Not in sales "officially"? Rainmaker = job security.

If you add business development to your "given" role in a company, even if you're not officially in sales, you are driving growth for your firm and giving yourself a healthy dose of job security.

But I find it amazing as we work with consulting and other professional service firms that very talented, well-connected, high level people on their teams don't see business development as something with which they feel the need to be involved.

So during economic times like this, or even when their firm has aggressive growth projections, their response is "hire a salesperson" and then they sit and wait for the results to roll in.

What a waste of talent and connections! We all know that referrals and word of mouth will create opportunities faster than cold outreach. Smart firms in this professional services space require everyone to be a marketer and a salesperson.