Are the well known great thinkers of the world also great at self promotion and getting their thoughts listened to or did they rely on supporters and advocates to convince the world they had something important to say?
Just looking at my own small sampling of people I have worked with over the years I have seen many great thinkers in the work place fail to thrive in industry simply because they lacked presentation and persuasiveness. The bosses usually knew who to come to for solutions and such individuals were usually able to secure a position but seldom got promotions.
Have any of the large successful corporations developed systems of advocacy within their own operations that sought out and promoted the silent thinkers within their own ranks?
Well, Einstein’s thoughts were revolutionary and flew in the face of what people knew about physics of the time (not to mention common sense. Light has weight? Ridiculous!). When they were confirmed, it created a stir in the sciences, which spilled over into public consciousness. He never tried to gain fame outside of his work, but fame came to him due to his theory and also because it was overhyped by the press.
IMHO this is not limited to great thinkers. In ANY endeavor, the ability to promote yourself is a skill separate from the skill being promoted.
In my long career I have seen highly talented productive people who did not have the social skills of self promotion - they were good at many aspects of their jobs, they got good raises, a few minor promotions along the way. Whereas, there were others who were fine at their jobs, just fine, but who had the knack for self promotion - now they are in leadership positions.
And by self promotion I’m not talking about Trumpish braggadocio and fabulism, instead a combination of social savvy, some political acumen, and the ability to talk about their work accomplishments and plans in a way that resonates with others. It is never enough to think, “The work speaks for itself.”
There was this one guy who I used to privately joke about:
Guy: Oh, boss, I see you need to have that paper photocopied, I see you are very busy, may I take care of that for you?
Guy: Everyone, please make way, I need to take care of this important photocopying assignment for the boss!
Guy: I will now photocopy this important document for the boss!
{presses copy button} wooooosh!
Guy: I have completed photocopying this important document for the boss! (Thunderous applause!)
Regarding Einstein, he must have had some opportunities to promote his ideas, else they would never had entered the public consciousness.
Compare him to Gregor Mendel. He made significant discoveries, but his work was not promoted in his lifetime. It took others to discover what he had done much later.
One of the reasons I brought this thread up has to do with the concept of a “Culture of Collaboration” For the past decade I have been obsessed with the idea of social media collaboration sites that became a part of our everyday lives. There are stacks of great books on the subject explaining the dynamics behind collaborating as well as the pitfalls. Some of them delve deeply into the potential benefits collaborating can have on us as individuals. The problem is no one is reading these books. They are long, drawn out studies on human behavior and interaction etc, really boring stuff.
My thoughts are that if a system of advocacy could be incorporated into this concept it would have a much better chance of gaining a foothold. The advocacy would start with the concept itself. Advocating the concept through fiction and screen plays demonstrating a system at work instead of boring explanations on how it could or should work.
The incorporation of advocacy into the concept of collaborating would open the field up to the masses in general as it recognizes and employs skills and talents not formerly valued so much in collaboration groups. For example: you may have a great idea about something but are terrible at expressing your thoughts. With the advocacy system people who were talented at recognizing could ideas might pick up your thought or idea and either expand on it themselves or get the attention of someone better qualified to expand on it. Good writers would be at a premium and would be valued at all stages of collaborating.
I have been participating in internet collaborations for close to 20 years. Some of them are short lived and some of them are ongoing but the one thing they have in common is that they are very motivating once we find our self immersed in them. I believe it gives a lot more people a much better chance of finding their niches in life and areas they can create value in themselves.
Tesla was well known by his contemporaries. He was the go to expert rhat the New York press went to on electical engineering issues. He had a bunch of successful lecture tours, including one in Berlin that was attended by the Kaiser’s brother. He was made a member of the Order of the White Eagle, Yugoslavia’s second highest honor, and the Order of the White Lion, Czechoslovakia’s highest honor. When he died, over 2000 people came to his funeral mass, including the Yugoslav ambassador and representatives from General Electric and Westinghouse.
That could well apply to future geniuses who are in the habit of such collaboration. It was one of the points of colleges and universities, to bring great minds together, the geniuses were spread pretty thinly among the schools, often with just one stand-out among lesser peers, though not at all always the case. The high water marks for intelligence may not be the key factors for a future like that though, the high rate of communication and parallel processing might achieve the results through more garden variety geniuses who are just good at utilizing the interaction.