Business Development

As you know, new business development (BD) is critical to success. First, I’ve never come across a firm that has a repeat work rate of 100% (I want to hear from you if you do!). Second, to provide advancement opportunities for emerging leaders, you must develop new client and project opportunities.

Perhaps the most challenging aspect of this is getting your foot in the door to begin the relationship-building process. Doing so can be challenging and frustrating for even the most seasoned BD professional. That’s why some firms employ outside lead generators to place the often-dreaded cold calls.

Does it work? Let’s explore.

The Business Case

Any regular reader of The Friedman File knows I’m not a fan of cold calls (see The Death of the Cold Call: May it Rest in Peace). In a nutshell, cold calls typically yield a low ROI and thus have a high […]

I’ve seen a surge in interest for business development (BD) training in the past year or two since the economic rebound. I believe this surge results from two primary factors:

• The financial reality that while most firms are still watching their overhead dollars like a hawk, there is more discretionary money available to fund training initiatives that were put on hold during the recession.
• A reluctance by some firms to (re)hire full-time business developers. Many were let go during the downturn, and some firms have never filled this role. In their place, many firms have doubled down on building a firm-wide BD culture and bolstering their existing seller-doer culture.

In this issue of The Friedman File, I address the long-standing debate about the efficacy of BD training and provide advice on how firms can maximize their return-on-investment (ROI) from training initiatives.

Any discussion of BD training […]

My last The Friedman File, “Full-Time Sales Professionals: Caveat Emptor,” generated lots of response from readers. In fact, it had the highest number of opens in the four-year history of this newsletter. Mission accomplished: I struck a nerve!

Many readers shared their own firm’s struggles with holding seller-doers accountable for selling (many would rather just keep “doing”) and the complexity of measuring the efficacy and value of full-time business developers given today’s complicated, inter-connected sales process.

And so I bring the second in this two-part series. This issue tackles some of the most important questions your firm should ask and attempt to answer regarding hiring and compensating full-time business developers, with helpful insights from some CEOs and BD professionals who’ve been successful.

What should you look for — and avoid — in the hiring process?

Identifying and hiring key sales talent is a real challenge for most […]

Making the most of full-time business developers in A/E/C firms is a topic I’ve struggled with and debated for years, as have many of my clients. Like most marketing and business development (BD) topics, the answers aren’t black and white and one size does not fit all. This issue of The Friedman File is the first of a two-part series on sales professionals. It tackles some of the most important questions your firm should ask and attempt to answer — with helpful insights from a sampling of CEOs and BD professionals.

Why is this topic so sensitive and polarizing?

Let’s face it: sales people, regardless of their skills and the results they achieve, are often misunderstood by fellow staff and even the firm leaders who hire them. The reasons are sometimes complex:

• Extroverted, glad-handing personalities working side-by-side with introverts
• The occasional (or not) long lunches and day-long […]