One of the most common things I hear from lawyers and accountants is that they want business development to move faster. They want the calls to come in sooner. They want opportunities to turn into clients more quickly. They want to know that the time they’re spending networking, attending conferences, and building visibility is actually paying off.
I understand that feeling. Business development can sometimes feel frustrating because the results are rarely immediate. We live in a world that rewards quick outcomes, but business development for professional service firms doesn’t usually work that way. In fact, some of the most valuable opportunities take months, or even years, to develop. When I first start working with clients, I tell them the same thing: business development is a long game.
The good news is that it becomes much easier when you focus less on generating immediate business and more on building authentic relationships. Recently, I was reminded of this lesson through a client success story that perfectly illustrates why patience and authenticity matter.
Getting Out of Your Comfort Zone
A few years ago, I started working with an attorney who was already doing many of the right things. She attended conferences regularly. She networked consistently. She was visible within her industry and had built a solid professional reputation. But like many professionals, she wanted to take her business development efforts to the next level.
As we discussed ways to increase her visibility and deepen her connections, she decided to push herself outside of her comfort zone. Rather than simply attending conferences, she began pursuing speaking opportunities. Specifically, she put her name forward to serve on conference panels.
If you’ve ever considered speaking at an event, you know that it can feel intimidating. There’s a certain level of vulnerability that comes with raising your hand and putting yourself in front of a room full of peers, prospects, and referral sources.
Fortunately, her efforts paid off. She was selected to participate in a panel at one of the conferences she regularly attended. At first glance, it may have seemed like the biggest opportunity would come from the audience members attending the session. After all, that’s where many professionals focus their attention. But that’s not where this story gets interesting.
The Relationship That Didn’t Look Like an Opportunity
As she prepared for the panel and participated in the conference, she naturally spent time with the other panelists. They worked together during preparation meetings. They interacted before the session. They spent time together during the conference. One of those panelists worked for a company that, on paper, didn’t appear to be an immediate source of business. There was no obvious opportunity. There wasn’t a clear path to work.
Many people would have looked at that relationship and mentally categorized the person as not a prospect. But she didn’t. Instead, she did what the best business developers do. She focused on building a genuine relationship. She was authentic. She stayed in touch. She showed interest in the other person’s work and career. Most importantly, she wasn’t approaching the relationship with the expectation that something needed to happen immediately. She simply invested in getting to know another professional.
The conference ended, but the relationship didn’t. Over the following months, they remained connected. They checked in periodically. They maintained the relationship naturally. There were no aggressive sales pitches. No constant requests for meetings. No pressure. Just consistent, authentic relationship building. Six months passed. Then eight months. Then, about a year. And then she received a phone call. The contact she had built a relationship with had changed jobs. Suddenly, that person was in a new organization with the ability to influence decisions regarding outside counsel.
When the time came to evaluate legal support, my client wasn’t competing as a stranger. She wasn’t introducing herself for the first time. She wasn’t trying to convince someone to trust her expertise. The trust had already been built. The relationship was already there. Because she had spent so much time investing in that connection, she became the obvious choice. She got the work. And it wasn’t a small opportunity. It became a significant client relationship for her practice.
Why This Works for Business Development
What I love about this story is that it highlights something many professionals overlook. If you evaluate your networking efforts only by immediate results, you’re likely to become discouraged. You’ll attend a conference and wonder why you didn’t get a client. You’ll have a coffee meeting and wonder why it didn’t lead to work. You’ll make a new connection on LinkedIn and question whether it was worth your time.
The reality is that many opportunities are invisible while they’re developing. You don’t know who will change jobs. You don’t know who will be promoted. You don’t know who will move into a decision-making role. You don’t know who will remember a conversation you had a year ago and think of you when an opportunity arises.
This isn’t just my experience. The American Bar Association has written extensively about how lawyers develop business through long-term professional relationships and industry involvement. Many opportunities come from people within your network who move into new roles and positions throughout their careers.
Similarly, Harvard Business School Online notes that successful networking isn’t about collecting the largest number of contacts. It’s about building meaningful relationships with the right people over time. In other words, relationships often create opportunities long before opportunities become visible.
What Authentic Business Development Looks Like
Authentic business development isn’t complicated, but it does require consistency. Some of the most effective relationship-building habits include:
- Staying in touch after events and conferences
- Following up without an immediate agenda
- Showing genuine interest in other people’s careers
- Looking for ways to help others first
- Being visible and engaged within your industry
- Maintaining relationships even when there’s no obvious opportunity
- Playing the long game
These actions may not generate immediate revenue, but they build something far more valuable: trust.
Research on relationship marketing has consistently found that trust and commitment are two of the strongest predictors of long-term business relationships. That shouldn’t be surprising.
- People hire professionals they trust.
- People refer professionals they trust.
- People remember professionals they trust.
Trust takes time to develop, but once it’s established, it can create opportunities that would never emerge through transactional networking alone.
Focus on Relationships, Not Speed
I know it’s tempting to want business development results right away. Everyone wants the process to move faster. But the strongest client relationships often start long before a proposal is sent or an engagement letter is signed. They start with conversations, credibility, and trust. And trust takes time.
The next time you’re attending a conference, participating in a panel, or meeting someone new, try not to focus solely on what opportunity might exist today. Instead, focus on building a real relationship. You never know where that person will be a year from now. You never know what opportunities may come from a connection that doesn’t seem important today.
Business development is a long game. But when you approach it authentically, the results are often worth the wait. The next big opportunity for your practice may already be sitting in your network. The question is whether you’re building and nurturing the right relationships today.
Schedule a strategy conversation with Lotus Business Growth, and let’s create a business development plan that helps you turn connections into opportunities over time.