Why you need a thought partner and how to identify one

Whether you work alone at home or in a corporate office with thousands of other people, it’s so helpful to find someone who can listen to your ideas, offer new ones and build upon them – and who will come to you to do the same. Although you can brainstorm all by yourself with a white board or a blank note pad, it’s a whole lot more fun (not to mention productive) to invite someone else to the party. And it’s fun to be invited to their party.

This mutually beneficial relationship is called thought partnership. I didn’t grasp the importance and honestly, joy of having a great thought partner for my work until much later in my career. Early on, a lot of us are taught to develop our own ideas and solutions and keep them to ourselves until it’s time to deliver or present them so we get full credit. I certainly felt this way as a high school student, and later as a journalist, and again as an academic. Only when I started seeing myself as a creative – which was truly just over the past 10 years even though I like to think I've been creative my whole life – did I really embrace the concept of building up better ideas and strategies with a thought partner. Working with a several amazing thought partners has energized me as a strategist and communicator and certainly made my own work much better.

How do you find an amazing thought partner? Who is this magical person? Here's what to look for:

1. Speak the same language. You must share a baseline language in order to give each other informed feedback, but you don’t necessarily each need to be experts. Are you looking for someone to react to your digital marketing strategy? Then they need to understand the basic technology and capabilities, but they don’t know the details. In fact, it’s more important that they understand strategy. You’re probably not looking for your thought partner to get into the weeds with you. Typically, you just need a little help to flesh out your ideas.

2. Understand the work. Similarly, you should understand each other’s work or industries. The easiest way to ensure that you understand each other’s work is to find someone you used to work with or whom you work with now, but you could branch out to people you've met while networking or friends from college or grad school.

3. Similar communication styles. Find someone whose communication preferences jibe with yours. Do you like to meet up in person and do a little spit-balling on the fly? Awesome! Know that not everyone likes that. In fact, some people dread that kind of invitation and they’d much rather read about your idea and respond to it in email or reach out to you by text or voice memo. Find a partner who is most comfortable communicating in the same way.

4. Ideas, not proofreading. Find someone who is all about giving good “yes ands” and “what ifs” in your conversations. A person who is more about “no, but here’s my idea” is not a thought partner. That person might be a good reviewer or critic if you need one, but the best thought partner can help you expand upon your ideas and not just shoot them down and offer their own. Granted, there’s room in thought partnership for gentle criticism, but the role of a thought partner is to generate ideas and solutions rather than to provide critique or edits.

5. No brain picking. (I know there’s a joke in here somewhere about how you can pick your friends and you can pick your friends’ brains… but I’m going to resist!) I admit I’m not a fan of random people reaching out to “pick my brain” (unless they’re a dear friend or they’re paying me for it), but I also think it’s important not to envision a thought partner as a person who is there only to provide you with answers and ideas. The idea is to bring them ideas and ask for generative, iterative thinking. It’s tough to keep the partnership mutually beneficial if it’s only one sided. Do that and you’re really just making it mental and emotional labor for them.

6. Show gratitude! Do you already have great thought partners? Make sure you thank them for their time and partnership. It can be a challenge to find a person whose thought partnership is a fit, and when you do, make sure that you’re not only being a good partner, but also offering something helpful and valuable to them in return.