Principal Consultant - Business Winning & Growth in Bristol

Are you a Principal Consultant or delivery leader who enjoys building trusted client relationships, shaping opportunities from real delivery insight and seeing work through from idea to impact? Whether your background is in business development or bidding, or you’ve built your career through project or programme management with strong commercial responsibility, you could be a great fit for this role.

Many successful business-winning leaders come from project and programme delivery backgrounds, using their credibility with clients to identify, shape, and secure follow-on work. We’re looking for a Principal Consultant - Business Winning & Growth who champions business growth, shapes high-impact opportunities and has delivered tangible results for fast-growing teams. This is a senior, delivery-led role designed for commercially minded consultants who balance hands-on client delivery with active business development, converting high-value leads into lasting partnerships.

You will join Whitetree’s respected Business Winning Practice, influencing strategy, developing propositions, leading pursuits, and guiding client teams. Since our establishment in 2018, Whitetree has been on a mission to empower clients, make lasting impacts, and provide unmatched career growth opportunities. We’re passionate innovators driven by our values of Trust, Integrity, Innovation, and Excellence.

To support effective collaboration and client delivery, you will ideally live within a commutable distance to Bristol.

This is an exceptional opportunity for an experienced, commercially minded consultant who thrives on building strategic relationships, identifying new opportunities and delivering measurable outcomes for clients. You’ll be joining a growing and respected Business Winning Practice within Whitetree, working alongside experienced consultants to help clients improve how they pursue, secure, and deliver work.

The role combines hands-on consulting delivery (typically around three days per week) with strategic business development, giving you the opportunity to stay close to client challenges while shaping Whitetree’s offer and influencing the future of business winning across Defence, Government, and Health sectors.

Your responsibilities will include:

• Playing a critical role in shaping and securing new work, from delivery-led opportunity identification and scoping, through pursuit strategy, bid leadership and solution delivery for the Business Winning Practice across Defence, Aerospace, Government, Healthcare, and related sectors.
• Identifying and shaping follow-on opportunities through trusted delivery relationships, turning successful programmes into long-term partnerships.
• Building and maintaining long-term client relationships to secure repeat business and referrals.
• Leveraging market insight, delivery experience and professional networks to identify, shape and convert opportunities.
• Representing Whitetree at industry events and forums, enhancing visibility and thought leadership.
• Leading strategic pursuits and consulting delivery from opportunity discovery through to bid leadership and contract win.
• Applying structured delivery expertise, stakeholder management, and commercial understanding to support client growth initiatives.
• Championing best practice and mentoring colleagues, sharing proven methodologies in capture planning, proposal development, and commercial growth.
• Supporting clients and internal teams with hands-on consultancy-delivering measurable results, driving innovation, and elevating business winning capability.
• Contributing to the development of Whitetree’s methodologies, tools, and frameworks.
• Collaborating internally to strengthen the brand and expand capability.
• Balancing commercial growth goals with high-quality client delivery (typically around three days per week), setting the standard for delivery excellence.

In your first 3-6 months, success might look like:

• Building a credible pipeline of opportunities and leading or supporting priority pursuits through to submission and/or win, while delivering high-quality client work.
• Balancing commercial growth goals with high-quality client outcomes, setting the standard for delivery excellence.
• Sharing best practice and mentoring colleagues across projects.

How success is measured:

We recognise that effective business development is a long-term investment. Success in this role is measured across pipeline creation, pursuit leadership, client delivery quality, and converted revenue, not just short-term wins. If you are a delivery leader who has naturally grown accounts, extended programmes, or shaped follow-on work — we consider that business winning, even if you’ve never held the formal title.

Skills & experience required:

• Proven experience shaping and converting opportunities through trusted client relationships and credible delivery leadership. This experience may come from formal business development and bidding roles or from project or programme leadership roles with commercial accountability.
• Strong commercial acumen - pricing, risk, governance, and financial performance.
• Experience engaging senior stakeholders within Defence, Aerospace, Government or Healthcare.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, with the credibility and professional gravitas to engage with senior client stakeholders.
• Self-motivated and confident working remotely and independently, managing your own workload and client portfolio.
• Collaborative, professional, and delivery-focused mindset.
• Ideally located within a commutable distance to Bristol.
• Current right to live and work in the UK.
• Current SC clearance or willing and eligible to undergo a Security Clearance check.
• Willingness and ability to work from home and travel for client engagements, including overnight stays away from home around the UK when required.

Desirable Experience & Attributes (one or more of the following):

• Mastery of capture planning, win themes, pipeline management and opportunity qualification.
• Success leading pursuits and consulting engagements in challenging delivery environments.
• Experience running complex programmes with responsibility for extensions, renewals, or additional scope.
• Understanding of procurement lifecycles, commercial models, and complex delivery environments.
• Experienced in balancing strategic vision and hands-on delivery providing a pragmatic approach – focused on outcomes, growth and professional impact.

Life at Whitetree:

At Whitetree, we are proud to provide a collaborative and supportive environment in which you can grow and develop your career, with the chance to work alongside some of the best people in the industry. We’re proud to have recently become one of the select few Chartered Management Consultancies in the UK. This prestigious accreditation reflects our commitment to the highest standards of professional practice and ethical conduct in consulting. As part of our dedication to your professional growth, we’re eager to sponsor suitable candidates on their journey to becoming Chartered Management Consultants themselves.

Whitetree’s success hinges on hiring great people and creating an environment where we can be happy, feel challenged, and do our best work. We hope that excites you enough to apply.

Our competitive benefits package includes: 25 days annual leave, plus