Here’s something new for 2012 on www.TheSpeechwriter.com: the five-question interview. Throughout the year, I’ll run a series of short interviews with leaders in the fields of speechwriting and executive thought leadership. Some you may have heard of; others perhaps not. But all of them will be people I’ve been fortunate enough to run across and who I believe can add to our understanding of speechwriting and executive communications. So welcome to the inaugural interview with executive visibility maven Terry Catchpole.

The image of a speechwriter whose only job is to write speeches is a bit old-fashioned. Yes, some still make a living doing that as a sole endeavor. But the role has changed over the years. It has expanded and grown as organizations have begun to understand that sometimes it’s not just what you say, but also where you say it and how that fits into a larger communications plan. And with that recognition has come new opportunities for speechwriters to widen their ability to help their organizations and their speakers. There are as many corporate types, for examples, with titles like “executive communications” and “thought leadership” on their business cards. And we’re working on not only individual speeches but thought leadership programs that maximize leaders’ time and energy in very deliberate and focused ways.

With that in mind, I’ve asked one of the leading experts in executive visibility to provide his thoughts on what it takes to more fully develop this other role. Terry Catchpole is Executive Chairman of The Catchpole Group in Boston. For 25 years, Catchpole has been working with companies (full disclosure: he works with Dow) to help them elevate their speakers’ profiles and to more fully develop their thought leadership programs. Although their specialty is sustainability, they are experts in helping organizations that are eager to expand the presence of their leaders.

1Q: Based on your experience, as well as on feedback from clients, how important is it for companies to have an executive visibility speaking program in place for its c-level executives?

1A: The short answer is that it depends on the executives, as some are just not comfortable in a public speaking role and do not feel that it is important for them in delivering value to stakeholders. For most companies and most executives, however, it  is a very important part of their overall corporate communications plan to have a well-considered strategy for having senior executives articulate a series of messages that map to their overall business objectives and for effectively delivering these messages to key target constituencies – customers, partners, investors, and, in some instances, the general public.

2Q: Many organizations have not even considered having an executive visibility speaking program. How would you recommend that they launch such a program?

2A: The best place to start is by identifying the messages that the company wants to communicate to its target constituencies. These “messages” cannot be warmed-over boilerplate about how terrific the companies’ products or services may be. They should be new, compelling, and relevant insights into their market – genuine “thought leadership,” in other words, not lagging-edge cliches trying to pass as such. Next they need to identify the best executive speakers to address facets of the messages set – the CFO or CMO will have a different perspective to share from the CEO, for example. Finally, identify their target stakeholder audiences and the forums where they can be found in attendance – deep due diligence in the conference world.

3Q: What is the most common mistake that companies make in launching an executive visibility speaking program?

3A: There are several. One, alluded to above, is thinking that your marketing copy passes for a thought leadership message, and failing to bring original insight with which you want to establish your executives’ stature as business leaders. Another is failure to cast a wide net in amassing a universe of conferences and other platforms from which your executives might speak and then to perform careful analysis as to the pros and cons of each – you can never have too many forum options or spend too much time researching and analyzing them.  Finally, perhaps the biggest mistake, is failure to respect the role of a conference organizer in understanding his or her attendees and what it is they want to hear from conference speakers – it might not be what you think they should hear or want to tell them. It is very important to be respectful of conference managers’ understanding of their attendees and be flexible in tailoring your messages to be synchronous with their agenda program plans.

4Q: Are there any big trends that you are seeing in trying to place client speakers at conferences and other speaking venues?

4A: Probably the most important development with executive leadership forums is the trend away from the traditional standalone, PowerPoint-driven keynote. What we are seeing instead are highly informal, unscripted sessions featuring three or four c-level speakers interacting with each other, the moderator, and audience members. Or a one-on-one “fireside chat” session with a CEO interacting with a moderator-interviewer, who could be a prominent business journalist or industry analyst.  The solo keynote is a dinosaur that, while never perhaps to be extinct, is seen less and less.

5Q: If you could provide just one piece of adv ice to an organization that is considering launching an executive visibility speaking program, what would it be?

5A: It may be fudging the question a bit, but I would say the one tip would be, “Respect the process” – but under that I would have sub-categories, including:  respect the fact that your “thought leadership” messages should be comprised of “thoughts” that are genuinely “leading” the dialog in your market, and are not lame and stale; respect the fact that conference managers do a lot of research on what their attendees want to hear, and be willing to work with them in providing content that adds value to their attendees’ experience; and respect the fact that your CEO will not always be invited to give a solo keynote presentation and should be prepared to consider participating in informal, interactive sessions with multiple participants  - all of whom should be of comparable stature in terms of title and company, of course.