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Avnir Your network is your net worth. We help sellers organize, activate, and monetize their relationships.
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The May newsletter is in your inbox this morning — and it's one we're proud of.It formally closes the "Value You're Not ...
05/29/2026

The May newsletter is in your inbox this morning — and it's one we're proud of.

It formally closes the "Value You're Not Seeing" theme with a clean summary of the full toolkit we built together: deposits, withdrawals, multipliers, the assessment matrix, and the distinction between well-connected and relationship-rich.

And it introduces where June is going to take us — which we think is one of the most important conversations yet.

For those who aren't subscribed: the link is in our bio and we'd love to have you with us. And for everyone: reply here or in the newsletter with the May insight that changed something for you. We read everything, and it shapes what we build next.

Here's a framing we want to leave you with as May closes:The most defensible competitive advantage in consulting and exe...
05/28/2026

Here's a framing we want to leave you with as May closes:

The most defensible competitive advantage in consulting and executive search isn't your methodology. It isn't your technology or your pricing or your brand.

It's your relationships — specifically, the depth of the value exchange you've built, the multipliers you've cultivated, and whether that capital belongs to your firm or just to the individuals who currently hold it.

Methodology can be copied. Pricing can be undercut. A competitor with the right resources can replicate almost anything visible about your firm.

What they cannot replicate is seven years of genuine mutual value exchange with a client who trusts you because you showed up with something real long before you needed anything. That depth is genuinely yours.

How much of your firm's competitive position rests on deliberately built relationship capital — and how much was accumulated by accident?

That's worth a real answer in the comments.

Here's something worth addressing directly: negative relationship balances happen. And most consulting founders and sear...
05/27/2026

Here's something worth addressing directly: negative relationship balances happen. And most consulting founders and search leaders have at least one in their network right now.

Not from bad intentions — from the patterns we've been talking about all month. Re-emerging after silence. Asking before the balance supports it. Inconsistent availability. These things accumulate.

The good news: most negative relationship balances are recoverable. But not through a single well-meaning message. Through a deliberate recovery arc.

It starts with honesty — actually seeing the imbalance. Then a deposit with no implicit ask attached. Then patience, because deposits need time to restore balance before any withdrawal can be made. And finally, re-establishing cadence before the relationship needs to deliver anything.

Is there a relationship in your network where the balance has gone negative — and what's kept you from starting the recovery? Tell us in the comments. This is worth talking about.

We want to share a story that captures something we see over and over in relationship-rich firms.A consulting partner ma...
05/26/2026

We want to share a story that captures something we see over and over in relationship-rich firms.

A consulting partner made two deposits into a key relationship over a period of several months. A thoughtful connection in November. A well-timed market insight in February. Neither was asked for. Neither had an immediate return.

In April, that relationship referred his most trusted colleague to her firm — unprompted.

When she asked him what had driven it, he said something that stuck with us: "You're the one person who always shows up with something useful before I've had to ask."

The referral wasn't caused by the follow-up email she sent in late March. It was caused by November and February. By a pattern of deposits that built a balance that eventually — naturally — produced the referral.

This is what relationship compounding looks like in practice. Not a single act of generosity. A pattern of intentional deposits that makes someone feel genuinely better off for knowing you.

Can you trace a recent referral or introduction you received back to a specific deposit you'd made earlier? Tell us the shape of it in the comments.

It's probably not a new relationship you need. It's this one. 🔦Think of one person in your network whose access, influen...
05/22/2026

It's probably not a new relationship you need. It's this one. 🔦

Think of one person in your network whose access, influence, or position makes them a genuine multiplier for your firm. Now ask: when was the last real deposit you made with them — not a check-in, a real one?

If the answer is six months or more — that relationship is drifting in the wrong direction regardless of how important you consider it.

What would a genuinely valuable deposit look like for them today? Specific enough to send this week.

Drop the type of deposit you're going to make in the comments — not the person, just the deposit. We'd love to see what this community does with that question. 👇

Here's a scenario most managing partners have lived through at least once:A senior partner leaves the firm. They had a r...
05/21/2026

Here's a scenario most managing partners have lived through at least once:

A senior partner leaves the firm. They had a remarkable client relationship — seven years of trust, consistently renewed engagements, a genuine advocate inside the client organization.

The handoff is informal. A few introductions made. Some emails copied. Good intentions all around.

Six months later, the relationship is noticeably cooler. The next engagement goes to a competitor. And when you try to trace what happened, the answer is always some version of the same thing: the relationship lived in the person, not the firm.

The equity built over seven years walked out in a single quarter.

This is the most common, most expensive, and most preventable form of relationship capital loss in consulting and search firms.

The relationship-rich firm builds deliberate handoff practices before someone leaves. Full context. A structured introduction process. A deposit strategy for the incoming relationship holder that maintains warmth while establishing their own credibility.

The relationship doesn't leave because the person does.

As a managing partner or firm leader: how structured are your firm's relationship handoffs right now — and what would it take to make them genuinely deliberate?

A managing partner at a mid-market consulting firm came to us with a familiar frustration.Strong reputation. Active in t...
05/20/2026

A managing partner at a mid-market consulting firm came to us with a familiar frustration.

Strong reputation. Active in the market. Regular conference attendance. A network that, by any external measure, looked healthy.

But BD felt inconsistent. Engagements came — but the source was always vague. He couldn't trace a specific opportunity to a specific relationship with any clarity.

We ran the value assessment together.

What we found was instructive.

Nearly 40% of his top relationship investment was going to what we'd call the Evaluate quadrant — relationships that were familiar and comfortable but low on both value exchange and strategic relevance. These relationships consumed the most time and returned the least momentum.

Two relationships in his Develop quadrant — high strategic relevance, low current value exchange — had gone essentially unattended for nearly a year. Real potential. No deposits.

And one relationship he would have described as one of his most important — a genuine Connector who had produced three meaningful introductions over two years — had received no intentional deposits in six months. The balance was quietly draining.

We shifted the investment.

Within 90 days: the Connector relationship produced two meaningful new introductions after three specific, well-timed deposits. One of the Develop-quadrant relationships, after a genuine and well-timed deposit sequence, advanced to the Invest tier — and became an active referral source. BD activity felt more focused. Less scattered. Less like effort and more like strategy.

His words: "We weren't under-investing in relationships overall. We were investing in the wrong ones."

If that sentence resonates — DM us "VALUE" and let's have a real conversation.

Most search practices nurture client relationships between engagements. Almost none nurture candidate relationships betw...
05/19/2026

Most search practices nurture client relationships between engagements. Almost none nurture candidate relationships between searches. That asymmetry limits the quality of your entire network. 🔄

Deposit 1: Genuine market intelligence about their career trajectory — how the market sees their profile, where the gaps are.

Deposit 2: A connection that has nothing to do with an active search — purely because it serves them.

Deposit 3: Public recognition of their achievement or transition — visibility with an audience that matters to them.

Deposit 4: A sector perspective they wouldn't get from a routine recruiter call.

How does your practice maintain candidate relationships between active searches? What does a real deposit look like for you? Drop your answer below.

Here's something worth imagining for a moment:What would it feel like to run a firm where you knew — with real clarity —...
05/15/2026

Here's something worth imagining for a moment:

What would it feel like to run a firm where you knew — with real clarity — exactly which relationships are compounding, which need attention, and where your next opportunity is most likely to come from?

Where every meaningful relationship in your network has a deliberate deposit strategy, and the value exchange is intentional rather than reactive?

Where the relationship knowledge that drives your most important client and candidate relationships belongs to the firm — not just to the individuals who hold it today?

This is what a relationship-rich firm feels like from the inside. And it's not a hypothetical — it's a description of what becomes possible when firms stop managing relationships reactively and start building the architecture that lets value compound.

This is the goal of everything we've been building toward in May.

Which of these three realities would change the most for your firm right now — clarity, deposit strategy, or firm-level relationship knowledge?

Tell us in the comments.

Here's something we don't talk about enough in relationship strategy conversations:The cost of investing in the wrong re...
05/14/2026

Here's something we don't talk about enough in relationship strategy conversations:

The cost of investing in the wrong relationships.

Not in a judgmental way — but in a real, practical one. Because the time you spend maintaining a relationship that will never compound is time you're not spending deepening one that will. The energy that goes to relationships that drain without reciprocating is energy that doesn't reach the ones with genuine multiplier potential.

In our work with consulting founders and search leaders, we consistently find that 20 to 30 percent of BD time is allocated to relationships in the Evaluate quadrant — low value exchange, low strategic relevance. They feel familiar. They're comfortable. They're easy to maintain. But they're not moving anything forward.

The most expensive cost isn't the time spent in the wrong place. It's the relationships in the high-potential quadrant that aren't getting the attention they deserve because the bandwidth is already consumed.

Prioritization — knowing where not to invest — is as valuable as knowing where to.

Where do you think the biggest misallocation is in your relationship strategy right now? Tell us in the comments.

Here's a story we've seen play out in our work more times than we can count.Two consulting firms. Same size. Similar mar...
05/13/2026

Here's a story we've seen play out in our work more times than we can count.

Two consulting firms. Same size. Similar markets. Similar reputations. Both spend meaningfully on BD — conferences, events, visibility.

Firm A is well-connected. The partners know a lot of people. Introductions come in sporadically. Events are attended regularly. But when you ask where the last three engagements came from, the answer is vague. Relationships feel important — but no one can say specifically why.

Firm B is relationship-rich. The partners know fewer people — but they know them deeply. They know exactly what value flows through each of their most strategic relationships. They make intentional deposits before any ask. And they know, with real clarity, where their next opportunities are most likely to come from.

Same industry. Different relationship strategy. Completely different growth trajectories.

The goal of May's work isn't to grow your network. It's to maximize the value of the one you already have.

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