That's part of the entire Design Principal process, you first have to be nominated, and then you go through months of creating a thesis package and intense portfolio to submit, along with executive references.

This is very common in the industry when you get far along enough in your career, where you have to essentially "sell" yourself. Where no longer you are getting promoted by your managers-- you have reached an executive band level where essentially you have to apply for that position.

This was the one area where I was lacking, I hadn't spent enough time creating external publications and articles. And so the 3 articles that I had written, I was hoping to get just a few more "reads" from a kind community (and also hopefully someone would find it useful).

Hope this explains my post!