Guide · 13 July 2026 · 4 min read
The shortest route in is usually two desks away
Firms carry far more relationship capital than they can see. The waste is not knowing who already knows whom.
Somewhere in your firm, someone worked with the procurement director you are about to cold-approach. They shared a project in 2019, or a previous employer, or a professional committee. That warm route turns a three-month courtship into one honest phone call, and most firms discover it only after the loss.
Connection is a query, not a memory
Who knows whom should be answerable in seconds, firm-wide: which colleagues have a live route to this organisation, how strong, how recent. That takes structured relationships rather than tribal memory, and it repays the structure the first time a pursuit finds its sponsor two desks away.
Warm introductions are a professional courtesy, run properly
An internal route is a favour with rules. The colleague who owns the relationship decides whether and how the introduction happens, sees what you intend to say, and keeps the credit. Firms that formalise this get more introductions, not fewer, because nobody fears their relationship being trampled by a bid deadline.
Every cold approach your firm makes is a claim that nobody inside knows anyone inside the client. That claim is usually false.