Relationships Are Like Time-Release Capsules

​Over the past few weeks, I've noticed a common theme in my coaching conversations.

Many of my clients have been taking on the 4-Week BD Challenge. The assignment is simple enough: reach out to one business contact each day, five days a week, for four weeks.

A couple of weeks into the challenge, I usually hear the same question.

"Doug, I'm doing the outreach. Why isn't anything happening?"

It's a fair question. But I usually tell them they're asking the wrong one.

In business development, we spend far too much time measuring outcomes and not enough time measuring consistency. That's a misleading way to judge progress because the results rarely show up on our timetable.

Somewhere along the way, we've developed unrealistic expectations about business development. We send an email, reconnect with a former client, attend a networking event, or have coffee with a referral source, and if nothing happens within a few weeks, we start wondering whether it was worth the effort.
​
That's not how relationships work.

 Over the years, I've started thinking about business development a little differently. I think of relationships as time-release capsules.

Once you've invested in a business relationship, you really don't know when, or even if, it will produce an opportunity. Some connections lead to a conversation the following week. Others may sit quietly for months, sometimes years, before something changes.

I've seen opportunities emerge for all kinds of reasons. A contact gets promoted. Someone joins a new company that's a much better fit for your firm. A long-standing advisor at a competitor retires, creating an opening that didn't exist before. And sometimes, there isn't a single obvious reason at all. The timing is simply different than it was a year earlier.

You can't predict when the capsule will open. You can only make sure you've placed it there when the time comes.

One example I often share with my coaching clients goes back to 2019. That year, I was introduced to three different law firms on the East Coast. All three were firms I wanted to work with, and all three seemed like great long-term fits. We had good conversations, but none of them were ready to hire me.

So I stayed in touch. I checked in periodically, shared ideas when I thought they would be helpful, and kept investing in the relationships without expecting immediate results.

Then something interesting happened.

In 2023, all three firms hired me for the first time.

Four years had passed.

Now, I'm certainly not suggesting every business relationship takes four years to develop. Many opportunities happen much faster than that. But some don't, and that's exactly the point. Relationships operate on their own timeline, not ours.

Had I judged those relationships after six months, or even a year, I probably would have convinced myself they weren't worth pursuing.

I would have been wrong.

That's one of the reasons I encourage my coaching clients to focus on the process instead of the results.

The purpose of the 4-Week BD Challenge isn't to generate new business in twenty business days. If it does, that's terrific. But that's not the measure of success.

The real goal is to build the habit of consistently investing in relationships. Over time, that habit becomes far more valuable than any single opportunity.

Ironically, I think August is a great month to do exactly that.

Yes, some people are on vacation. A few emails may go unanswered until after Labor Day. But many others are still working, often with a little more breathing room than they'll have in September. Conversations are less rushed. People have time to catch up.

More importantly, you're building momentum while others are waiting for the "right" time to restart their business development efforts.

I've learned that business development rewards consistency far more than intensity.

The professionals who build the strongest practices aren't necessarily the smartest or the most connected. They're the ones who keep showing up. They stay curious. They stay visible. They continue investing in relationships, even when they don't see immediate results.

So if you've been wondering whether your outreach is working, I'd encourage you to ask a different question.

Instead of asking, "What did I get from that conversation?" Ask yourself, "Did I strengthen the relationship?"

If you did, you've probably made more progress than you realize.

Some relationships open quickly. Others take longer.

Your job isn't to predict when they'll open.
​
It's to keep investing in relationships worth having.