Raby, S. & Smith, J. (2018). DNA of Sales & Business Development - Building a Competency Framework.
The primary aim of this review is to inform the development of post secondary education curricula in sales and business development. Market-based research investigations by the Calgary-based Bissett School of Business at Mount Royal University have highlighted the need for businesses to build capacity, and for graduates and business professionals to be educated in the fundamentals of sales and business development. While Canada currently has dozens of Business Schools, we have witnessed a slow embracing of sales and business development in the curricula. Despite the terms of ‘sales’ and ‘business development’ being used frequently within organizations, a close appraisal of the literature reveals a lack of consensus on how they are differentiated. We propose that research on sales and business development has progressed down parallel tracks that continue to rarely cross. Equally, business development remains a relatively nascent field. The aim of this review is to dedicate scholarly attention to sales and business development disciplines, to examine how these disciplines have emerged over time, and the skills and functions that individuals perform when working in these fields. The outcome of this review is the development of a competency-based framework for sales and business development that offers further clarity on these fields and how they interact, helping to inform curricula development and future research enquiry.