Business Development Executive (12 Month FTC)

Birketts is an ambitious full service, top 50 UK law firm, operating in East Anglia, London and the surrounding areas.  With a rich heritage spanning over 150 years we’ve built an enviable track record advising businesses, institutions and individuals in the UK and internationally.

Throughout our history our ethos has remained simple: we provide clear legal advice and value and insight to our clients.

We believe that through this approach and a combination of technical excellence and high quality service we can develop long-lasting partnerships and become our clients' solicitor of choice.

The Birketts Business Development (BD) and Marketing team consists of over 30 people who are responsible for the firm’s Business Development, PR and Communications, CRM, Campaigns and Events, as well as tender and proposal management.

The team is based across each of the Regional Birketts’ offices (Ipswich, Norwich, Cambridge and Chelmsford) and we operate as one team across the firm, with areas of specialist focus, operating as an extension to our lawyer teams.

With the benefit of our professional qualifications, experience, knowledge of targets and our client base, we direct activity to support the firm’s strategic objectives; for all business development and marketing activity. We are KPI focussed, keen to measure and track activity and review return on investment.

We support our firm-wide vision to be the standout law firm for client experience, we continue to support delivery of a differentiated services and at the heart of what we do is build and drive the awareness of the Birketts’ brand to support firm wide growth.

We are insights driven and use data to facilitate making the best decisions for both our clients and our business and hold the business true to their team strategies and bringing them to life. Our ultimate aim is to support the firm’s strategic objectives.

To support the Business Development team and other new business opportunities of strategic importance to the firm by working with lawyer teams to generate informative marketing material to support sector growth.

You will work closely with the firms Lawyers to devise and implement a business development strategy which supports their respective team objectives by bringing their business development plan to life through engaging and well thought through BD activities and initiatives.

Main Accountabilities:

Legal directory submissions:

• Responsibility for co-ordinating the production of the firm's annual legal directory submissions, guiding practice teams to ensure they submit on time and to a high quality standard to ensure continued high rankings.

 Business development and research:

• Responsibility to work closely with the office Sales teams to implement effective BD processes and pipelines within the respective offices, to manage a list of new prospects and key accounts across the office to generate new fees from both existing clients and new prospects.
• Ensure sales targets have a regular contact programme in place as well as effective follow-up to move targets through the sales pipeline.
• Provide the BD Manager with sales target management information to feed into Management Board reports on a monthly basis.
• Working closely with industry sector and practice teams to identify and research potential targets and execute local business development and marketing plans.
• BD representative for specific practice / sector teams with responsibility for organising the group and maximising marketing and business development opportunities.
• Assisting with the development, implementation and coordination of fee earner Personal Business Development plans.
• To be an ambassador for the firm’s CRM system to record all relevant business development activity to assist measurement of this for the firm.
• Creating and updating marketing collateral to reflect the expertise, professionalism and wide knowledge of the firms various divisions.

Clients and intermediaries:

• Liaising with fee earners to ensure clients and intermediaries have appropriate access to the firm's services and information.
• To work with fee earners to improve client retention and the identification of potential opportunities with existing clients to increase customer satisfaction.

Personal development:

• As part of a team, investigating new ideas to differentiate Birketts in the market place.
• Support other Business Development team members in other office locations where necessary.
• Support the BD manager on ad-hoc projects as appropriate.
• Other Business Development duties/projects as and when required.

• Strong understanding of marketing and business development processes.
• A team player with the ability to create a positive impact with colleagues, peers, partners and clients and to demonstrate diplomacy, listening and influencing skills.
• Proactive rather than reactive in approach, with a ‘can-do’ attitude.
• Demonstrating enthusiasm, confronting and overcoming obstacles to make progress.
• Applies broad knowledge to analyse problems, suggest solutions and where appropriate, implement them.
• Good written and verbal communication skills with an excellent eye for detail and the ability to write compelling propositions.
• Demonstrating consistent excellent service delivery to internal clients.
• Effective project management skills including the ability to plan ahead and prioritise conflicting demands to meet deadlines for the team.
• Demonstrating an understanding of the firm's business and marketplace.
• Working effectively under pressure.
• Demonstrating a keen interest in self-development and showing initiative.  

Furthermore, the ideal candidate will have:

• Good business development and marketing experience, gained within a professional services, legal services or similar industry.
• Proven ability to manage and influence at many levels and comfortable liaising with colleagues working at a senior level.
• Track record of developing and implementing business development and marketing plans resulting in measurable commercial success.
• Excellent IT skills (Microsoft Word and PowerPoint  essential).  Experience of Excel and desktop publishing tools such as InDesign would also be useful.

One of the best things about joining Birketts is our rewards package. At Birketts we’re appreciative of the people who work for us and our rewards package is reviewed regularly to reflect that. You can expect to receive:

• 25 days holiday (FTE) plus Bank Holidays
• Long Service holiday award – 1 extra week every 10 years continuous service
• Private Healthcare with BUPA (offered after probation is passed)
• Scottish Widows Pension Scheme (5% employer / 5% Employee)
• Staff Profit Share / Salary sacrifice (Pensions, Staff Profit Share)
• Life Assurance   - 4 x salary / Permanent Health Insurance
• Paid CSR day 
• Enhanced Maternity/Paternity Leave
• Subsidised gym membership
• Electric car scheme
• Eye Care Voucher
• Agile Working Policy
• Dress for your Day Policy.

Birketts is a flexible business which has embraced a hybrid working model where our colleagues enjoy a mix of home and office working. We welcome applications from people looking for flexible, agile and part time roles and we are happy to explore your preferred working patterns as part of your application.