listen. Some people like to watch, some people like to read. And I would like to be a part of that sharing of information. What is taken me, as I said, more than 20 years to kind of learn I would like to share with other people, give them some shortcuts, give them some nuggets to chew on. Invite them if they’re interested in a deeper understanding. Here are some resources that you could tap into if you wanted. But yeah, so five years from now. I would like to be doing a lot more, maybe teaching in a different way. Maybe I’m no longer teaching in an academic setting in the same way that I am now, but it’s teaching a general audience, and that would bring me a lot of joy.

Bill Sherman Thank you, Lisa. So I want to thank you for joining us here today and sharing your insights not only on women in leadership, but also your journey so far. And a peek ahead into your journey of leadership.

Lisa DeFrank-Cole Thanks, Bill. It’s been a pleasure to talk with you today.

Bill Sherman Okay. You’ve made it to the end of the episode and that means you’re probably someone deeply interested in thought leadership. Want to learn even more? Here are three recommendations. First, check out the back catalog of our podcast episodes. There are a lot of great conversations with people at the top of their game and thought leadership as well as just starting out second. Subscribe to our newsletter that talks about the business of thought leadership. And finally, feel free to reach out to me. My day job is helping people with big insights take them to scale through the practice of thought leadership. Maybe you’re looking for strategy or maybe you want to polish up your ideas or even create new products and offerings. I’d love to chat with you. Thanks for listening.