What does a repeatable business development process look like written down?

How to write a business development play your team will actually run

A play is one repeatable move written down end to end: trigger, research, score, draft, approval, stop rule. Build two or three, not ten. If somebody else cannot run it on Monday without asking you a question, it is not a play yet.

20 August 2026 · 5 min read

A play is one repeatable commercial move, written down end to end, so somebody else in your firm could run it on Monday without asking you a single question. Most firms have tactics instead: the same move, living in one person's judgement, never written down.

The six parts of a play

All six, or it is notes. Miss the last two and you have built something that will damage your reputation.

1Trigger. The specific event that starts it. No trigger, no play.
2Research. What you find out first, and where you find it.
3Score. How you decide this account is worth continuing after the research.
4Draft. What gets written, by whom, in what shape.
5Approval. Which named person reads it before it leaves the building.
6Stop rule. What happens with no reply, and when you stop.

Copy this one

A full play for a firm selling change and transformation work. Copy the shape, not the content.

Play: new director, first hundred days

Part	What it says
Trigger	A director-level appointment at a company on our top forty, announced in the last 60 days, in a role owning a transformation budget.
Research	Fifteen minutes. What did their predecessor leave unfinished? What has the company publicly committed to that this person now owns? What did they do in their last role that they will repeat?
Score	Continue only if all three are true: they own a budget, there is a public commitment they are accountable for, and we have comparable work we can name. Any false, stop and log why.
Draft	One short message. Opens with the commitment they inherited, not with us. One sentence on comparable work. One specific question worth answering. No attachment, no capability statement, no calendar link.
Approval	The partner who would deliver the work reads it before it sends, checking one thing: would I be comfortable if this were forwarded to somebody I respect?
Stop rule	One follow-up after ten working days, adding something new rather than repeating. No reply after that, the account returns to the list and cannot re-enter this play for six months.

Two rules that keep it honest

Write the stop rule at the same time you write the play, not after somebody complains. A play without one becomes a sequence, and a sequence becomes the thing you complain about receiving.

Build two or three, not ten

Ten sketched plays get run zero times. Two fully written ones tell you within a month which is working. Start with the trigger you see most often.

Test whether it is really written down

1.Hand it to somebody who was not in the room.
Somebody in the firm who did not help write it.
2.Ask them to run it once without asking you anything.
Watch, do not help.
3.Write down every question they have to ask.
Each one is a gap in the play.
4.Fill the gaps and hand it back.
Repeat until they ask nothing. Then you have a play.

What to do next

1Write one play for the trigger you see most often.Use the six parts as headings. One play, not a set.
2Name the approver before you write the message.If you cannot name one, the play is not ready to run.
3Write the stop rule in the same sitting.Decide it now, while you are not chasing anything.
4Hand it to somebody who was not in the room.Fill every gap their questions expose.
5Run it on five accounts before changing anything.Fewer than five is noise. Then change one thing at a time.