What should executive positioning and narrative work include?

Executive positioning should define which stakeholders need the executive, which subjects they can address credibly, what evidence supports their positions, and where their public role stops. The narrative should connect the executive's relevant history, decisions, evidence, and current point of view without inventing a cleaner story than the facts support. Buy a working foundation that helps the team make consistent decisions across channels.

Require research before approving the narrative

A credible provider reviews company strategy, executive history, existing coverage and content, priority stakeholders, competitors or peers, category language, relevant public records, and available research. Interviews should include the executive and people who understand the company, stakeholder needs, and foreseeable risks.

Require a research log that distinguishes:

• the executive's firsthand experience;
• approved company facts and source records;
• published research and public records;
• stakeholder interviews or other audience research;
• provider interpretation; and
• open questions, contradictions, and missing evidence.

Confirm permission and required privacy or confidentiality review before using customer, employee, or partner examples. Performance, scientific, financial, legal, employment, and market claims may need specialist substantiation. The provider should identify when another executive or the company is the more qualified source.

Approve explicit choices about audience, subject, and boundaries

Require the approved foundation to state:

• the stakeholder groups and decisions the work is intended to support;
• the executive's relevant qualifications and direct experience;
• a small set of subjects the executive can address credibly;
• the useful point of view on each subject and its supporting evidence;
• where the view differs from conventional practice or competing explanations;
• limits, counterevidence, unknowns, and claims the executive will not make;
• personal, company, confidential, legal, political, and safety boundaries; and
• the role of other executives and company channels.

The provider recommends choices and explains the evidence. The executive owns their attributed judgment, identity, and personal boundaries. The company approves company facts and positions and owns organizational risk. The program manager maintains the approved system, while the payer controls the budget. Record rights in the executive's identity and preexisting ideas instead of inferring them from payment.

If personal and company objectives differ, record both and set their priority. A founder seeking a long-term professional profile may want portable positioning, while the company may be funding a short-term category campaign. The three-party objective test should settle that conflict before production begins.

Require outputs that support publishing and opportunity decisions

Usable outputs can include a positioning statement, stakeholder map, topic and evidence map, narrative architecture, biography variants, message and proof library, personal-versus-company boundary notes, issue-response principles, and an opportunity filter. Every factual claim should have a source, version date, owner, approval status, and review trigger.

Test the materials against real decisions:

• Can a writer trace every consequential claim?
• Can a publicist accept or reject an opportunity by subject and audience?
• Can a reviewer identify the factual and risk approvers?
• Can the executive recognize and defend the actual position?
• Can the team adapt it by channel without changing its meaning?

The foundation should feed thought leadership and ghostwriting and executive media relations. Each channel needs its own format and editorial process; consistency means preserving the position and evidence.

Accept and revise the work through evidence

At acceptance, ask what the research changed, which subjects were excluded, which claims remain unverified, and where stakeholder evidence contradicts internal assumptions. A polished deck with no source trail or exclusion decisions is incomplete.

Set revision triggers for a change in role, strategy, company status, regulation, evidence, or public context. The AMEC Integrated Evaluation Framework separates communication outputs from audience response, outcomes, and organizational impact. Use that distinction to evaluate whether the positioning improved stakeholder understanding or another defined outcome, beyond increasing content volume.

Record ownership and permitted use for research, interview recordings, transcripts, drafts, message libraries, and final materials. Resolve reuse after the executive changes roles or the provider leaves in the contract rights and exit terms.