Introhive today released its 2026 Partner Survey Report, AI and Business Development in Law and Accounting Firms. Report based on survey of 123 partner-level professionals conducted by growth strategy firm Thinktiv at legal, accounting, and other professional services firms. Each respondent responsible for delivering client work and bringing in new business. Report looks at how business development gets done today, which tools partners trust, and where firms plan to invest over next two years.
Findings point to one clear conclusion. Return firms see from business development and AI investments depends on relationship context underneath them. That context covers who knows whom across firm, how strong relationships are, and what changed recently. When partners and AI tools can reach it, firms can spot next cross-sell, protect key accounts, and walk into every meeting prepared.
Firms expect major change in how they develop business. Today 41% respondents say firm runs structured or AI-driven business development programs such as proactive cross-sell identification and key account management. Within 18 to 24 months 84% expect to reach that level. Number expecting to run AI-driven business development grows fivefold from 8 to 40 or one in three respondents.
Pressure behind shift real. Partners rate business development difficulty at 3.4 out of 5 and urgency of relationship intelligence challenges at 7.3 out of 10. Biggest sources of friction knowing where to focus BD time 50%, making time for BD 45%, and identifying cross-sell opportunities 43%.
Nearly eight in ten partners 78% say current tools give some relationship visibility that is hard to act on. Seven in ten 70% say firm leadership lacks visibility into firm's relationship capital. Among partners who rated BD tools below 7 out of 10, 51% said tools store records without surfacing insight or send no proactive alerts.
AI adoption follows same pattern. Among respondents actively using AI for business development, 68% rely only on general-purpose tools such as ChatGPT, Copilot, or Gemini. On their own these tools have no view of firm's relationship network. Partners rate satisfaction with current AI tools for BD at 6.7 out of 10.
Measurement also early. Most firms 63% have no revenue-linked way to measure business development ROI today and 15% can track revenue with strong attribution. Partners say most convincing proof would be cross-sell and expansion revenue 44% and pipeline generated or deals influenced 35%.
When asked which single capability most want done well each week, 47% chose surfacing new business opportunities. Who-knows-whom mapping 24% and automated data capture 17% followed. When asked what could do by combining information from across firm, partners ranked cross-sell opportunities 54%, at-risk relationship alerts 49%, and relationship mapping 46% as most valuable.
About Introhive
Introhive is the Relationship Intelligence Platform purpose-built for legal, accounting, consulting and built-environment firms. Introhive automatically captures, enriches and activates relationship data, turning emails, meetings and interactions into measurable relationship capital: the collective value of every client, prospective client, alumni and referral relationship across the firm.
Because that data is captured continuously and kept current without manual effort, Introhive gives professionals and AI tools the reliable, timely context they need to identify the right connections and support firm growth. Introhive is trusted by 20 of the world's top 100 law firms and 36 of the top 100 accounting firms, with users in more than 90 countries.
