Could A Transition To Business Development Be The Right Move For Your Career? (With Salary Insights)
If you’re considering a career in business development, you probably have some questions about what you might expect to encounter as you progress from an entry level position up through the business development ladder.
To help set your expectations, and to help you make an informed decision on whether or not this is the right path for you, we’ll be answering some of the most commonly asked questions by AEC professionals considering a career in business development, including:
Is Business Development A Good Career?
What Does A Business Development Professional Do?
What Is The Career Path Of A Business Development Professional?
What Are Some Common Business Development Job Titles?
How Much Does A Business Development Professional Earn?
What Are The Highest Paying Locations For Business Development Professionals?
How Do You Transition Into Business Development?
Let’s begin by exploring whether or not a transition to business development might be a smart move for your career.
Is Business Development A Good Career?
We all have different desires and goals for our careers.
What defines a good career for you can be quite different from the factors that would define a good career for someone else. Thankfully, opportunities abound within the business development career path.
There’s a good chance you’ll be able to find a position that offers you both the conditions and the benefits you’re looking for. Some of the top reasons that people choose to pursue a specific career are:
- It pays well
- It allows them to feel like they’re making an impact in the world
- They feel like they’ll be excited to wake up and go to work each morning
For individuals considering a career in business development, opportunities to experience these benefits and more are widely available.
Is Business Development The Right Career For You?
If you’re still on the fence about a career in business development, you may want to start by assessing if your strengths match the strengths for the role.
Common strengths required for success in business development include:
- Creative problem solving
- A desire to continuously learn
- An embrace of any required change
- A consideration of both the present and the future
- Strong communication and interpersonal skills
- Persistence and a high level of self-motivation
Another great way to determine whether business development is the right career for you is to consider if you would enjoy the day-to-day activities.
Some typical BD activities that commonly show up on job listings include:
- Conducting market research
- Building strong client relationships
- Identifying new project opportunities
- Demonstrating strong interpersonal skills
- Identifying new leads and potential clients
- Populating and maintaining a CRM database
- Engaging effectively with multiple levels of clients
- Creating and executing a strategic business development plan
- Assisting with drafting business plans, marketing pitches, presentations, reference material, and other documents as required.
If these types of activities seem to even loosely match your personality traits, strengths, and interests, you’ll want to keep reading to gain a high-level perspective of how BD professionals contribute value to their organizations.
What Does A Business Development Professional Do?
Business development professionals play a critical role in the growth of an organization.
They are typically involved in lead generation, revenue generation, strategic planning and networking activities.
This often takes the form of identifying new opportunities that have high enough probability and profitability that they are deemed worthwhile for their firm to pursue.
These opportunities can include identifying and connecting with new markets, seeking ways to better serve existing markets, and forming strategic partnerships with complimentary firms.
1) Identifying And Connecting With New Markets
BD professionals always keep one eye to the future.
They understand that operating within the same familiar market and prospective client pool can lead to stunted growth for their organization in the form of missed opportunities elsewhere.
For this reason, expanding out into new markets is a critical activity for BD professionals.
Before reaching out to form connections in these new markets, a BD professional will need to assess the value of potential opportunities in terms of probability to produce results and long-term profitability once established.
2) Seeking Ways To Better Serve Existing Markets
BD professionals are also in the business of client retention. They understand that ignoring existing customers to chase new ones is no way to secure the long-term success they desire.
Instead, they look for desires and pain points within their existing markets that their organization isn’t yet serving and look for ways to provide solutions to address them.
Similar to assessing opportunities in new markets, BD professionals will also need to assess the probability and profitability of pursuing new opportunities within their existing markets as well.
3) Forming Strategic Partnerships With Complimentary Firms
Networking is one of the most powerful tools a BD professional can leverage. They understand the benefits of forging strategic partnerships with complimentary firms.
BD professionals seek out organizations that serve the same market, but that are not direct competitors. They look for ways that they can serve together, providing strengths in places where the other firm might be weak, and shoring up their own weaknesses by leveraging the other firm’s strengths.
Together, both firms can serve their mutual market far better than trying to do everything on their own. It’s a win-win-win for the partnering firms and their clients.
What Is The Career Path Of A Business Development Professional?
As with making any major life decision, it’s always important to see the bigger picture before committing to a specific direction.
If you’re considering a career as a business development professional, you’re going to want to understand the typical career progression so you can know where you are and where you’re headed at any stage along the journey.
With that in mind, let’s explore the career path of a business development professional in greater detail.
A Common Business Development Career Progression
BD professionals typically enter the field as business development representatives. As they find success with clients, they will be trusted with entire accounts in the BD manager role. Once they’ve proven themselves with client accounts, they can be promoted to lead the BD department in the role of BD director.
Finally, some BD professionals will be elevated once again to the role of VP of BD, where they could potentially oversee multiple BD directors and work closely with senior management and the leadership team.
BD Representative → BD Manager → BD Director → VP Of BD
Let’s discuss what each of these four roles involve in greater detail.
What Are Some Common Business Development Job Titles?
1) Business Development Representative
What Does A Business Development Representative Do?
As the most entry-level position of the four, the role of BD representative takes place on the frontlines communicating directly with prospects and clients. The main focus of BDRs is new business acquisition.
Who Does A Business Development Representative Report To?
Depending on the size of their organization, BDRs may report to the manager of their team, department, or even directly to the president or CEO, however, most commonly, a BDRs will be the direct report of a BD manager.
Who Is A Business Development Representative Responsible For?
As the most entry-level position in business development, BDRs don’t typically have any direct reports and are primarily responsible for themselves and their own results.
2) Business Development Manager
What Does A Business Development Manager Do?
Similar to BDRs, BD managers also have a wide range of tasks to oversee. They will still be communicating directly with prospects through lead generation and customer education efforts in the form of cold calling, face-to-face meetings, and follow-up activities.
They have a greater focus on identifying opportunities beyond simply acquiring new customers compared to BDRs, but are still more client-focused than visionary in their business development efforts.
Who Does A Business Development Manager Report To?
Business development managers most commonly report to their organization’s BD director. In smaller organizations, BD managers may report to the president or CEO of the firm directly.
Who Is A Business Development Manager Responsible For?
The term ‘manager’ here refers primarily to the management of the business development process, rather than of a team. That said, BD managers are also likely to have a team of BDRs underneath them to assist them in the execution of their business development strategy.
3) Business Development Director
What Does A Business Development Director Do?
The role of business development director is more strategic than those of BDRs or BDMs. There is also a heavier emphasis placed on well-informed planning as the means by which BD directors help ensure the long-term future success for their firm.
One of the most common ways BD directors accomplish this is by identifying and pursuing strategic partnerships to better serve their existing and expanding customer base.
Who Does A Business Development Director Report To?
Business development directors most commonly report to their organization’s VP of business development. In rarer cases, they may report directly to the firm’s president or CEO.
Who Is A Business Development Director Responsible For?
In organizations where the director role exists, there will most likely be teams of BD managers and BD reps for the business development director to oversee.
4) VP Of Business Development
What Does A VP Of Business Development Do?
The role of VP of business development is less about managing the BD staff and more about planning for the long-term future of the company. This involves making key decisions surrounding partnerships, large-scale acquisitions, and highly-strategic transactions that their organization will benefit from for years to come.
Who Does A VP Of Business Development Report To?
VPs of business development most commonly report to their organization’s president or CEO.
Who Is A VP Of Business Development Responsible For?
In organizations where the VP role exists, there will most likely also be a BD director, BD managers, and BD reps for the VP of business development to oversee.
How Much Does A Business Development Professional Earn?
Naturally, one of the first questions asked by someone considering a career in any field is around the topic of salary. Salary is a powerful indicator of the lifestyle a specific career can afford for a professional.
When it comes to business development, we believe the earning potential may leave you pleasantly surprised.
The following analysis is accurate as of time of publishing. Click the corresponding links to the sources to view the most recent salary statistics.
BD Representative
BD representative is the most entry-level of the four business development roles we’re assessing here. Not surprisingly, they also receive the lowest compensation out of the four.
US BD Representative Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in the US, BD representatives can expect to earn a base salary of $63k per year. They also enjoy average commissions to the tune of an additional $12k per year for an average total income of $75k per year.
The top five highest paying cities for business development representatives in the United States are Houston, San Diego, Dallas, New York, and Austin.
In a survey conducted by indeed.com, 53% of US business development representatives said their salary was sufficient to cover the cost of living in their area.
Canadian BD Representative Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in Canada, BD representatives can expect to earn a base salary of $57k per year. At the time of this article’s publishing, indeed.ca did not display data on income from commission earnings for BD representatives.
If we assume a similar commission-to-base-salary ratio as their US counterparts, the average commission earnings for a BD rep in Canada would be approximately $11k per year. This would bring the average estimated income of a BD representative in Canada to $68k per year.
The top five highest paying cities for business development representatives in Canada are Kitchener, London, Ottawa, Edmonton, and Prince George.
It’s worth noting that both US and Canadian sites reported the average tenure of a BD representative to be less than one year. This can be primarily attributed to the performance-based nature of this entry-level business development position. Here, success is often rewarded with promotion while failure won’t be tolerated very long.
BD Manager
Business development manager is the position after BD representative, but before BD director and VP of BD. As a result, they compensated better than reps, but not as well as their director or VP superiors.
US BD Manager Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in the US, BD managers can expect to earn a base salary of $71k per year.
They also enjoy average commissions to the tune of $25k per year and average profit sharing to the tune of $10k per year for an average total income of $106k per year.
The top five highest paying cities for business development managers in the United States are Houson, New York, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Chicago.
In a survey conducted by indeed.com, 60% of US business development managers said their salary was sufficient to cover the cost of living in their area.
Canadian BD Manager Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in Canada, BD managers can expect to earn a base salary of $67k per year. At the time of this article’s publishing, indeed.ca did not display data on income from commission earnings or profit sharing for BD managers.
If we assume similar commission-to-base-salary and profit-sharing-to-base-salary ratios as their US counterparts, the average commission earnings for a BD manager in Canada would be approximately $23k per year, and their average profit sharing income would be $9k per year. This would bring the average estimated income of a BD manager in Canada to $99k per year.
The top five highest paying cities for business development managers in Canada are Calgary, Vancouver, Toronto, Mississauga, and Edmonton.
It’s worth noting that both US and Canadian sites reported the average tenure of a BD manager to be between one and three years. This can be primarily attributed to the greater level of stability that comes with making it past the previous representative role. This average tenure is both reflective of the transition between manager and director roles, as well as between organizations at the manager level.
BD Director
Business development director is the second-highest position in the BD career progression. As a result, they are compensated far better than both BD reps and BD managers, but still not as well as VPs.
US BD Director Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in the US, BD directors can expect to earn a base salary of $104k per year.
They also enjoy average commissions to the tune of $50k per year and average profit sharing to the tune of $18k per year for an average total income of $172k per year.
The top five highest paying cities for business development directors in the United States are Chicago, Austin, San Diego, New York, and Houston.
In a survey conducted by indeed.com, 71% of US business development directors said their salary was sufficient to cover the cost of living in their area.
Canadian BD Director Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in Canada, BD directors can expect to earn a base salary of $82k per year. At the time of this article’s publishing, indeed.ca did not display data on income from commission earnings or profit sharing for BD directors.
If we assume similar commission-to-base-salary and profit-sharing-to-base-salary ratios as their US counterparts, the average commission earnings for a BD director in Canada would be approximately $39k per year, and their average profit sharing income would be $14k per year. This would bring the average estimated income of a BD director in Canada to $135k per year.
The top five highest paying cities for business development directors in Canada are Montreal, Edmonton, Vancouver, Ottawa, and Regina.
It’s worth noting that both US and Canadian sites reported the average tenure of a BD director to be between one and three years. This can be primarily attributed to the transition between director and VP roles, as well as between organizations at the director level.
VP Of BD
As the highest position within the Business Development career path, VPs are compensated extremely well. Even though the other positions pay well, none of them come close to the rewards you can experience at the VP level.
US Vice President Of BD Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in the US, VPs of BD can expect to earn a base salary of $121k per year.
They also enjoy average profit sharing to the tune of $27k per year. At the VP level, traditional commission earnings are replaced by a referral program, which can see total income well exceed the $200k per year mark.
The top five highest paying cities for VPs of business development in the United States are Boston, Washington, San Francisco, Houston, and Dallas.
In a survey conducted by indeed.com, 74% of US business development directors said their salary was sufficient to cover the cost of living in their area.
Canadian Vice President Of BD Salary Stats (view most recent salary statistics)
On average in Canada, VPs of BD can expect to earn a base salary of $136k per year. At the time of this article’s publishing, indeed.ca did not display data on income from profit sharing or referral programs for VPs of BD.
If we assume a similar profit-sharing-to-base-salary ratio as their US counterparts, their average profit sharing income would be $30k per year. Combined with additional compensation through a referral program, this could bring the average estimated income of a VP of BD in Canada well over the $200k per year mark.
The top five highest paying cities for VPs of business development in Canada are Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, and Edmonton.
It’s worth noting that both US and Canadian sites reported the average tenure of a VP of BD to be between two and four years. This can be primarily attributed to transitions between organizations at the VP level.
What Are The Highest Paying Locations For Business Development Professionals?
Highest Paying Locations For Business Development Jobs In The US
Overall, the best location to pursue a business development career in the United States is Houston, Texas. This location appears in the top five highest paying US cities for all four of the BD roles we’ve discussed.
In addition to Houston, San Diego and New York also appear to be great places to start a career in business development. They each land in the top five highest paying cities for rep, manager, and director roles.
If you’re further along in your career, you may also want to consider Dallas, Boston, Washington, and San Francisco as each of these locations fall into the top five cities for the VP of BD role.
Highest Paying Locations For Business Development Jobs In Canada
Overall, the best location to pursue a business development career in Canada is Edmonton, Alberta. This location appears in the top five highest paying Canadian cities for all four of the BD roles we’ve discussed.
In addition to Edmonton, Ottawa, Kitchener, London, and Prince George also look like great places to start your career in business development, although you may end up needing to relocate to a larger city such as Vancouver, Toronto, Calgary, or Montreal in order to move up into high paying manager, director, or VP roles.
How Do You Transition Into Business Development?
Experience
While not completely necessary for an entry-level role, past experience in sales, marketing, or business can be a great help when breaking into business development. Specific product knowledge, including a technical background can also be helpful if what you’re selling has a strong technical aspect to it.
If you’re coming into business development without a wealth of relevant experience, you’ll want to shoot for a BD representative role and work your way up through the ranks from there.
Education
While many BD job descriptions require at least a bachelor’s degree, this isn’t something you should let stop you if you want to pursue a career in business development.
In many organizations today, credibility wins over credentials. Savvy managers are looking for people with a knowledge of the BD process and a hunger to succeed more than they’re looking for someone who has the ‘right stuff’ on paper.
What this means is, if you have relevant industry experience, and a strong track record (for example in a sales role), and you’ve proven your ability to build a strong network, you could be an ideal hire for the right organization.
If you want formal training in business development, there are many accelerated courses you can take to help ensure your success.
If you’re actively engaged in a full-time career outside of business development, you’ll want to look for a course that fits in well with your schedule. The best format for this is an online course that can be taken on your time and at your own pace.
Next Steps
If you’d like to dive much deeper into business development and explore our proprietary BD framework, we invite you to consider investing in a membership to Growth Through Learning Academy, where you’ll gain access to our entire Business Development course.
The course will take your understanding of business development to the next level with insightful video lessons, quizzes, and exercises all designed to increase your confidence and prime you for success.
Sign up for the Academy today and receive instant access to our entire library of courses on consultative sales, business development, personal branding, and priority management.