Senior Business Development Executive (9 months) Mat cover

We will offer you a place where you can be yourself and where there are no limits on what you can achieve. With us, you can take ownership of your career and have honest conversations throughout. You would join an ambitious firm with a clear strategy for profitable growth where you can gain early responsibility and early involvement in growing the business. Here you can expect a competitive and fair reward as well as recognition based on all round performance. This forms part of our internal promise to you, The Deal, between the firm and its employees.

The Greater China Business Development team operates across Hong Kong and Shanghai. It is led by a Senior Business Development Manager based in Hong Kong, supported in the same office by two Senior Business Development Executives and one Business Development Executive. The team in Shanghai consists of one Senior Business Development Executive.
The team in Greater China also work closely with our business development colleagues in Singapore and the office manager in Seoul to integrate our practice areas and general marketing across the Asia-Pacific region.
Our Chief BD and Client Officer is based in London and our Regional Head of BD is based in Singapore. You will be part of a wider network of business development and marketing professionals around the world with team members (mainly in London) responsible for business development, media relations, web and communications, events, and CRM.

Responsible for providing strategic and operational leadership and support, the key responsibilities of the role include:

Business planning and implementation

• Take responsibility for understanding the different practice group offerings within the firm and explore ways to cross-sell the Greater China work into other areas of the firm (and vice versa)
• Coordinate implementation of the Stephenson Harwood Wei Tu China Association's business development plan
• Develop a strategic, cross-practice approach to the association in Shanghai and Guangzhou, working in conjunction with relevant members of the GC BD team and other key stakeholders
• Support and drive firm-wide or regional BD initiatives as appropriate, develop marketing communications and campaigns to profile the firm's sector offering/group in the external marketplace

Pitches, proposals and tender submissions

• Delivery of high-quality and impactful bids and proposals, working alongside the wider international business development team
• Spearhead the pitching process across GC offices and support the global team for pitches production
• Collaborate with all of teams involved in delivering bids (including lawyers, pricing, innovation, risk and responsible business teams), ensuring client-focused solutions that are tailored for a successful outcome
• Develop strong key selling messages for the practice, to be deployed consistently in pitches and submissions
• Driving bid feedback, collect and share client insights
• Monitor the updating and maintaining of pitch support material for the practice group including credentials, pitch templates and CVs

Marketing literature

• Working with EAs to create, amend and update profile sheets/CVs for lawyers, maintaining and updating the profile sheet log
• Liaising with designer/studio in based in London to support the production of marketing collateral
• Managing reception area displays of marketing literature
• Proofreading of marketing literature
• Uploading and maintaining documents on the Intranet (QUEST)

Legal directories and awards submissions

• Managing directory submissions, ensuring deadlines for entry are met and all the relevant information is supplied
• Drafting awards and legal directory submissions and preparing referee spreadsheets
• Maintaining and updating the directories log
• Co-ordinating research interviews - liaising with the partners and the external researchers, building good relationships, providing the partners with all the necessary/relevant information, dealing with queries and last-minute requests for information, scheduling/rescheduling appointments, booking rooms and conference calls
• Updating rankings and commentary documents (including profile sheets) for practice groups following publication

Client relationship management

• Keep abreast of client issues to enable proactive identification of business opportunities
• Working with the GC BD team & talent development team to support the development of client relationship skills of the lawyers
• Undertake client research and analysis as required
• Support the implementation of the global key client programme, including potentially taking CRM responsibility for one or more clients
• Liaise with lawyers on articles for external publications and with PSLs and knowledge management on content for client materials.
• Creating, managing and quality controlling marketing lists for newsletter mailshots and event invitations via the firm’s InterAction system

Internal and external communications, social media platforms

• Managing the firm’s WeChat account including drafting (in Chinese), typesetting, and design of all contents on WeChat. Also work with Wei Tu team to update their respective WeChat account
• Work with lawyers and London communication team to managing information going on to the website, QUEST (intranet) and newsletters, including simple Chinese/English translations
• Act as the primary person in preparing briefing notes, newsletters and the distribution of materials for Greater China offices
• Work with the London BD team on maintaining SH website Chinese information

Events

• Assisting practice groups with all events, including client seminars and social events in Greater China
• Monitor events budget and ensure suggested BD spend is within pre-approved budget
• Co-ordinating sponsorships and partnerships

General BD team co-ordination and support

• Be a BD representative at practice group meetings to share BD best practices, market knowledge, client insights and current activities
• Creating, managing and quality controlling marketing lists via the firm's CRM system (InterAction) for BD activities, such as newsletter mailshots and event invitations
• Conduct research on existing and prospective clients, competitor's activity and industry or regionals trends
• Stay attuned to news and business developments that may impact the practice/industry and apply that knowledge to identify opportunities for promoting the firm
• Checking presentations for brand compliance and making amends/recommendations as appropriate
• Updating various practice group related memberships and directory listings
• Work closely with the Wei Tu team for Chinese translations of BD work
• Maintaining order of the BD storage space and keeping a log of items stored
• Assisting global BD teams with requests for information and marketing literature
• Working closely with international BD teams and ensuring they are kept up to date with upcoming projects
• Ability to expertly navigate and utilise Vuture, InterAction and the pitch tool in Word and PowerPoint

We are looking for a professional with relevant marketing and business development experience in a professional services firm.

Other attributes or skills required include:

• Experience of Chinese bids and bidding in a professional services environment is essential, with experience of managing multiple cross-practice/ cross-office responses
• Confident, robust, pragmatic and easy to work with
• A skilled written communicator with a good eye for detail and the ability to influence senior people in the business and develop relationships
• Well-organised and someone who delivers what they promise to a consistently high standard of quality
• Ability to work under pressure and to tight deadlines with excellent project management skills
• Proactive and enthusiastic with a positive attitude
• A supportive and committed team player able to demonstrate experience of building a collaborative environment
• Innovative and open to new ideas, with the ability to challenge where necessary
• Commercially aware and knowledgeable and able to demonstrate that you consistently add value to business development thinking and activities
• Good skills in using Vuture, InterAction, WeChat
• Fluent (verbal and written) in English and Mandarin
• Flexibility of working outside normal office hours where necessary

This job description is indicative only and does not represent an exhaustive list of responsibilities. The firm reserves the right to alter or change the responsibilities at any time, in line with the firm’s strategy and business needs.