Latest news with #ForbesBusinessDevelopmentCouncil
Forbes
09-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
20 Tips To Navigate Sudden Funding Losses
getty Whether due to shifting market conditions, funding freezes or a simple change in priorities, a sudden loss of funding can disrupt even the best-planned business development or research initiatives. While this can feel like a major setback, it doesn't have to signal the end of progress. In moments like these, taking strategic action to reassess and move forward can turn a funding loss into a pivot point for innovation. If you find yourself facing a sudden funding loss, follow this advice from the members of Forbes Business Development Council to regain momentum and move forward. One should avoid a knee-jerk reaction and first assess the facts. Is the funding truly lost, or could minor tweaks help requalify it? Don't assume the decision is final. The first step is to diagnose the root cause and explore if there's a salvage opportunity. Once the "why" is clear, determine next steps—this may include repositioning, adjusting scope or seeking alternative funding sources. - Janesh Janardhanan, Frost & Sullivan It's important to understand why funding was cut and how the project aligns with current strategic priorities. In my experience, funding should never be taken for granted—always have a plan B. In this case, it's worthwhile to reassess the value and cost and to explore scrappier, more cost-effective ways to achieve similar outcomes. I've often seen roadblocks spark innovation in unexpected ways. - Jani Hirvonen, Google Some first steps to take include reforecasting the roadmap based on available funding, adjusting the burn rate and transparently communicating the situation to stakeholders, such as your team, investors or partners. Also, explore alternative funding sources like grants, partnerships or bridge funding—and consider repackaging key initiatives to attract new investment or sponsor support. - Vinit Mojes, EY When you lose significant funding, it's time to reassess your current financial situation, priorities and processes. This involves evaluating what resources you still have and identifying which aspects of the project are most critical to maintain. Communicating transparently with your team and stakeholders is essential. Then, refocus, reimagine and take your first steps toward success. - Scotty Elliott, AmeriLife Reach out early and often. Whether it's mentors, advisors, industry peers or your team, don't try to course-correct alone. Collaboration costs nothing but can be worth everything. A quick brainstorming session or honest conversation might uncover resources, workarounds or support you hadn't considered. You never know who's willing to help until you ask—and wants to be part of a solution. - Bryce Welker, The CPA Exam Guy Forbes Business Development Council is an invitation-only community for sales and biz dev executives. Do I qualify? The first step is to assess the impact of the funding loss: Identify affected activities, quantify the financial gap and evaluate consequences on timelines and goals. Then, reprioritize the project and seek alternative funding sources, while maintaining clear communication with the team and stakeholders. - Umberto Cavallaro, AscoService Constraints often lead to innovation, and this is where leadership has to be decisive, resourceful and transparent. Figure out what's a must-have versus a nice-to-have. Engage key stakeholders, cross-functional teams, partners or even customers to explore alternative funding sources. Also, explore creative partnerships that could fill the gap. It's about shifting from a scarcity mindset to an opportunity mindset. - Olga Lykova, When your funding gets cut, competitive intelligence is a budget pivot pro move. There are no hard costs required to collect the websites, LinkedIn page posts and ad creative that other brands are running. You can view this information on the ad libraries of Meta, Google and LinkedIn. Compare how you and your competitors talk about your brands and your solutions. Differentiation opportunities will present themselves. - Barry Reicherter, Finn Partners When funding cuts hit, start by evaluating your cash flow and securing critical operations to keep your project afloat. Then, seek bridge funding or streamline efforts to preserve progress toward your goals. - Vivek Vishal, Honeywell Take a pulse on the marketplace and customer impact. Review the impact of the budget cut on major deliverables and assess customer plans. Before reaching out to internal and external stakeholders, it's helpful to first outline alternative scenarios, for example, descoping features to focus only on the top-priority, high-impact ones, or planning a staggered release approach with fewer resources. - Srinivas Vadhri, Skydo When funding drops, the first move is to reassess priorities through the lens of strategic alignment. Focus on what still supports your core goals with the resources you have. Tighten the scope, engage your team and get creative. A clear sense of purpose can turn constraints into momentum. - Michael Fritsch, Smarter Operations Review your priorities at hand and then figure out a way to self-fund the most critical ones through the existing business. Once you reduce your priorities, you have an option to reduce expenses associated with those shelved projects. - Ruchir Nath, Dell Technologies Identify which parts of the project matter most. If you figure out which pieces are directly tied to the main goals, you can shift your time and resources to those first. You can also look into changing the timeline to fit the current situation better. It's a practical way to keep moving forward and allows time to rethink the overall strategy if needed. - Max Avery, Digital Ascension Group Accept that tomorrow is never guaranteed, especially in business development. When funding disappears, don't just react—reframe. The real cost isn't always in the dollars lost, but in the opportunity left on the table. Rally your allies, sharpen the business case and make it clear what's at stake. In business development, conviction is often the bridge between a setback and a comeback. - Alexander Masters, MBA, BIDA, Siemens Do a team-wide debriefing to clarify what led to the loss of funding, and if the possibility still exists to go back and revive the conversation. If it does, then find out how to approach this conversation. Who needs to be involved? What do you need to present or showcase to get back in the ring? If these questions are not possible, are there other funding avenues that you can explore? - Mustansir Paliwala, Zomara Group The first step is to revisit and prioritize objectives based on available resources. Conduct a review of the project's core goals and identify the most critical activities that align with the business's strategic vision. By focusing on high-impact and low-resource initiatives, you can maintain momentum, preserve value and position your business to adapt while seeking alternative funding sources. - Salice Thomas, Wipro Limited The first step is to reassess the project's key parts tied to your goals. Use "first principles thinking" to find cost-effective, creative solutions that keep things moving forward, even if they're less scalable. Communicate with your team, explain the new direction and keep everyone motivated. With budget cuts, focus on progress, not perfection—sometimes good enough is enough to keep advancing. - Jayant Walia, Gainbridge Review project goals through an impact analysis to understand how the funding gap affects objectives, timelines and deliverables. Identify essential components and determine what can be scaled down, postponed or adapted—without losing core value. Explore alternatives—such as partnerships, grants or budget reallocations—to complete the project or research. - Ali Faizan Rizvi, Mint Gateway Reassess and prioritize initiatives that align with strategic goals and offer high ROI. Explore alternative funding—partnerships, grants or internal shifts. Communicate transparently with stakeholders and use the challenge as a catalyst for innovation and focus. - Rahul Saluja, Cognizant If funding takes a hit, start by stepping back to reassess. Focus on what's still possible with the resources you have. Are there leaner, more creative approaches you can take to reach your goals? Funding loss doesn't have to mean giving up; it can be an opportunity to test new strategies and refocus efforts to efficiently win new business or conduct research. - Raviraj Hegde, Donorbox
Forbes
29-04-2025
- Business
- Forbes
19 Insights Into How AI Is Reshaping Workflows And Sales Funnels
Over the last several years, artificial intelligence has been reshaping how professionals manage daily tasks and connect with potential leads. From automating time-consuming admin work to refining how and when prospects engage with your brand, AI has started to influence decisions across the entire sales journey. Below, Forbes Business Development Council members describe how they've adjusted their workflows and lead generation strategies in response to AI tools. If you're looking to streamline your processes or sharpen your sales funnel, these insights are worth a closer look. AI enhances lead identification, tracking and engagement, giving us deeper insights into the customer journey. Automation streamlines acquisition and fosters leads through the funnel, improving efficiency. At our company, we've developed disciplined processes and personalized follow-ups, balancing automation with a human touch to nurture relationships and drive conversions effectively. - Sohail Djariri, Sagility AI has streamlined our lead scoring and personalized outreach, making our sales funnel faster and more targeted (using our own technology), especially in capturing intent signals and sending qualified messages rather than shooting and praying. - Hugo Lamy, Brainbase With more than 76% of purchase decision makers using AI to research vendors, we use AI to view what AI platforms think about you and your competitors. Simply ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, Microsoft Copilot and even Grok to compare your company to competitors, and you've got real-time fodder for customer objections sheets and battlecards that your sales team can use during engagement. - Barry Reicherter, Finn Partners Our team, like all sales teams, is looking to increase win rates and be more productive with AI. We've brought this technology into our workflow by using AI to identify new leads and buyer groups, as well as to ensure our teams are prepared for meetings using AI for account prep. This saves our teams time and manual work, helping us target the leads that matter and drive better outcomes. - Alyssa Merwin, LinkedIn In one solution, AI has fundamentally changed selling by leveraging past transaction data to understand risks of churn and opportunities to upsell and cross-sell products to customers. AI can automatically create opportunities pre-loaded with suggested products and create alerts with potential churn risk. This not only increases revenue but also decreases the time reps take to manage CRM. - Doug Fuehne, Pricefx Forbes Business Development Council is an invitation-only community for sales and biz dev executives. Do I qualify? Go-to-market leaders can quickly become overwhelmed by AI's possibilities. A good approach to integrating AI into the sales workflow is to break down the entire process piece by piece and then look for ways to enhance it with AI at each stage. For example, how can your SDRs use AI to make their days more productive and efficient? Start with one focus area, operationalize it and then move to the next. - Hayden Stafford, Seismic AI has transformed how we identify and connect with potential customers. Automating mundane tasks allows us more time to personalize our outreach. Our sales pipeline is now a balance of human insight and data-driven targeting. This synergy has improved engagement, streamlined follow-ups and delivered higher-value leads. We're evolving from automation to data-led interactions that increase ROI. - Ashu Goel, WinWire We must remember that AI isn't about replacing human connection but enhancing it. For our team, tech allows us to focus on more phone calls and conversations with leads and customers. It's also allowed us to personalize outreach better and prioritize the best leads based on people's engagement with our brands. - Wayne Elsey, The Funds2Orgs Group AI is already automating routine tasks, and with the growing adoption of gen AI-based tools, planning sales meetings with prospects has become faster and more efficient through improved outcome simulations. For example, generating price quotes based on complex simulations with greater accuracy during client interactions enhances responsiveness to urgent requests, making us a preferred choice. - Srinivas Vadhri, Skydo We started using AI to analyze patterns in customer behavior linked to external factors, like economic shifts, political events and information scandals. Once we identified those patterns, we adjusted our funnels to better align with them. And it worked—we came out ahead. - Dima Raketa, Reputation House AI has revamped our sales process for the better. It helps us spot the best leads faster, personalize outreach hours faster and automate follow-ups so nothing slips through the cracks. In addition, insights from that data show our team what's working (and what's not), making it easier to tweak our funnel for better results. And by the end of the day, we've had more conversations, higher close rates and less busywork. - Aaron Biggs, Summit AI improved my pipeline accuracy by 30%, automating lead scoring and forecasting while saving hours weekly. This helped sellers focus on high-converting opportunities. My advice: Use AI to surface intent early and close faster. - Vivek Vishal, Honeywell We've evolved beyond the AI hype by creating engagement filters that match prospects to solutions before conversations start. By analyzing which content truly resonates versus what prospects merely click on, the team targets real pain points instead of surface interest. It's like having a skilled researcher do the homework before each meeting, ensuring every conversation starts with depth. - Sidharth Ramsinghaney, Twilio AI has redefined workflow dynamics and sales funnel strategies through precision-driven engagement. Sentiment analysis deciphers client emotions in email and on websites, refining interactions for deeper rapport. Smart ad targeting optimizes campaigns across Google, LinkedIn and Meta, which elevates outreach. AI-powered ABM ensures seamless, bespoke and automated lead cultivation, maximizing efficiency and conversions. - Praneeth Kudithipudi, Sacumen AI levels up my sales funnel by combining deep prospect research with industry trends and best practices to target the right leads. Automated reminders keep follow-ups personal and timely, making outreach more relevant. No cold pitches—just smart, data-driven engagement that connects prospects with real impact. Faster insights, better conversations, more wins. - Michael Fritsch, Smarter Operations Improve workflows for personalized outreach with AI. Smart sellers and lead generation teams know that customization makes a big difference in attracting prospects and converting sales, but it takes lots of time. Leveraging generative AI for brainstorming and drafting copy helps streamline the process, empowering sellers to send more personalized notes, generate more prospects and close more deals. - Michael Della Penna, InMarket Enhance leads with data-driven attraction. AI has reshaped our lead generation from guesswork to precision. Predictive scoring helps us pinpoint high-value leads, while programmatic ads ensure optimal, targeted reach. This data-driven approach drives lead attraction and increases conversions. - William DeCourcy, AmeriLife AI has, in some organizations and should in many other organizations, changed the workflow and funnel management because it can take away mundane, routine tasks, which are not an efficient use of your team's time. It can also lead to a behavioral or timing identification where your prospect is more likely to make a decision or transition toward. Its application should strictly be like any other support tool. - Mustansir Paliwala, Zomara Group AI has improved our workflow by identifying high-intent prospects through engagement metrics like website visits and content interactions. Integrating AI into our CRM provides deeper insights into prospect history, helping us personalize outreach. This allows us to determine the most effective channels for different customer types, making our lead generation and sales approach more efficient. - Jayant Walia, Gainbridge
Forbes
17-04-2025
- Business
- Forbes
20 Proven Strategies To Level Up Your Sales Team's Training
Sales training isn't a one-and-done process; it's an ongoing investment in your team's success. From onboarding new hires to refining skills for seasoned reps, the most effective sales organizations take a thoughtful, structured approach to enablement. Below, 20 Forbes Business Development Council members share the best practices they use to keep their sales teams motivated and aligned with business goals. Follow their recommendations to boost your team's skills and effectiveness. Train your first hire thoroughly, then have them train the second hire while you observe and evaluate. Continue this chain with each new hire training the next, with the previous trainee evaluating. This approach ensures that knowledge is properly transferred and reinforced, as teaching others demonstrates true understanding. This method creates a sustainable system while maintaining consistent quality across the team. - Vipin Thomas, SparrowGenie Institutionalizing customer feedback and relevant market perspectives is key to being a great sales organization. Successful sales organizations understand their customers' pain points, lead with questions instead of solutions and are equipped with overall market context information to have a relevant and meaningful conversation with potential buyers. - Jojo Duttaroy, EY Sales teams are inherently competitive by nature and they learn heavily on the job and through practice. They all aspire to crush their quotas and make more money. To this end, learning from their colleagues by creating forums where the best teams share their own best practices is a very effective way to land key messages and train the broader organization. - Anjai Lal, Google Cloud One best practice is to tailor training to your sales team's specific needs, using real-world scenarios and role-playing. Incorporate ongoing coaching, leverage data from CRM tools to identify gaps and bring in industry experts for insights. This keeps skills sharp, relevant and aligned with current market demands, boosting performance effectively. - Tomer Warschauer Nuni, Kima Network The best way a sales team learns is through practical examples. Showcasing the business pain a customer was looking to solve and how the product/service tackled it is pivotal. Instead of focusing on feature parity and market validation, teach your team that the best selling happens when people want to work with other people through trust and customer validation. - Olga Lykova, Forbes Business Development Council is an invitation-only community for sales and biz dev executives. Do I qualify? Have a rigorous, formalized, classroom-type training program for new hires, quarterly training for seasoned sellers on changing paradigms and new technology (like CoPilot, AI and more) and mandatory, on-demand online training. It is most critical to ensure that all trainings are cataloged in one place. This can help build a sales force of the future - Ruchir Nath, Dell Technologies Hire the right people first—those passionate about the client, product and industry with a strong desire to learn and grow. Then, implement a continuous, structured learning program with hands-on coaching, real-world scenarios and data-driven feedback. Ensure dedicated team members own sales enablement and learning to drive consistency, skill development and long-term success. - Amit Ashkenazi, Artlist Create "solution sandboxes" where reps solve client problems with peers coaching in real-time, not just scripted role-plays. When training shifts from knowledge transfer to decision-making under pressure, you build sales muscle memory that works with real customers. Link training directly to what's happening on actual calls. - Sidharth Ramsinghaney, Twilio An investment in knowledge pays the best interest, so cultivate a perpetual learning ethos by leveraging AI for tailored coaching, real-time intelligence and adaptive instruction. This ensures sales teams remain agile and adept. Impart expertise in AI-powered tools that streamline, refine and elevate productivity. Continuously update training with AI innovations to enhance efficiency and performance. - Praneeth Kudithipudi, Sacumen Establish a perpetual transformation culture by combining scenario-based training with peer and mentor feedback. This ensures that knowledge sticks, fosters adaptability and boosts sales excellence. Real-time practice and relevant sessions empower teams to handle evolving challenges effectively, leading to lasting growth and performance. Dynamic development motivates teams to exceed targets. - Kiran Yelamaneni, TCS One best practice is to create a continuous learning culture by blending structured training with real-time coaching, peer learning and practical application. Combine formal workshops, role-playing and e-learning modules with ongoing feedback and collaborative knowledge sharing, ensuring training stays relevant, actionable and evolves with changing customer needs and market trends. - Aziz Jafri, Reckitt Enablement is the magic word here. Many leaders think of enablement as a simple support role when they need to prioritize enablement as a strategic, transformational lever for their business. When done right, enablement becomes so much more than sales training—it can shorten ramp times, increase win rates and drive real business impact that brings out the best in their sales reps. - Toby Carrington, Seismic The best practice is to treat training as a continuous process, not a one-time event. Markets, clients and environments evolve constantly. Stay vigilant, adapt regularly and involve sales teams in shaping learning. Create space for them to ask questions, even anonymously, to address reservations and ensure training stays relevant and impactful. - Anna Jankowska, RTB House Foster ongoing learning by encouraging sales teams to shadow top performers, gather client feedback and adapt training based on real-world insights. Continuous improvement, shaped by both wins and losses, keeps training relevant. Training is not one-and-done. Build regular development opportunities and seek external insights for fresh ideas. - Alexander Masters, MBA, BIDA, Siemens Our sales leadership set a fantastic example, offering hands-on support and leading by example to ensure the team is poised for success. Be present and participate in client meetings for the best training. This enables junior sellers to learn how to handle sales objections and position products consistently and accordingly. This can also inspire effective strategies to help the best sellers train others. - Michael Della Penna, InMarket Work with your top rep to build weekly training on the market, product, ICP, competitors and sales tactics. Reps should record demos for feedback. Start with small accounts before mid-market and enterprise. Give one to three months to ramp up to full quota. Regularly audit and update training materials to keep them fresh and aligned with strategy. - Raviraj Hegde, Donorbox Establish regular coaching and feedback sessions, reviewing recordings of past client interactions. Foster continuous learning on industry trends and encourage thought leadership discussions to build subject matter experts. Share performance data periodically, covering pipeline management, deal close rates and revenue targets, and identify areas where individual support is needed for improvement. - Jayant Walia, Gainbridge Train for execution, not just knowledge. Sales training should be hands-on, strategically aligned and reinforced through sales enablement tools. Role-play real scenarios, drill objections and refine messaging—then back it up with AI insights, content libraries and coaching nudges in the flow of work. When training, enablement and strategy align, reps adapt faster and close with confidence. - Michael Fritsch, Smarter Operations One best practice is to work closely alongside your sales team during live walkthrough sessions. By reviewing each case in detail and discussing the rationale behind every decision, you create an interactive training environment that enables your team to learn, adapt and master effective sales closure techniques. - Suhail Syed, Vesper Telecom Align training with business goals such as increasing revenue, expanding product offerings and entering new markets. Partner with leading business schools to deliver targeted training to the right audience at the right time, ensuring alignment with business objectives. Regularly measure the ROI of training programs and update content accordingly to enhance effectiveness and relevance. - Salice Thomas, Wipro Limited
Forbes
11-04-2025
- Business
- Forbes
10 Ways To Protect Fintech Data Security And Regulate Compliance
The rise of fintech has brought about numerous opportunities for financial innovation, but it has also introduced a higher risk related to data security and regulatory compliance. Business leaders within these organizations must not only foster growth and agility but also implement effective strategies to ensure their companies adhere to strict data protection laws and financial regulations. Below, Forbes Business Development Council members share their best practices to ensure compliance and data security are maintained within their fintech organizations. Fintech leaders must ensure compliance and data security with solid governance, technology and corporate culture. Define clear policies (GDPR, PSD2), invest in cybersecurity (encryption, RBAC), train employees, conduct regular audits and manage suppliers with strict standards. This mitigates risks, protects trust and ensures compliance. - Davide Sartini, SpA Fintech teams stay ahead on compliance and security by creating a true urgency and priority within their businesses. In addition to setting clear policies, leaders must train their teams regularly and invest in the right tech. Think about encryption, AI-driven fraud detection and secure cloud solutions. There are so many checkboxes for IT today, that you cannot let the table stakes go overlooked or assumed. - Aaron Biggs, Summit I embedded compliance into ops reviews—linking KPIs to data integrity and audit readiness. My advice: Make security a shared responsibility, not just IT's job. Tie it to performance metrics to drive accountability. - Vivek Vishal, Honeywell Business leaders can safeguard compliance and data security by implementing robust cybersecurity protocols alongside systematic policy reviews and risk assessments. By analyzing pertinent case studies to benchmark best practices, they ensure that policies are continually refined to address evolving regulatory requirements and emerging threats. - Suhail Syed, Vesper Telecom Companies should consider implementing robust encryption, multifactor authentication and real-time fraud detection. Regular audits, adherence to industry regulations (e.g., GDPR, PCI-DSS), and employee training on security best practices are crucial. Partnering with trusted verification providers and continuously updating protocols against emerging threats further strengthens compliance. - Luke Boddis, Forbes Business Development Council is an invitation-only community for sales and biz dev executives. Do I qualify? Leaders can ensure compliance and data security by adhering to regulations, implementing cybersecurity measures, training staff and deploying AI systems for fraud detection. Disaster recovery and business continuity plans are also essential. - Umberto Cavallaro, AscoService Establishing a robust organizational-level policy with well-defined processes and controls is crucial to ensuring compliance and data security. Collaborating closely with banking partners is equally important as a strategic approach. Additionally, maintaining oversight of software vendors (ISVs and SaaS providers) and their compliance programs helps mitigate counterparty risk. - Srinivas Vadhri, Kestone Integrated Marketing Solutions It starts with the regulations and policies agreed upon by the company and its employees. That is where the first layer of the compliance pyramid is formed—through moral responsibility. The second layer is ongoing security training, which keeps awareness high. The third layer involves adding extra security software and establishing dedicated security teams to strengthen protection even further. - Dima Raketa, Reputation House Fintech organizations require a holistic and proactive compliance and data security approach due to the sensitive nature of financial data and the highly regulated environment. Apply a strong compliance and data security framework. Leverage AI-driven tools to identify anomalies and predict potential security risks. Subscribe to threat intelligence feeds to stay ahead of emerging threats. - Salice Thomas, Wipro Limited Embed security into every process, not just IT. Fintech leaders must integrate compliance and data security into daily workflows, using real-time visibility, automated risk alerts and encryption by design. Equip teams with real-time dashboards and ongoing training to stay ahead of threats. Proactive security isn't a one-time fix—it's a living strategy that evolves with the industry. - Michael Fritsch, Smarter Operations
