To all heads of BD, how easily can you answer these “simple” questions about your organization:

1. How many deals are in your pipeline, and at what stage in deal-flow are each?
2. Who are the best performers in the team for – number of leads sourced, number of leads triaged, number of CDAs signed, number of leads that reached contracting, number of deals signed? 
3. How long does your typical deal cycle last? 
4. At what stage do your deals get stuck most often? 
5. Are those deals stuck due to organizational bottlenecks and inefficiencies? 
6. Do you have a diligence team that can jump on a project and get ramped up quickly – i.e. do you have a curated list of functional experts? 
7. Do you have templated diligence assessments or have to build them (read: cobble together last minute) for each project – hence raising the risk of missed questions that can lead to gaps in evaluation? 
8. If your management/board/JSC asks for “top 5” deals presented as executive summary deck, how easily can you pull this information without pulling an all-nighter?
9. Has/will your operational blindside lead to regrets analysis rather than win reports? 
10. A competitor signed a deal with that under-the-radar biotech, why did YOU miss it?

By now, all of us have been badgered with the term “data-driven organization”.  We’ve seen that concept typically translated as loads of data floating about in disparate enterprise data storages/warehouses and systems, loosely connected by spreadsheets, emails and “productivity” tools.  Such inefficiencies can not only cause headaches for corporate memory; particularly for BD teams, it could mean losing a deal.  Are you prepared to answer these questions? 

If you’re uncomfortable with these queries, or are stumped by some/many of them – an audit of your data-driven processes will be worthwhile. 

Let’s collaborate to transform your BD practices.