Paul Dewick: Business Development Vs Account Management

This is part of a series of blog posts written for UK Recruiter by the team at BlueSky PR. If you didn’t make the event (or this particular session) it’s a nice summary of Paul’s key points.

Business Development Vs Account Management

They require many of the same skills, but in the current economic climate, where cutting costs is more important than ever, can Business Development and Account Management be executed by the same person? Or are they still very much two distinct roles, which must be considered separately by recruiters when searching for employees?

This was the question put forward by Boomerang’s Paul Dewick, at one of the most interactive presentations at UK Recruiter’s November Conference.

Before posing the question to an audience of recruiters, Paul highlighted the skills which are traditionally considered important in each role:

Business Development (or ‘hunters’):

• This role involves hunting for and starting relationships with potential clients
• They are required to be confident, resilient and target-driven
• Once the relationship has been opened up, the business developer will pass them onto the support team and continue searching for new opportunities

Accounts Management (or ‘farmers’):

• This position is more concerned with retaining customers than gaining new ones
• Whilst customer service is vital, Account Managers must also be highly organised, as the role includes administrative duties

Paul then raised two potential issues created by the lack of distinction between ‘hunters’ and ‘farmers’.

Firstly, he identified the large bonuses often awarded to those working in business development, and asked whether the audience believed they should be kept solely for those searching for new clients, or spread amongst the sales support team. Here, he found the room divided. Some recruiters believed that the amount of work required was the same in each role, and as such, the rewards should also be equal. However, others believed that winning business was not only the most important, but also the hardest role in the company, and that bonuses are a just incentive.

The second issue raised concerned recruiting; was it more effective to cover both roles within one job specification and search for talent which could perform a mix of the two, or is this unrealistic?

On this point however, the response was unanimous, with all recruiters agreeing that, although there was some overlap in skills, the personality traits required in winning clients and keeping them were not always transferrable, and they should be considered separate positions to fill.