Senior Business Development Manager in London

The Maples Group is a standard bearer in financial and legal services, trusted by many of the world’s largest hedge fund managers, private equity firms and international corporations. Our distinction flows from our carefully curated team: 2,500+ professionals characterised by tenacity, ethics and exacting excellence. Operating in key financial centres across the Americas, Asia, Europe and the Middle East, our international presence offers a unique springboard for career development and cross-cultural immersion.

We are committed to diversity, inclusion and equality of opportunity as we attract, retain and develop world-class talent.

About the Role

The Senior Business Development Manager will be based in London and will serve as a trusted practice group advisor across offices in the region. This role will have an important role to play in contributing to the development and execution of practice group strategy and will be key in providing strategic and operational support to the business development function, supporting the future growth and success of the business.

Main responsibilities include but are not limited to:

• Strategic planning and profile raising
• Support LPGLs and local BD colleagues in developing strategic, forward-looking BD plans, with a focus on ensuring priorities are aligned across the region, activity is coordinated effectively and progress is tracked against agreed objectives.
• Co-develop with the Regional Head of Business Development incisive initiatives that drive revenue and profit, build relationships and strengthen the firm's reputation.
• Work with the local BD team to help translate practice group goals into specific and coordinated activity, ensuring clear ownership and visibility of progress.
• Work with the local BD team to continuously review business development plans and reconcile budgets, ensuring actions are implemented and maintaining regional and global alignment.
• Develop best practice and policies for business development activity, tracking and reporting on outcomes and demonstrating ROI where possible.
• Work with the global and regional Marketing team to develop engaging content for campaigns, collateral, digital channels and other marketing tactics.
• Identify, evaluate and oversee strategic sponsorships and speaking opportunities at conferences and seminars.
• Maintain oversight of BD trips, ensuring the purpose and objectives are scoped and agreed, the appropriate stakeholders and BD colleagues are engaged, the team is fully briefed, and follow-up actions are captured in the CRM system and implemented.
• Proactively working with partners to target and develop clients and ensure alignment with BD plans and global programmes, including producing client relationship overviews and conducting advanced research and analysis.
• Oversee and provide strategic input on priority pitches and proposals, ensuring appropriate BD team support is in place and that pitch materials are aligned with the opportunity, client relationship and wider practice group strategy.
• Developing and overseeing client (and intermediary) relationship management initiatives.
• Putting in place best practice for monitoring information related to client and matter feedback, matter experience, client contacts and business development leads to support the growth and development of the business.
• Participate in relevant internal BD meetings to provide strategic input, help coordinate next steps and ensure appropriate BD team support is aligned to agreed priorities.
• Proactively encouraging and managing lawyer involvement in business development and marketing activities by clearly communicating the value and rationale of proposed strategies and initiatives.
• Work with the events team and relevant BD colleagues to ensure conferences, seminars, client entertainment and firm-hosted events are aligned with BD priorities, appropriately resourced and followed up effectively.
• Provide oversight of CRM data quality and usage for priority clients, targets and BD initiatives, working with the team to ensure client and target lists are accurate, strategically useful and consistently maintained.
• Leading on the identification and pursuit of opportunities to develop new and existing clients as well as proactively seeking out ways to upsell and cross sell into the wider Maples Group business.
• Working with the BD team, to analyze and identify market, client and competitor developments and follow through with new business opportunities.
• Support on ad hoc strategic projects outside of the day-to-day responsibilities that benefit the wider function and firm.

Management and coordination

• Working with the Regional Head of Business Development, provide day-to-day coordination and oversight across the London BD team, helping to prioritise activity, join up work across practice groups and offices, share best practice, and ensure resources are deployed effectively against agreed strategic priorities.
• Working with the Regional Head of Business Development, play an active role in developing the regional based business development team by supporting prioritisation, ways of working, knowledge-sharing and capability-building.
• Promote alignment and coordination across global and regional BD teams to support consistent delivery of agreed BD priorities.
• Building and maintaining strong working relationships with key stakeholders across the partnership.
• Working closely with marketing and business development colleagues to align and collaborate on go to market strategies and take an active role in supporting the rollout of global client initiatives.
• Supporting the business development and marketing leadership team in firm wide business development activities, including taking a strategic lead role on complex projects that may fall outside of the core activities of this position, but require managerial involvement.
• Proactively challenge and support partners to focus on high-value BD activity aligned to agreed strategic priorities.
• Support on the allocation of budget for activities that help deliver on BD plans and monitor spend against this. Challenge unplanned spend and ensure there is a proper business case for spend not originally included in the budget allocation.
• Keep abreast of developments by listening to the markets so to detect and/or anticipate any business opportunities to present to clients. Advise others in the business on key trends and opportunities – leading strategic brainstorming discussions on how we can develop the opportunities highlighted.

What You Bring

The successful applicant will have the ability to engage credibly with all members of the organisation with enthusiasm and initiative. They will be able to provide strategic as well as operational support and be an excellent communicator with good organisational and team player skills. Attention to detail and the ability to handle a consistent and varied workload is essential. The individual's skills and experience will include:

• Law firm experience, as well as a professional qualification in Marketing, Business or a related field is preferred.
• Over eight years' experience in a business development and/or mixed marketing/BD role in professional services with knowledge of the finance/legal industry, B2B target audiences and tactics, attention to detail, and exceptional project management skills.
• Demonstrated experience, ideally gained in a professional services environment, of managing senior stakeholders.
• Decision making and problem solving - the ideal candidate will need to be able to juggle a number of ongoing projects simultaneously with associated deadlines and budgets. The individual should be calm under pressure and think through problem solving both logically and creatively.
• Prior experience managing high performing teams, training new talent, developing, upskilling and retaining individual contributors.
• Experience with InterAction or similar CRM systems; with experience in maximising the data value.
• A team player with the ability to build relationships within the marketing team both locally and globally.
• Excellent verbal and written communication and presentation skills.
• Strong project management, organisational, time management and administrative skills.
• A 'can-do' attitude and hands-on approach where required.

Benefits & Rewards

The most enduring professional relationships are reciprocal relationships. The Maples Group prioritises employee health and wellbeing. Depending on your location, we offer a range of benefits, including:

• Comprehensive health coverage (medical, dental and optical).
• Competitive vacation packages.
• Educational assistance and professional development programmes.
• Savings or pension plan.
• Life insurance.
• Travel insurance.
• Global mental wellness programme.
• Sports clubs and social events.

Over five decades, the Maples Group has grown from modest beginnings into one of the world's preeminent professional services firms, offering specialised fiduciary, fund administration, regulatory and compliance, entity formation and management and legal services on the laws of the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Ireland, Jersey and Luxembourg.