Head of New Business in London

The Head of New Business leads the New Business sub‑capability, accountable for increasing new client acquisition by building a professional, repeatable approach to identifying, targeting and converting new organisations and individuals within our “sweet spot”. The role ensures new business activity is aligned to growth and market priorities, including the firm’s target and Priority Client programmes, and supports the early stages of our sales methodology through disciplined targeting, connection and qualification activity.

This Wider Leadership role is responsible for methodology, service standards, performance management and skills development, leading a team that generates qualified meetings through proactive origination and progresses sales‑qualified leads (SQLs) generated by marketing campaigns. The role partners closely with GTM, Markets Activation, Marketing and Operations/Insights to ensure activity is insight‑led, buyer‑led and solution‑oriented, and that learning loops continuously improve propositions, messaging and performance. A key expectation is building the firm’s capability by upskilling fee earners and supporting adoption of consistent selling habits aligned to our sales methodology.

• Own and continuously improve the New Business methodology covering: targeting, outreach, qualification, SQL follow‑up, progression, handoff and feedback loops, aligned to our sales methodology.
• Maintain a clear “how to engage” service guide: inputs, outputs, timelines, definitions of done and quality standards.
• Establish briefing standards for requests into New Business (what good looks like, minimum information, priority rules).
• Run practical learning loops (what’s working/what isn’t/what we’ll change) to improve standards, scripts and tools.
• Partner with GTM and Sales leadership to define target priorities and focus areas aligned to growth and market priorities and firm programmes (Target and Priority Client).
• Ensure targeting is grounded in buyer needs and issue‑led opportunities, not just firm structure.
• Lead delivery of proactive origination and meeting generation with clear standards and measurable outcomes.
• Define and govern how the team receives, qualifies and progresses sales‑qualified leads (SQLs) from marketing campaigns, ensuring speed‑to‑lead, follow‑up quality and clear next steps.
• Partner with Markets Activation and Content to ensure propositions and proof points are buyer‑led, issue‑based and solution‑oriented.
• Work with Campaigns and Digital to align targeting, nurture and lead handoff processes, including definitions and feedback loops.
• Ensure insight from outreach and SQL progression feeds back into proposition refinement and GTM/campaign planning.
• Establish clean handoffs into Partners/Account teams with minimum packs and acceptance criteria (what has happened, what matters, what is next).
• Ensure accurate campaign attribution and source discipline in CRM so marketing contribution is visible and trusted.
• Partner with Operations/CRM and Digital to operationalise new business activity through tools and automation (e.g., consistent logging, follow‑up discipline, templates, workflow and reporting), improving consistency and reducing manual rework.
• Build awareness and adoption of available tools for fee earners (playbooks, quick guides, short enablement sessions), ensuring teams know what is available and how to use it well.
• Define and track KPIs for New Business performance (origination activity, SQL follow‑up timeliness, qualification quality, meeting conversion, progression signals and outcomes).
• Lead and develop the New Business team: recruitment input, onboarding, coaching, performance management and progression.

You’ll Be Someone With:

• Significant experience in new business sales/origination in complex B2B environments (professional services preferred).
• Proven ability to build repeatable approaches and improve conversion through disciplined execution and coaching.
• Strong buyer‑led, issue‑based and solution selling capability and confidence embedding sales methodology adoption.
• Strong performance mindset: comfortable defining measures, using insight and driving interventions.
• Strong stakeholder influence skills; able to contract priorities and manage trade‑offs.
• Proven people leadership and capability‑building experience.
• Experience operationalising activity through tools/automation and building adoption across stakeholders is beneficial.

At BDO, we’ll help you achieve your personal goals and career ambitions, and we have programmes, resources, and frameworks that provide clarity and structure around career development.