Job Description

Position: Vice President of Business Development, Construction Industry General Contractor
Location: Onsite in Chicago, IL; in a current hub location: San Diego, CA, Colorado Springs, CO areas; or willing to commute regularly to these locations will be considered. (Relocation assistance available)
Travel: Estimated travel to reach 50% with frequent travel to existing and new business client locations as needed.

We're partnering with a rapidly growing Chicago-based general contractor with 150+ employees, and a clear trajectory to grow to more than 500 employees and over $1B in revenue to find an exceptional Vice President of Business Development to join their senior leadership team. This is a rare opportunity to lead and shape business development as a strategic partner to the CEO, as they develop and execute on their sector specialization and geographic growth efforts. This position will focus on growing new business revenue across Healthcare – hospitals, clinics; Living – mixed use, student housing, and senior living; Mission Critical – data centers; Clean/Smart Manufacturing – tech, pharma, medical and food production; Education – public & private K-12, higher education; and Energy – substation, grid resilience.   You won't just support the business; you'll be instrumental in shaping the business development strategy, elevating the company culture, and using disciplined data-driven insights to fuel this significant business growth. If you're an experienced Business Development professional with a passion for what you do, this is your chance to lead all aspects of business development while making a tangible impact on a thriving organization.

Core profile: alignment with one of these two core profiles is required to get you in the conversation.

• VP or Head of Function Business Development leadership experience for an organization or business unit: The ideal candidate brings senior business development leadership experience within commercial general contracting, design-build environments, with a proven track record of winning complex projects across the country in multiple sectors.  Demonstrated history of building large, multi-year pipelines that can generate $100+ million in revenue within the first 12 to 18 months.  You combine “rainmaker” relationship-building instincts and analytical marketing rigor, CRM and process discipline to drive alignment and results. Provides Business Development oversight as a generalist for several of the sectors in scope, in some cases establishing sectors from the group up.
• Significant Business Development experience: A proven senior leader who has led the core aspects of the business development sales cycle and is seeking a change or is ready now for an opportunity to lead one of the sectors in scope. A leader who has been directly responsible for lead generation, market intelligence, opportunity qualification, positioning & relationship management, procurement & bidding phases, award & transition while partnering closely with operations, preconstruction, and marketing teams.

Differentiators: these will set you apart in the selection process.

• Entrepreneurial spirit, self-starter & company culture alignment: The ideal candidate should have a strong desire to build, grow, and own the outcomes of a business’s success, with a continuous improvement mindset and a willingness to take a hands-on approach to achieve results quickly. They should have an authentic executive presence and be respected, relatable, and approachable across the organization. Is personally known and respected by owners, developers, institutions, and sponsors in key markets.   The candidate should prioritize team success over individual titles and have experience aligning corporate culture with organizational goals to create a positive and collaborative work environment.
• General contracting construction industry business development experience: A proven track record of delivering innovative solutions, engaging stakeholders, and securing new business opportunities. The ideal candidate continuously builds defensible multi-year pipelines that can generate $100 - $200M million of work to pursue every 12 – 18 months. Capable of managing 20 – 30 different client relationships and is consistently competitive and winning opportunities within the $10M - $75M range. A thought leader who brings strong executive presence and credibility with sophisticated buyers and is an influential, visible participant on relevant boards, councils, and industry associations, using those platforms to build trust and access.
• Disciplined sales & business development methodology: The ideal candidate utilizes a disciplined, process-oriented sales methodology—such as the Shipley Method or Whale Hunting—to strategically target and land transformative accounts through rigorous metrics and milestone tracking. You are a long-term strategist who develops one, three, and five-year plans, ensuring that today’s high-velocity activities directly fuel future growth and organizational goals. By blending a relationship-driven selling cycle with data-backed decision matrices and mitigation strategies, you build "Purpose-Built" partnerships rooted in persistence and trust. Ultimately, you provide expert recommendations to leadership, excelling at the "strong finish" and diligent follow-through required to navigate complex, multi-year business development cycles.
• Existing & new business revenue growth: The ideal candidate has a growth mindset with the ability to align geographic ownership, sector strategy, and Centers of Excellence into a focused, repeatable revenue engine. They demonstrate strong pattern recognition across markets, owners, and competitors, enabling smarter prioritization as the organization expands its Midwest presence while scaling nationally across 20+ states, at times “standing up” new sectors with no brand recognition. Operates as a sector generalist with depth, they bring credibility across multiple building types and can guide both existing and future sector BD leaders,  
• Data backed selling & decision support performance metrics: As strategic analytical marketing expert, you possess the deep technical proficiency required to transform complex data into a disciplined growth pipeline through rigorous CRM governance and KPI implementation. You have a proven ability to synthesize macro-market intelligence from diverse data sources to conduct sophisticated SWOT analyses and define precise customer profiles that optimize win-rate ratios. You excel at establishing the structure and oversight necessary to align sector-specific performance with overarching corporate objectives, ensuring every strategic pursuit is grounded in analytical excellence.
• Cross-functional business leadership: As a collaborative leader, you possess the professional diplomacy and structural agility required to operate effectively within a matrixed organization where business development, marketing, and program management intersect. You have a proven track record of securing complex project pursuits by aligning diverse teams and navigating "dotted-line" reporting structures to remain accountable to the deal’s P&L Sponsor. Your experience allows you to balance sector-specific goals with broader organizational interests, ensuring that all stakeholders are synchronized throughout the lifecycle of a deal.

Core Accountabilities:

Strategic Growth & Market Expansion

• Geographic Hub Acceleration: Lead the strategy to scale the national footprint across 21 states, with a specific focus on developing 6+ geographic hubs (including Chicago, San Diego, and Colorado Springs) into $300M business units.
• Sector Center of Excellence: Establish and direct the entry into new industry sectors (e.g., Mission Critical, Clean Manufacturing, Energy), driving the expansion until these sectors become recognized as industry-leading "Centers of Excellence."
• M&A & JV Strategy: Partner with executive leadership during M&A due diligence to assess the BD capabilities of target firms and identify strategic Joint Venture (JV) opportunities that allow for faster entry into sophisticated markets.
• Predictability through Planning: Partner with senior leadership to develop and execute one-, three-, and five-year business development plans that move the organization away from reactive bidding and toward a predictable, scalable growth engine.

Pipeline Development & Revenue Generation

• High-Integrity Pipeline Generation: Build and lead a defensible, multi-year pipeline capable of generating $100M–$200M in qualified work, specifically targeting project sizes in the $10M–$75M range.
• Field-First Business Development: Maintain a highly mobile, externally focused presence by spending 50% or more of your time in the field, executing a “breakfast, lunch, dinner” mentality to advance strategic client relationships.
• Personal Relationship Origination: Drive the personal advancement of relationships with owners, developers, and institutional sponsors, winning business based on personal credibility independent of existing brand recognition in new markets.
• Industry Influence & Visibility: Serve as an influential, visible participant on relevant boards, councils, and industry associations, using these platforms to create "relationship gravity" that pulls national opportunities toward the firm.

Data-Driven Sales Discipline

• Methodology Governance: Explicitly adopt and drive the organization’s commitment to the Shipley Method and Whale Hunting frameworks; ensuring these processes are the foundation of every pursuit without reinventing them.
• Salesforce/CRM Ownership: Own the evolution and mastery of the CRM (Salesforce), ensuring it serves as the "single source of truth" for the full pursuit lifecycle, from initial lead through RFP and final award.
• Analytical Qualification Standards: Partner with estimating and marketing to enforce strict qualification standards, ensuring resources are only allocated to pursuits with a high win-probability and favorable fee-to-cost ratios.
• Strategic Decision Support: Apply macro-market intelligence, SWOT analysis, and pursuit-cost modeling to provide the CEO and senior leadership with data-backed recommendations for resource allocation and market prioritization.

Cross-Functional Leadership & Culture

• Operational Conversion: Partner directly with delivery leaders and operators to convert high-level relationships into active pursuits, ensuring customer expectations are aligned with the firm’s actual execution and project size capabilities.
• Risk-Informed Pursuit Governance: Design and enforce clear pursuit parameters that integrate financial literacy and risk assessment, ensuring every opportunity aligns with specific margin targets and the firm’s strategic objectives.
• Cross-Functional Synchronization: Lead the coordination between BD, Marketing, Preconstruction, and Public Relations to ensure a unified "voice to the market" and a consistent, professional brand presence across all 21 operating states.
• Emotional Intelligence in Sales: Lead the "long-cycle" relationship management process by applying high EQ to navigate complex, multi-year business development cycles and maintain persistence through the bidding and award phases.

What qualifications you need:

• Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Marketing, Construction Management, Engineering, or other relevant business or technical discipline is required; MBA or other advanced business degree is highly desirable.
• Typically, 15 – 20+ years of total professional experience with progressive career growth, including senior-level responsibility for business development, revenue generation, or client acquisition within complex, scaling organizations.
• Minimum of 10 – 15+ years of experience providing senior leadership, management, and oversight of business development, sales, or revenue-generating teams, including direct responsibility for pursuit strategy, pipeline development, and deal conversion.
• Minimum of 10+ years of experience operating in highly relationship-driven, long-cycle sales environments, including building and sustaining executive-level client relationships across geographically distributed markets.
• 15+ years of direct involvement in core business development functions, including opportunity origination, pipeline management, pursuit qualification, capture planning, competitive positioning, pricing strategy, contract negotiation, and deal close.
• Construction industry experience is required. The ideal candidate will have led or played a senior role in business development within a commercial general contractor, design-build firm, specialty contractor, EPC (Engineering, Procurement, Construction), or AEC (Architecture, Engineering, Construction) organization.
• Prior experience within a construction company of meaningful scale is required, preferably organizations with $300M – $500M+ in annual revenue, with strong preference for experience in firms that have scaled toward or beyond $1B in revenue through geographic expansion, sector diversification, or acquisition.
• Demonstrated success selling complex, multi-stakeholder construction projects, including negotiated work, alternative delivery models (design-build, CMAR, IPD), and competitive pursuits across multiple vertical markets.
• Experience building and managing enterprise-level pipelines, including ownership of CRM platforms (e.g., Salesforce or equivalent), forecasting accuracy, pipeline hygiene, and disciplined use of leading and lagging KPIs to drive business development performance.
• Proven ability to partner effectively with operations, preconstruction, estimating, and marketing teams, aligning pursuit strategy with operational capacity, risk tolerance, and margin objectives.
• Experience leading business development through periods of rapid growth and organizational change, including market entry, geographic expansion, sector specialization, or operating-model redesign.
• Multi-market and multi-office leadership experience required, including frequent travel and the ability to maintain strong executive presence across distributed teams and regional leadership structures.
• Experience working in organizations with formalized BD methodologies (e.g., Shipley Method, Miller Heiman, “Whale Hunting,” or equivalent structured pursuit systems), with the ability to refine and enforce discipline rather than reinvent processes.
• Strong executive communication and leadership presence, with the confidence to influence senior operators, challenge internal assumptions, and drive alignment around pursuit decisions and growth priorities.
• Experience with mergers and acquisitions (M&A), strategic partnerships, or post-acquisition integration a plus, particularly where business development capabilities, client relationships, or sector expertise were key components of the transaction rationale.

About Our Client
Our client is a rapidly growing general contractor based in Chicago. With a current team of 150 people, they have built a reputation for excellence through an unwavering commitment to quality and innovative project management. The company specializes in both commercial and residential projects and are on a mission to build the most dynamic and efficient spaces where people can work smarter, heal faster, and live happier. By harnessing the power of technology, they amplify human potential while nurturing a people-first culture.  The company’s core purpose—building to solve the world’s greatest challenges—extends to their employees, with the company actively investing in their health and well-being. They have been consistently recognized as one of the most entrepreneurial, fastest growing and best places to work in the construction industry, reflecting their exceptional leadership, innovation, strong workplace culture and commitment to employee satisfaction.  The company Values are Transparency, Gratitude, Resilience, Excellence & Adventure.

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Job Tags

Contract work, For contractors, Work at office, Relocation package

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