On average, every month, Seldon Rosser hires a senior BD & Marketing Leader for a professional services firm, somewhere in the APAC. Their job titles vary from Head of BD & Marketing, Chief Marketing Officer, Director of Marketing etc. and there are many similarities between job descriptions; yet every single job is different, and the ideal candidate profile can vary a lot from job to job.
If you are hiring a BD & Marketing Leader, the main thing to consider is what type of skills and experience you want to harness most. We recommend you figure out the number one priority that you need the person in the role to deliver above everything else, and then continue making a list based on priorities.
To help here are the top 5 things we often see feature as the key driver for the hire.
1) A business-as-usual role, managing a team and providing leadership to the business on delivering strategies that align to key business goals, priorities, and resourcing. Prior experience managing teams and a generalist BDMC function is often the key criteria when hiring – and these roles are usually replacement roles.
2) Driving sales and developing a strategy to build pipeline, win work and create solid client relationship management frameworks. Often with the emphasis on BD, more than marketing, a past record in sophisticated sales is critical as is a culture that wants sales results as a KPI of the role.
3) Raising the brand profile – either managing a rebrand or building marketing campaigns that elevate the brand, the emphasis is more on marketing than BD.
4) If the business is undergoing a major transformation, then candidates with project management and change management experience should be prioritised.
5) Experience on Executive Leadership Groups or Boards is useful when hiring for rapid growth, when large investment decisions need to be made – candidates with M&A and whole of business strategy experience are effective in these roles.
In most searches that we do, we require candidates that have some, or all the above skills and experience but it is important for the success of the role if you have given some weighting to the priorities of the business.
If you wish to talk through your recruitment process and/or get advice on how best to attract the right talent, reach out to Graham or Katie.