What is Business Development?
Tony Gray, BDP
BD ?? Author of the BD-BOK ? Director GBDA ? Certified Business Development Professional ? Certified Master Fitness Trainer
This article is one of a three-part series. The content is found in Chapter 2 of the recently published Business Development Body of Knowledge (BD-BOK) available in digital Kindle edition and paperback on Amazon.
Click?here?to read PART 1 of this three-part series.
1.??????The Business Development Profession
Good business developers grow customers.
Great business developers, keep them.
?
Business developers are champions.?The Mirriam-Webster dictionary defines a champion as "a winner of first prize, and a militant advocate."?In business development, the prize is business growth, and the prize is won through tenacious advocacy for customers.
The business developer's oath is:?"I am a champion.?My mission is to grow the corporation through customer and community advocacy."
Dr. Sorensen defines a business developer as "a person characterized by being an integrating specialist who performs business development activities."?Therefore, business development professionals integrate customer advocacy across all the Business Development Integration Activities.
Quality is defined as a prospect or customer's perception of product benefits. Quality may change throughout the BD value chain. The chart below shows how customer perception of benefit may vary for different types of products.
Product "A" such as a commodity, has self-evident and steady quality throughout the BD value chain.?All other products have benefits that are not self-evident at the beginning of the BD value chain.?
Product "B" shows an ideal product perception pathway where the prospect steadily increases their positive perception of quality and converts into a customer. The customer's positive perception of quality continues to grow until the end of the BD value chain.
Product "C" shows a product perception pathway where the prospect successfully converts.?However, the customer's positive perception of quality decreases during the remainder of the BD value chain.?Unfortunately, this pathway fails to result in sustainable growth.
Product "D" shows a product perception pathway where the prospect fails to convert into a customer as their perception of product quality drops rapidly during the Conversion Phase.?
Product "F" shows a product perception pathway where the prospect successfully converts.?However, the customer's positive perception of quality decreases after the onboarding phase, and the corporation loses the customer before the Growth Phase.?This is typically referred to as "customer churn" or "customer turnover."
Business development aims to facilitate a positive product perception pathway by successfully integrating activities throughout the BD value chain.?Therefore, business developers seek an ideal product pathway that mirrors the Product "B" pathway.
Business development resource requirements depend on the variability of product perception.?Suppose a corporation sells a product similar to Product A. In that case, they require minimal business development resources because the perception of quality is stable, with self-evident and steady perceptions of quality throughout the BD value chain.
Corporations may also automate or systematize the shaping of customer perception of quality during the BD value chain with mass marketing and mass production.?In such cases, the corporation may achieve a product perception pathway resembling the Product A pathway. Corporations with mass-marketed and mass-produced consumer goods seek this pathway.
Business developers are necessary when the customer perception of a product's benefits cannot be fully automated or systematized throughout the BD value chain.?In such cases, the corporation must continually shape and sustain perceptions of quality.?
Business developers are used to achieve a Product "B" perception pathway where business developers help increase the perception of quality throughout the BD value chain.?
Any employee directly influencing prospect or customer perception is a Business Developer.?All other employees still have a role in business development because they support the Business Developers.?Therefore, any employee not directly influencing prospect and customer perceptions is called a Business Development Enabler.?
Every employee has a customer.?The business developer's customer is the buyer of the product.?The Business Development Enabler's customer is the Business Developer.?Business Development Enablers are responsible for efficiently and effectively leveraging corporate assets to support Business Developers, as shown in the Business Development Team Model.
The brand is a container of trust, and branding is the act of filling the Brand Trust with promises kept.?Every employee directly or indirectly impacts the delivery of a corporation's promises to the customer.
The three drivers of Purpose, Empathy, and Truth lead to increased trust. Greater trust increases brand value.?Purpose, Empathy, and Truth also increase employee engagement, leading to positive customer experiences that increases corporate growth.?
Purpose, Empathy, and Truth yield enthusiastic early adopters and corporate partners that increase growth.??Increased brand value yields corporate growth, in turn growing the total value of the corporation. ?Continual cycles of customer advocacy increase Purpose, Empathy, and Truth.?
This continual growth cycle results in the Brand Trust Flywheel continually growing revenue. Therefore, every employee is responsible for implementing the Brand Trust Flywheel to win and keep customers.
A Brief History of the Business Development Profession
Business development is a relatively new profession compared to the sister professions of marketing and sales. ?The first published use of the business development job title was on 25 January 1923, when the San Francisco Stock Exchange announced a new Director of Business Development role.?Conversely, published records show listings of Director of Sales and Director of Marketing jobs originating as early as the mid-1800s.
The volume of sales and marketing positions historically eclipsed the number of business development positions.?However, an interesting shift commenced in the 1960s.?During that decade, the growth rate of published sales and marketing positions peaked. Afterward, sales and marketing leadership position growth rates dropped rapidly around the year 2000.
The rate of published business development positions rapidly grew during the 1980s and 1990s, just as the rate of published sales and marketing positions decelerated.?The rapid growth of business development continues.
As Director of Business Development jobs rapidly grew during the 1980s and 1990s, the Business Development Representative job title started to appear. ?In January 2022, LinkedIn reported the Business Development Representative role as the 6th fastest growing job in the United States. ?
This era ushered in a solid business development career path with Business Development Representatives promoted to the Director of Business Development role.?The career path continued to evolve until the late 1990s, when corporations finally formed a C-Suite title for business development professionals called the Chief Growth Officer.?
The first Chief Growth Officer (CGO) title was published in Calgary, Canada, on 10 May 1997.??This title rapidly grew after 2010.?In November 2020, LinkedIn reported that the Chief Growth Officer title was the second fastest growing C-Suite title in the first ten months of 2020, with 46% growth.?
A February 2021 LinkedIn study found, "Chief Growth Officer – rivaling the Chief Marketing Officer in recent years, the role of Chief Growth Officer increased by 37%. Blending the expertise of marketing, sales, product development, and finance, the Chief Growth Officer helps businesses achieve their strategic objectives."
The business development profession now has a clear path, from the entry level Business Development Representative, up the corporate ladder to the Chief Growth Officer role.?
The business developer has increasing roles, responsibilities, and authority shown in the Business Development Professional Pyramid below.
Each level of the pyramid has a specified Authority and Responsibility.?Authority is the power to influence behavior within an organization.?Responsibility is the act of being accountable for controlling an organization's behavior.
1.1???????Business Development Functional Specialties
Business development functional specialties are the shaded business development integration activities shown below.
·??????Prospect Development:?Many business developers start their BD careers in Prospect Development where they cultivate and nurture prospects through the Activation Phase.
·??????Customer Development:?This specialty collaborates with operations personnel to monitor and nurture the customer experiences that drive corporate growth.
·??????Corporate Development:?These business developers typically enter this specialty from the private equity and investment banking industry with merger and acquisition experience.??They help their corporation conduct successful mergers and acquisitions.
·??????Community Development:?These business developers identify, attract, and collaborate with members of the community to drive corporate growth. This specialty consists of the following sub-specialties:
o??Partner Development:?These business developers create and nurture corporate partnerships to drive growth.
o??Audience Development:?Also called “Community Developers”, these business developers grow and leverage the corporation’s community of prospects, customers, and corporate partners.
o??Economic Development:?They initiate or leverage community assets to promote the starting and growth of corporate partners.
·??????Product Development:?These business developers allocate the corporation's resources to create and continually enhance the corporation’s product(s) based on the needs of the prospects and customers.
·??????Full Cycle Business Development:?These are typically seasoned business developers with mastery of one or multiple business development specialties.?They also have proficiency across all business development integration activities.?They are typically found in Startup corporations where they help the founders achieve initial Product Market Fit and lay the business development foundation for scalable growth.
1.2???????How Many Business Developers Do You Need?
Business development resource requirements depend on four factors:
1.????Product Quality Characteristics:?Products with self-evident quality and sustainable quality, such as commodities, require very few, if any, business development resources. Products with customer perceptions of quality that may vary throughout the BD value chain require more business development resources.
2.????Business Phase: The type and number of business development resources depend upon the phase of the business, as summarized in the graphic below.
3.????Business Orientation:?A corporation's business orientation defines how the corporation delivers value to its customers.?Businesses may be oriented to multiple internal or external factors.?Here are some of the more common business orientations:
Corporations with a Market Orientation typically require the most business development resources since they seek to integrate a superior customer perception of quality throughout the business development value chain.?
Perhaps it should be no surprise that "numerous empirical studies have shown that business ventures that have a market (customer) orientation as their dominant business orientation perform better than their competitors." (Sorenson)?Harvard Professor Ranjay Gulati's 2009 “Reorganize for Resilience” research study also demonstrated that market-oriented businesses were significantly more resilient than product-oriented corporations.
4.????Business Development Scale:?The number of business development resources may decrease as a business increases economies of scale.?Business development scale occurs when a business can grow while business development resource requirements decrease.?
This can be achieved in several ways:
1.3???????Business Development Operations Framework
An operations framework is a hierarchical representation of the roles, responsibilities, and resources to accomplish a business operation.?The graphic below shows the Business Development Operations Framework. ??
The Chief Growth officer creates and leads implementation of the Business Plan.?In turn, the Business Development Managers create and manage campaign plans that directly support the business plan.?The Entry Level Business Developers then generate and implement account plans to support the campaign plans.
The entire business development team ethically implements the Brand Trust Flywheel and integrates the Business Development Growth Model to maximize a positive customer experience for all customers.?
Business Developer Competency and Proficiency Requirements:
Competency is the possession of sufficient knowledge to accomplish a task.??Proficiency is the skills, ability, and experience to accomplish a task.?
In other words, competency is learned by observing, whereas proficiency is learned by doing.?
Business developers must possess competency and proficiency to effectively and efficiently meet their authorities and responsibilities, shown below.
Entry-level business developers must have tactical and operational competency in all Business Development Integration Activities.?In addition, they must have tactical proficiency with account plan development and implementation.?
As operational leaders, business development managers must have tactical and operational business development competency. This enables proficient campaign plan development and implementation.?Business development managers must also possess strategic business development competency to ensure their campaign plans support the corporation’s strategic plan.?They must have operational proficiency with all Business Development Integration Activities.
The Chief Growth Officer may likely be promoted from any functional role within the Business Development Operations Framework. As leaders of the entire business development team, they must have tactical competency.?As leaders and mentors to business development managers, they must have operational competency and proficiency.?Finally, they must have strategic business development competency and proficiency, enabling strategic plan development and implementation.
Every business developer may have a basic level of proficiency when they enter their role.?As they serve in their role, their proficiency levels should improve.?However, every business developer must be competent before commencing their role.
Purpose of the BD-BOK
The purpose of the Business Development Body of Knowledge (BD-BOK) is to advance the art, science, and ethics of the business development profession.?
The BD-BOK provides four primary benefits to employees and corporations:
·??????Comprehensive:?It serves as the common knowledge repository enabling business developer competency across the entire Business Development Operations Framework.
·??????Standardized:?The core body of knowledge found within the BD-BOK is required for the successful attainment of the Business Development ProfessionalTM (BDP), Business Growth Practioner (BGP), and the Business Quality Level (BQL) certifications.?This ensures common standards of competency across all business developers and businesses.
·??????Efficient:?The 2020 Gartner “Shifting Skills Survey for HR Executives” shows that 60% of HR leaders report pressure from the CEO to ensure employees have the right skills. The survey also showed that 69% of HR leaders felt pressure from employees to receive new skills. At the same time, only 9% of managers spend time on employee skills development, and 45%, "don’t feel confident in their ability to develop employee skills."?The BD-BOK enables efficient training across the entire business development team.
·??????Effective:?GBDA analysis shows that most Business Developers enter the profession via adjacent job categories, such as project management, operations, marketing, and sales.?The BD-BOK enables entry into the business development profession with sufficient competency to effectively enter and succeed in the business development profession.
The BD-BOK is a living document constantly evolving in response to the dynamic business development profession.?As such, it also serves as a reference for BDP and BGP-certified personnel to continually enhance knowledge of our profession's art, science, and ethics.
****** This concludes PART 3 of this three-part series *******
Follow the?Global Business Development Association (GBDA)?to learn more about Business Development.
Click?here?to read PART 1 of this three-part series.
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CEO & Co-founder at AppRecode - Innovator for the Future of Cloud | Product stability and DevOps | AWS Well-Architected FTR | Kubernetes & Infrastructure as Code
1 年Business development is essential for identifying new opportunities for growth and revenue. Building strong client relationships and delivering innovative solutions are key to a successful strategy that can keep a company ahead of the competition.