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A Series of Articles
by Doug Allston, President,
Advantage Consulting
Article
#1 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
In a recent advertisement from one of our competitors they said business
development is an art, not a science. That statement is not only wrong
but it is also one of the main reasons why companies have problems with
business development. Business development is not witchcraft that only
the initiated few can know the secrets and all others are excluded. It is
this myth that gets more companies into trouble and gets more BD
professionals fired then probably anything else. Over the next several
weeks I am going to take this myth apart and demonstrate to you why it is
a myth and why business development is far more science then art.
To understand
business development we have to understand our client and ourselves. Our
clients are reasonable intelligent, self-interested people who want to
make the best decisions possible for their organization and for them
personally. In other words, they are just like you and me. Would you hire
a new employee, even one whose job is not all that important, simply from
a resume? Even for a very junior position you will interview. You
probably will check references. For a more important position you will
have multiple people probably do multiple interviews. Finally, if
possible you will hire the candidate that is recommended by someone you
know and respect. When you or I make a decision like hiring an employee
we know it is a costly process and if we make a bad decision it could be
extremely costly in both money and time. We want to get as much
information on our choices as possible so we can make the best possible
decision.
When the government
hires a contractor they are hiring a few or maybe hundreds of employees.
If their decision is not a good one it could be a very costly mistake, a
mistake that not only costs the government money but costs the government
employee’s time, energy, and even their careers. So, why would anyone
think a reasonably intelligent government person would hire a contractor
simply on a proposal (company resume) if they can get additional
information on the contractor. The government employees would like to
have several interviews and several opportunities to see the people they
are hiring actually work. If you were the government employee isn’t this
what you would do if you could?
Next, I will look at
the myth that business development is a separate company function.
Article
#2 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
In a previous article I established that our client’s are reasonably
intelligent, self-interested people like you and me. I also showed you
that hiring a contractor is very much handled the same way that you and I
would hire a new employee. We want as much information as possible so we
can make the best possible decision. In this article let’s look at the
myth that business development is a separate function in a company.
Business development
can not stand on its own. It has no product or service to offer the
client. The government employee gains no value from anything Business
Developer has to offer. The only value business development has is the
marriage of the client’s needs and requirements with our operational
staff of technical skills and line management and therefore the solution
of their requirements. I have never heard of a single case where the
government hired the company because of the business developer.
Ultimately, the government is hiring your technical and line management
people to do the work, not your business developers.
Since the client is
contracting the services of your technical staff and line managers I
would strongly suggest that the best business development structure is
one where the business development staff is integrated with the
operational staff and not a separate, stand alone organization.
Article
#3 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
Far too often we find the lines of responsibility for growth within a
company are blurred. Typically the line manager’s responsibility is to
manage the existing contracts and work. They may also have responsibility
for winning new task orders on their existing ID/IQ contracts. The
business developer is typically responsible for identifying and winning
new contracts. But what happens when we are not growing as a company?
The line manager may
not have a client who can give us more business, business over and above
what we already have. In other words, their particular client can not be
grown.
The business
developer identifies new contracts we can pursue, but, who does the
pursuit? The only way you are going to win that new business is if we can
get our line managers and technical staff in front of this potentially
new client. But the line managers and technical staff are already focused
on taking good care of their existing client and winning new contracts is
the business developer’s responsibility.
We have a dilemma.
The only solution to ensuring growth in a company is to have a single
point of responsibility and authority for growth. The logical person for
this responsibility is the senior manager and not the business
development staff. Therefore our recommendation based on the best
practices of successful companies is that the Vice President for your
Navy clients is responsible for the growth of our Navy business to
include both growing our existing contracts and winning new contracts
with the Navy. The VP should have their share of the business development
staff working for them to assist them. If the Navy business is not
growing then it is this VP who is held accountable.
Next time we will
discuss why you should have a VP of Navy business.
Article
#4 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
In the last article in this series I suggested the ultimate
responsibility for business growth has to be senior operations management
and that they should be structured by a client group. The business
development staff works for these senior managers. The prevailing
organizational structure in the industry is to organize based on what we
do as a company. Companies have VP’s of engineering, IT, Networking, etc.
As a company we think of ourselves as engineering or IT companies.
However, you do not have a single engineering or IT contract or client.
Every one of your contracts is with a government organization. You have a
contract with the NAVSEA to provide IT services. There is no one in
NAVSEA name IT who gave you this contract. Joe and Martha in NAVSEA hired
you to do IT for them. Mr. IT does not pay you. Joe and Martha in NAVSEA
pay you. Mr. IT is not going to give you more business. Joe and Martha of
NAVSEA may.
As companies we have
clients. We do things for these clients. In fact we may do lots of
different thing for the same client. If we are not, we would like to. We
should organize ourselves based on clients. If you have one contract with
NAVSEA then management is focused on the next higher and broader level –
Navy. You should have a VP for Navy Support and Services. This VP manages
all services and support to the NAVY and all business development
activities related to the Navy.
The Homeland Defense
reorganization is an interesting problem for companies. Each of the
twenty two agencies that make up HD has a mission and separate identity
as an organization. However, the government recognized a very important
additional mission that each of them participate in and created a super
organization to control and coordinate these agencies. Well folks, if you
plan to be a player in Homeland Defense you better organize yourselves
accordingly. You need a VP or maybe even a President focused on homeland
Defense who is focused on this government organization and who can
coordinate your company efforts, to include business development, with
this super government agency. Your VP for the Coast Guard should work for
them.
Next time we will
examine what the business developer who works for your VP of Navy Support
and Services should be doing and their role in your corporate structure.
Article
#5 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
In my last article in this series I hope I made the case for organizing
your company focused on clients. Your VP of the client agency is your
Warlord for the client to include all aspects of business development.
Your business development assets work for this operations manager. There
are two reasons for this organization. First, you have a single person
responsible for servicing and growing the client. When you have more then
one person responsible for something you have no one responsible. Second,
with a client focus companies tend to focus on providing what the client
wants and needs rather then just trying to sell them our products or
services. This client focus also helps to breakdown the stove pipes of
technology or function that tend to develop in companies that are
organized by technology or function.
The role of the
business developers in this client focused organization tends to be more
managers of the business development process, coach, and supporter and
less the great hunter who feeds the clan. It’s all about leverage!!!!! We
leverage the professional knowledge and experience by infusing that
knowledge and experience across dozens of technical staff and line
managers. We leverage the contacts of the technical staff and line
management back to the professionals experience and knowledge. With more
resources available to the business development process we are able to
actually engage in real capture processes. Actually get to know
prospective clients and understand their requirements, needs, and most
importantly their dreams. We can actually demonstrate to prospective
clients we are the company and people they should want to work with.
Next time I will
write about the wall of distrust and misunderstanding that typically
exists in companies between the operational staff and your business
development staff and how this client focus helps to break that wall
down.
P.S. I have had
several comments from small companies regarding this series of articles.
Let there be no confusion. The smaller you are the more you need to be
client focused and therefore organized. It is all about leveraging your
people, their time, and expertise. With fewer resources the more you need
to leverage their use and value.
Article
#6 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
In our last article I suggested you organize your company focused on
clients or groups of related clients with a VP in charge and responsible
for growing that business. You business developer works for the VP. In
this article I will cover some of the duties of this Division level
business developer. Let’s look at the “finding” business process. The
typical small to mid-size company have a ratio of one business developer
for every 100 to 200 operational employees on average. For our purpose we
will compromise at 150 people. The typical BD person can know and work
with up to 60 contacts. Our experience is that the typical operational
person knows and can work with five to ten contacts. That means your
operational people can be monitoring 750 to 1,500 contacts for
information related to new business while your business developer has 60
contacts. Ok, let say we can only get half the operational staff to play
our game. That means they are monitoring 375 to 750 people. I think you
see the point. Maybe we should not worry about the business developers 60
contacts. Instead, let’s have them focus on coaching, managing, and
supporting the operational staff’s “finding” new business. In this way we
leverage their knowledge and experience and at the same time tap into a
much larger pool of contacts for information on new business. But Doug,
the business developer is much better at talking with people and knowing
what to say. That is probably true. This is especially true when talking
with strangers. However, our operational staff is talking with people
they know and who know them. Our conclusion is to have the business
developer focus on a few major procurements and spend most of their time
coaching, managing, and supporting the business development system of the
company for finding new business. Next time, I will look at the business
developer’s role in your Capture Process.
Article
#7 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
In my last article in this series I hope I made the case for organizing
your company focused on clients. Your VP of the client agency is your
Warlord for the client to include all aspects of business development.
Your business development assets work for this operations manager. There
are two reasons for this organization. First, you have a single person
responsible for servicing and growing the client. When you have more then
one person responsible for something you have no one responsible. Second,
with a client focus companies tend to focus on providing what the client
wants and needs rather then just trying to sell them their products or
services. This client focus also helps to breakdown the stove pipes of
technology or function that tend to develop in companies that are
organized by technology or function. The role of the business developers
in this client focused organization tends to be more managers of the
business development process, coach, and supporter and less the great
hunter who feeds the clan. It’s all about leverage!!!!! We leverage the
professional knowledge and experience by infusing that knowledge and
experience across dozens of technical staff and line managers. We
leverage the contacts of the technical staff and line management back to
the professional staff’s experience and knowledge. With more resources
available to the business development process we are able to actually
engage in real capture processes. We actually get to know prospective
clients and understand their requirements, needs, and most importantly
their dreams. We can actually demonstrate to prospective clients that we are
the company and people they should want to work with. Next time I will
write about the wall of distrust and misunderstanding that typically
exists in companies between the operational staff and your business
development staff and how this client focus helps to break that wall
down. Doug Allston P.S. I have
had several comments from small companies regarding this series of
articles. Let there be no confusion. The smaller you are the more you
need to be client focused and therefore organized. It is all about
leveraging your people, their time, and expertise. With fewer resources
the more you need to leverage your people.
Article
#8 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
This time I will write about the wall of distrust and misunderstanding
that typically exists in companies between the operational staff and your
business development staff and how a client focus helps to break that
wall down. It is an old story. The business developers view the
operational staff as the pawns in the game. They hear from the
operational staff how they are over-selling their capabilities. The
operational staff seems reluctant or not interested in helping the BD
staff win the business. If the BD staff gets them in front of the client
they more often then not will screw things up. Of course, the BD staff is
always faced with the ever present comment, what is the charge number?
The operations staff, technical people and line mangers, sees the BD
staff as an on-going expense, over paid, with little to show for it. The
operational staff has to find most of their own business and still pay
the overhead charges of the BD staff. The BD staff are those people with
the fancy clothes and cars who are always going to lunch and do not
generate revenue. The funny thing about these stereo types is that they
are true. Fortunately, it does not matter. If the company is going to be
successful these two groups have to be joined and work together because
they both have a major role in winning. The client focus that we have
written about before helps solve this problem. The operational staff is
client focused. It is how they work and related to clients. Yes, good
work generates new business; however, it generates a lot more when you
systematically pursue it and that is what the BD staff knows how to do.
Clients don’t hire your BD staff. They hire your operational staff;
however, the operational staff is already too busy to develop new
business until they are not to busy?. Then it is too late. The client
focus puts the horse before the cart. Operations are the horse. Business
development should belong to the operations people. Besides, they already
own the resources to be successful. Next time, I will look at the
strategic planning.
Article
#9 - Business Development an Art or a Science?
Today I want to discuss the issues of core competencies and strategic
planning. Core competencies are the things you do well as a company. They
tend to define the company. We are a software development company or we
are an engineering services company. Because they are what you are good
at they also help define your marketplace. They also get companies into
trouble. The reason why companies write losing proposals is the knowledge
that they can do the work. It is the reason why FedBizOps is still in
business and why the Commerce Business Daily (CBD) survived all those
years. The only problem is there are two questions that need to have
positive answers before you are likely to win. First, can we do the work?
Second, are they likely to give us a chance to do the work? Most
companies do not do a good job measuring their answer to the second
question. The typical strategic plan is based on core competencies when
in fact it should be focused on who is likely to allow you to work. The
core competency approach is selling. I have this solution (product or
service) and I am looking for a client to buy it. That is selling as
viewed by the prospective client. Your focus is my money, your solution,
then my problem and last me. Business development is focused on clients
and helping solve their problems. It is focused on people, their problem,
then your solutions, and finally if we do this we get paid. Your
strategic plan should be about winning and that is about people, not your
core competencies.
Please Contact Us
with your questions or comments or to obtain more information
Advantage
Consulting, Inc. ™
7611 Little River Turnpike, Suite 204 West, Annandale, VA 22003-2407 USA
VOICE: 703-642-5153, FAX: 703-658-0159
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Advantage Consulting, Inc.™
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