Question

Topic: Strategy

Setting Up A Business Development Department

Posted by imtomal on 4/27/2010 at 6:05 AM ET 250 Points
Hi there,

I've been working with a media company that owns Newspaper, Radio and a number of websites and was looking after a number of Internal / External Business Development, Strategic and Innovation projects.

Currently my company asked me to establish a different department; the 'Business Development Department', as the strategic department for growth and innovation.

Any suggestion form this forum experts and readers will be highly appreciated.

thanks everyone!
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by mgoodman on 4/27/2010 at 6:10 AM Accepted
    My suggestion is to get a clear definition of how your success in this new department will be evaluated. If you don't know what they expect of you, it's almost impossible to succeed.

    And if THEY don't know what to expect, then this is truly a fool's errand. Time to teach them what they should be expecting and write your own definition of success.
  • Posted by CarolBlaha on 4/27/2010 at 7:57 AM Accepted
    Goodman is correct, or as the saying goes, "Begin with the end in mind".

    The title is very broad, too broad for us to hone in on. Just as a field rep must analyze a territory and it's potential you are going to have to analyze your market and areas for development. Then you can be lazar sharp in developing that market. Look for areas less served by competitors or where you have strengths they do not. Start by doing a SWOT, and a lot of the answers will bubble to the surface for you. Drill deeper.
  • Posted by imtomal on 4/28/2010 at 5:00 AM Author
    Hi everyone!

    Thanks a lot for your suggestions and yes I am more careful now to establish my goals and a clear understanding to measure the success of the department. I also do have some of the strategic areas in mind to start with which seems like low hanging fruits such as starting new revenue driven projects, build partnerships, sell product oriented advertisement packages, initiate more events, new projects for readership and audience development, branding, etc, etc!

    What is basically bothering me is, all these seems pretty heavy-weight activities and i am kind of in a dilemma to shape this department keeping a right balance so that i don't fall off track and make a fool out of myself! The challenge seems big and more on the tricky management/strategic part; and seems like i have too little idea to deal with it!

    Any help from anyone? any real-life experiences?

    Thanks to everyone in advance !
  • Posted by CarolBlaha on 4/29/2010 at 7:29 PM Member
    I think everyone here has given you real life experience.

    Business Development Dept is just too broad for a specific answer. What others have tried to tell you, it means different things to different people.

    Drill deeper, give us more info and I am sure we can help.
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