Are you poisoning your Business Development Team?

Yesterday I met one of my older colleagues who is currently working as a Business Development Manager with an IT Services company (outsourced technology development). We were having our discussion over a cup of coffee, as usual, and he had an experience which I found quite worth writing about!

He reports to the President of the company who has a unique way of 'prioritizing' clients; the bigger the requirement (read more money) from a client, the more important and valuable he is. For a moment, I was shocked and had millions of thoughts cross my mind. In my view, this is a completely naive approach which will not only hurt the company in the long run, but even my fellow colleague's image, who is trying to build rapport and his mark in the industry.


Inviting Trouble
Let's consider I have 2 prospects that can lead to good business and I have started actively pursuing them. Shortly, when I have succeeded in building a good rapport with both, we take our relationship to the next step of actually discussing the requirement in detail. This is one point where I realize the net worth of projects discussed. Let's say Client A has a $ 100K project budget while Client B has a $ 30K budget. Do you think that this information is more than enough to prioritize Client A as more important? If so, you are inviting death for your business!

What is more important at this stage is to assess your relationship with both the clients.
What if Client B has more trust on my capabilities than Client A?
What if Client A has 50 vendors to choose from?
What if Client B is just testing you with a small bait and has some big pie in store?

If these are the questions that let you prioritize your clients, yes, you are in the right direction. However, I still am strictly against the prioritizing game. If you are really looking to hit fortune, you need to treat all of them as equal. There can be no bias. I still remember one of my clients who has never been able to give me direct business (because of budget issues or some other reasons) but he has indirectly given me 200K+ business by providing me with references. Can I even afford to ignore such a precious client?

Clearly, I am never game for the prioritizing techniques, let me know what you think of the same!