> I can think of at least one counterexample of a person who was extremely prolific with blogging and giving talks at conferences who happened to be absolutely

> I can think of at least one counterexample of a person who was extremely prolific with blogging and giving talks at conferences who happened to be absolutely garbage at their role. My employer once hired someone into a leadership role who we all knew from conferences and press coverage. We were pretty excited to land such a high-profile guy. Turned out, he spent most of his time prepping and going to conferences, and working on his press coverage. Very little actual work got done, and we quietly parted ways with him in less than a year. In retrospect, it’s a bit of a “well duh” moment, connecting the dots. But at the time, we all just assumed that there must be incredible substance for him to have such a high profile. I took a big lesson from that: people who are good at building an audience would be a great hire if you need to build an audience. If you need something else, don’t assume the audience (or conference organizers, or reporters) have actually vetted that person for the skills you need. They probably didn’t. Ultimately, he ended up as an executive at another company, with responsibility for raising their profile and finding new clients. His skills and inclinations are perfect for that.