Your MVP’s

Supporting Team Members Who Want to Grow in Business Development

Last week, I recorded a webinar with Laurie Currell on how to create a culture of business development across your firm. During the session, we received a powerful question from a participant who had a team member eager to participate in BD—but she couldn’t picture him succeeding. Her question was, “How should I deal with that?”

In the webinar, I shared three essential conditions for anyone stepping into business development training or client engagement roles. First, people need to understand exactly what you want them to do. Second, they genuinely need to want to do it. And third, they need to be good at it—or willing to develop the right communication and presence skills through leadership presence coaching, business development coaching, and confident presence work.

The Value of Desire in Business Development

After 20 years working with AEC firms and professional services teams, I can tell you this: willingness is a massive advantage. If someone wants to grow their BD skills, they’re already two-thirds of the way to becoming effective. Skills can always be built through interview skills training for professionals, sales pitch coaching, group presentation coaching, and real-world practice. The desire to participate—that internal motivation—is the hardest part to teach.

Leaders often identify strengths and weaknesses accurately. Not everyone naturally excels at BD or at confident communication. But if a team member is motivated and already has business development on their radar, that’s incredibly valuable. Those individuals can grow into strong relationship builders, client-facing communicators, and authentic seller-doers through consistent business development communication training.

Breaking Skills Down Into Simple Concepts

If you have a motivated team member, sit down with them and break BD down into simple, clear concepts. Start with foundational principles—how business development works, what clients actually respond to, and how AEC interview preparation influences client trust, shortlist interview performance, and project pursuits.

Just like virtual presentation skills coaching, hybrid presentation skills training, or executive presence coaching, skill building in BD requires two things: knowledge and experience. They need the frameworks in their head—and the experience of applying them successfully. That’s where coaching, mentoring, role-playing, and practice come in. These are the repetitions that create confident communication and leadership presence.

Recognizing Who Your Most Valuable BD Players Are

As you evaluate your team, remember this: your most valuable business development contributors are the people who know what you want, want to do it, and simply need practice to get good at it. These are the future leaders of your BD culture. Invest in them with presence coaching, AEC interview skills training, and business development training that builds communication confidence.

Support them, coach them, and give them opportunities to grow. When you do, you strengthen your firm’s ability to build relationships, win work, and elevate your BD culture from within.