Bad at Business Development As An Independent Consultant? The 4-Part Remedy

Author: Melisa Liberman

Host of the ???Grow Your Independent Consulting Business podcast &?

Creator of the?? IC Business Scalability Scorecard

Have you ever thought that you are just BAD at business development?

If you want to be a successful independent consulting business owner, you have to tackle this mindset.

Thinking that you are BAD at business development will keep you from being able to sell, which is a critical component of your business. Otherwise, you don’t have a business.

Believe it or not, I was actually bad at sales once upon a time. I even had a CEO call me sales repellent. So I can understand how you feel.

In today’s article, I’m giving you a process that will help you overcome being bad at business development.?

You’ll be surprised at this remedy.

It’s not what you think.

We’ll uncover:

• The impact of being bad at business development.
• How to know if it is true that you are bad at business development, and what to do about it
• How to know if you’re (unintentionally) lying to yourself that you are bad at business development.
• The 4-part remedy to being bad at business development as an independent consultant.

The impact of being bad at business development in your independent consulting business

Just an FYI- almost every independent consultant that I talk to or work with tells me that they are bad at business development in some way, shape, or form. So you are in good company.?

There are two instances where people believe they are bad at selling.

• Across the board terrible at it.
• Situationally.

So why is it so important to tackle this mindset that you are so bad at business development??

It’s simple. You don’t have a business if you are not selling, aka business development.?

Impact #1 - Thinking you are bad at business development in your independent consulting business creates a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The answer to this question is found by digging into the situation a few layers at a time.?

Oftentimes, when I’m working with my clients through the process of peeling back all these layers, we figure out they actually aren’t that bad at selling.?

They’ve sold things in the past including hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of consulting. But for some reason, they still feel bad at selling.?

This is the human brain’s way of protecting you.?

Then, because you don’t think you are good at selling, you don’t show up as powerfully during the sales process and possibly lose out on a contract you would have made if you had been more confident.?

So thinking you are bad at sales will often lead to you actually being bad at sales.

Impact #2 - Thinking you are bad at business development in your independent consulting business leads to procrastination.

If you think you are bad at business development, you are going to procrastinate on at least one of the following things if not more:

• Lead generation
• Sending proposals
• Scheduling meetings
• Sending invoices

Of course, if you think you are bad at something, it’s going to be that much harder to put yourself out there. So you are inevitably going to procrastinate on doing any of the activities that lead to that. You will end up delaying the process until you no longer can, and then you will rush through it.?

Sure you will still close some deals. But getting rid of the thoughts that lead to this procrastination generates 3 things:

• Realizing that your business development process does not have to be this hard.
• Your close rate can go up dramatically.
• Knowing that If your close rate is already high, then it’s an indication you could be charging a lot more for the services you are providing.

You're running a business so that you can have autonomy, unlimited income potential, and full control over things. There's no reason to torture yourself.?

Scenario #1: You really are bad - What do you do if you truly are “bad” at business development??

An example from a 1st grader learning to read.

My son is in 1st grade and he’s learning to read. I want to give this to you as an example, because I think it's so relevant to the growth that you have as a business owner, and learning to sell your services.?

When it comes to learning to read, he is relaxed. He is:

• Sounding things out.
• Making educated guesses.
• Laughing at his mistakes.
• Comfortable in the fact he should not be born with the ability to read.
• Not thinking that he should be good at reading just because he's good at other things.

You probably know where I’m going with this.?

Just because you are good at one thing doesn't mean that you're automatically going to be good at something else.?

When you can approach being “bad” at business development like my first grader by laughing at your mistakes and not putting so much pressure on yourself, you're going to get to create and build these skills faster.?

Now, let’s compare this to my middle son who is in 3rd grade.?

When it came to him learning to read he got very frustrated by it. He would not want to read more than a page because he was frustrated and it made the process so miserable! It was painful!?

So I share this comparison with you to have you ask yourself where you fall in line. Are you more like my 1st grader or my 3rd grader? Consider these two questions:

1. How much harder is it for you to learn how to be better at something when it’s so painful to do and you think you are so bad at it?
2. What techniques do you need to utilize to help you learn how to get better at it?

You need to think about separating yourself out into the two personas:

1. The CEO who is supporting his/her sales rep.
2. The sales rep who’s navigating a new potential client through to a contract

Scenario #2: You’re lying to yourself, and you’re not bad - how to know.

Are you lying to yourself about being bad at business development in your independent consulting business?

I'm calling you out on this in a loving way. You're lying to yourself because, as humans, we lie to ourselves to protect ourselves from feeling bad.?

As I start unpacking this with my clients, figuring out what their skill level is from a business development perspective, we always uncover everything they know about sales.?

In fact, I was working with a client recently who knew exactly what he was doing from a sales perspective. The only issue is that he wasn’t doing it for himself.?

Here’s a news flash for you. Consultant jobs in large part are persuading someone or a group of people to do something. That’s selling, my friend. You're getting your clients to:

• Buy into a plan or a process that you've recommended to them.
• Share information with you about what's happening in their ecosystem.
• Consider recommendations you have made about how to improve it.?

That is selling all day long. You're also uncovering why they're not taking action, or why they're having challenges in their organization and helping them move forward. That's called a sales cycle.?

Everything you do as a consultant is the same thing you do in a business development process.?

You're understanding:?

• What their challenges are.
• Why they haven't done anything about those challenges.?
• Why they want to do something about the challenges they're having.
• What the goal that they're trying to accomplish is.

Then you are taking that information and crafting a plan for them. The only difference is you happen to be asking for money at the end of it.?

You already do all the activities in a business development process when you are already consulting for someone.?

But you seem to get amnesia about this. That is why it is most often a lie that you are bad at business development.

The 4-Part Remedy to Being Bad (or Thinking You’re Bad) At Business Development as an Independent Consultant

The likelikhood is that you fall somewhere in the middle. You think you’re bad, at least situationally, and you also see where you are lying to yourself that you’re bad at business development.

Here’s the 4-part remedy to get out of this vicious, self-sabotaging cycle:

1. Give yourself credit. Get clear and give yourself credit for what you do know, and what you have accomplished, from a business development perspective.
2. Build your skills. Get into my first grader’s mentality. Be willing to make mistakes without making it such a big deal. Also, get into my third grader’s process. Separate yourself. Think about yourself as the CEO and as the consultant.?
3. Evaluate and iterate. This isn't a hard and fast “I'm bad or I’m good.” This is you learning and purposefully reviewing what's going on so that you can get better. it is so important to do after-action reviews for your sales process. At the end of the sales process, you can continue to refine it. Don't bury your head in the sand because it feels bad to go back and look at what didn't go well and to not give yourself credit for what did go well.
4. Purposefully build up your business development identity. When you just constantly reinforce this idea that you aren't bad at business development, it's going to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is really important for your success as a business owner to actively work on every single day until it's second nature.

Put This All Into Action

1. Go to melisaliberman.com/IPA to download my checklist of 52 Income Producing Activities for Independent Consultants. This will help you start tackling and replacing the idea that you’re “bad at business development” using the concept of micro-actions. Take small, daily actions to build up your confidence in business development.
2. If you are looking to grow and scale your consulting business, and feel like you're stuck on a plateau, and you want to be able to move further, faster, then reach out to me. I would love to talk with you about private coaching. We can figure out if it's a good fit. You can grab a spot on my calendar at consultMelisa.com.