Vice President, Global Business Development

Job Description

Opportunity:

Abt Associates seeks Vice President of Global Business Development. The Vice President is the key executive responsible for driving and managing the global business development pipeline. The VP is accountable, along with each division’s leadership, for the respective division’s business development processes and results. S/he is responsible for ensuring that our business development pipeline meets our strategic objectives; specific areas of responsibility include: Portfolio Governance, Tier 1 opportunity Capture and Proposal Management, BD reporting and analytics.

The VP as a member of the leadership team will provide vision for and contribute leadership to business development strategy, new client development, client account management, and marketing strategies for Abt capabilities and offerings. In collaboration with the Chief Marketing & Business Development Officer, Division Vice President’s (DVP’s) and Abt leadership, the VP will develop a comprehensive, market-facing new business development strategy and model designed to support the short- and long-term growth goals of Abt’s global businesses.

Key Roles and Responsibilities:

• Manage the One Global Abt opportunity pipeline
• Manage Tier 1 Gate and Color team process
• Partner with Division leadership to lead/drive growth across Abt’s global business, including developing strategy, and focusing Abt resources on the highest potential and highest impact captures and bids
• Work with the Global Business Development Unit (GBDU) to qualify business pipeline, focusing Abt resources on the highest potential and highest impact captures and bids while creating transparency around the global Business Development pipeline
• Collaborate with DVPs, C-Suite and client account managers to establish priorities, targets and budgets for business development with key clients
• Assure that business opportunity pipelines for key clients, and Global Business overall, are sufficient to support sales target achievement and Book-to-Bill ratios4
• Ensure that Abt applies industry best practices across the entire Business Development Life Cycle and participate as a player-coach in execution, especially supporting highest priority targets
• Lead identification of strategic long range business capture opportunities and Global Priority Bids. Verify that best practice, ‘next generation’ business development and proposal processes are applied to Global Priority Bids
• Coordinate, support or lead strategic capture and business development initiatives, supporting capture meetings, and serving on capture and proposal teams for strategic bids with key clients
• Be a driving force in instilling rigor in the business development process across the Global business platform to include the enhancement of BD analytics

Preferred Skills / Prerequisites:

• Minimum of 15 years of business development experience at a professional services organization that focuses on delivery of professional services to the U.S. federal government
• Proven track record leading and developing a business development function, including capture planning, proposal management, marketing outreach, and communications and branding
• Experience responding to RFPs, leading proposal teams and writing winning proposals
• Experience managing technical business development operations at an executive level
• Very strong business acumen and the ability to work in a structured corporate environment
• Proven ability to represent the firm at an executive level
• Highly developed communications skills including oral and written presentations of complex topics to a wide array of audience types, as well as experience in outward marketing and branding
• Track record for leading and managing large, diverse teams
• Bachelor’s degree required; Master’s degree or PhD preferred

Minimum Qualifications:

• BA or BS degree with 15 + years of experience

About the Organization

Abt Associates is a mission-driven, global leader in research and program implementation in the fields of health, social and environmental policy, and international development. Founded in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1965, Abt Associates was built on the concept that sound information and empirical analysis are the best foundations for effective decision making. The firm blends the subject matter expertise of our staff with technical capabilities in applied research, program implementation, and data collection to shape policy, strengthen systems, measure performance, and deliver other solutions to our public and private sector clients. Examples of Abt Associates’ work include nationally recognized research, evaluation, and technical assistance to improve the efficiency of healthcare systems, the effectiveness of government housing programs, the production of food, and the measurement of public opinion. Abt’s staff of more than 2000 includes national and international experts who are known for their understanding of communities and governments worldwide, innovative research techniques, and insightful—and often groundbreaking—analyses and recommendations. Approximately 51 percent of our staff has graduate degrees; one in six has a doctorate. Our staff’s educational and professional disciplines include economics, engineering, environmental analysis, epidemiology, food security, health, housing, international development, psychology, social science, statistics, and survey methodology. Abt’s research staff is experienced with prominent statistical software packages, including SPSS, SAS, and STATA, along with qualitative software such as NVIVO and Atlas. In 2011, Abt Associates was ranked among the top 20 global research firms and one of the top 40 development innovators. Abt has offices in Atlanta, Ga.; Rockville, Md.; Cambridge, Mass.; Chicago, Ill.; Durham, N.C.; and New York City and program offices in nearly 40 countries in Africa, Central and Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Middle East and North Africa. www.abtassociates.com