Valuable ideas workshops

Business development (BD) training

Empower your client-facing teams to win new work with Beaton's business development training and sales prospecting workshops

Client-centric business development training, tailored for professional services

  • Develop sales expertise backed by real client insights – Equip your team with proven BD skills, grounded in 20 years of Beaton’s client research.
  • Strengthen client relationships and drive growth – Master the art of meaningful conversations to improve cross-selling and deepen client engagement.
  • Win new work – learn to identify and convert new business opportunities.
  • Enhance client retention – strengthen your team's capacity to anticipate client needs and provide solutions.
  • Boost confidence and networking – professional development for client teams that improves your team’s ability to expand and leverage their professional networks.

Workshops are run on site at your firm’s premises across Australia and New Zealand.

Talk to us about a workshop for your team

BD training workshop details

Who should participate?

  • Firm leaders, partners, principals and directors
  • Client relationship partners and leaders 
  • C-suite leaders
  • Business development teams
  • Senior executives responsible for client or growth strategy
  • Growth strategists

Workshop structure

  • Half-day workshop on your firm’s premises
  • Action-oriented, focusing on a model client for each attendee
  • Expert guidance – enhanced by the unrivalled experience and knowledge of our Beaton partners 
  • An interactive session practising conversation exercises, example situations and real-life scenarios
  • Unique workshop delivery specific to your needs and client base

Training outcomes

Your team will leave with:
  • An understanding of what clients want and value and how they buy.
  • Skills for generating new business
  • Valuable ideas to share with the client, specific to their business issues
  • Greater confidence and ability to improve cross-selling conversations
  • Refined understanding of sales conversations in professional services

Why firms need Beaton business development training

Clients today are reporting between 30 to 50 per cent fewer proactive outreach efforts by firms in their industry. 

What is causing this?

  • Practitioners are busy – their primary focus is on billable hours and project delivery. Many are concerned about bothering their clients – who are also very busy.
  • BD skills are declining – opportunities to participate in BD practices have diminished as more professionals work remotely.
  • Diminished confidence – many professionals report concerns about not knowing how to approach their client about their business needs and broader issues.
  • Fewer training opportunities – budget cuts and less interaction in physical offices has impacted sales skills development.
  • Ineffective, generic sales training methods focused on selling mean many professionals are missing a sophisticated client-centric approach.
  • Boost revenue
  • Reduce costs and improve efficiencies
  • Improve client relationships
  • Boost team confidence and collaboration
  • Generate new and repeat business

Learn valuable, client-centric prospecting techniques

Firms that want to succeed need to be proactively seeking out new clients, broadening relationships and winning new work from existing clients.

Beaton’s business development training workshops redefine how professionals approach BD and prospecting. Using unique client data on buying behaviour and decision drivers, we introduce a client-centric approach to BD. Our unique Valuable Ideas Conversations framework equips professionals with the skills to identify client needs and engage in more meaningful, high-value discussions that drive business growth.

With insights from two decades of client feedback research through Beaton Benchmarks, we refine a sophisticated BD approach. Our delivering partners, with over 75 years of combined in-house consulting experience, bring deep expertise in building client relationships and closing sales conversations.

Upskill your client-facing teams with an evidence-based approach to sales prospecting and business development training

Get in touch to discuss our tailored business development training workshops for your professional services firm.

Contact Us

FAQs

Our workshops are half-day training sessions run on site at your firm’s premises. A Beaton partner will deliver the training via a series of practise scenarios and example conversations for participants to engage in. Attendees will be given a small amount of preparatory work and homework to do outside the workshop to fully benefit from the time in training.

We find small groups of 2-15 are optimal for the best learning experience, however this can be adapted for up to 30 attendees.

Our half-day training workshops are a great place to start for hands-on training for teams and individuals. 

To continue to maximise your team’s newly development BD skills, we highly recommend aligning your broader business development strategy with our Key Account Management program. A Beaton partner will consult with you on a longer-term basis, utilising client feedback research to build an effective business growth plan through firm-wide collaboration and a clear strategy on client engagement.

We cover client relationship building skills, cross-selling, lead generation, client retention, networking tips, sales skills development and conversation techniques.

We come to you! A Beaton partner will deliver the workshop on-site at your firm in Australia or New Zealand.

No. We believe client-centric selling, client retention training and sales skills development are techniques best learned in person. Our face-to-face workshops enable the most engaging and interactive experience, where you can ask questions and participate in a group setting without an annoying video call lag.

Participants will be given a worksheet to fill out prior to the session in preparation. You will leave with a conversation template and at least three valuable ideas to start conversations with their current clients or real prospects.

Our BD workshops are half-day sessions designed to upskill teams and individuals with proven techniques to build client relationships and generate sales one-to-one.

Beaton’s Key Account Management program is a whole-of-firm program designed to organise and streamline your entire client relationship management system for better sales results. This involves a Beaton partner consulting with your team on a longer-term basis to assess and improve on your current clients and prospects. We help you understand how to prioritise the highest value clients, and develop systems to ensure consistent and regular work.

Still have questions? Please contact us and one of our team will be in touch to help.

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