Business Development Director Real Estate

Baker Tilly•Chicago, IL

11h

About The Position

The Business Development Director at Baker Tilly is a senior-level, strategic role focused on accelerating growth across the firm’s Tax, Assurance, and Consulting practices. This leader is directly responsible for identifying and developing new business opportunities within the Real Estate sector in an assigned territory, while building, managing, and expanding strong client relationships. The Director serves as a key member of the Real Estate Industry Practice leadership team, partnering with practice leaders to shape and execute go-to-market strategies and drive industry-focused growth initiatives. This includes collaborating across service lines to develop innovative, value-driven solutions that support clients engaged in the acquisition, development, financing, ownership, and management of real estate assets—including developers, owners/operators, and real estate investment firms such as real estate private equity funds and REITs. This role requires a strong understanding of market dynamics, capital structures, and regulatory considerations impacting the Real Estate sector, and is critical to enhancing Baker Tilly’s market position and delivering differentiated value to clients.

Requirements

Bachelor's Degree required
15+ years of experience in Real Estate–focused industries or in professional services supporting these sectors (e.g., accounting, law, management consulting, real estate advisory), required
Minimum of 10 years of experience selling or delivering tax, assurance, and/or consulting services within Real Estate environments (e.g., developers, owners/operators, investment firms, REITs), required
Excellent sales skills and a proven track record of achieving KPI’s
Strong interpersonal skills and an ability to build rapport with internal Partners, Senior Management and stakeholders of varying levels/experience
Driven and ambitious individual with a strong desire to succeed
Eligibility to work in the U.S. without sponsorship required
Ability to travel up to 50% as needed

Responsibilities

Generate and manage a client facing pipeline- lead//own/participate in client pursuits (i.e. client discovery, proposal (pursuit) strategy, proposal development).
Represent the firm and it’s entire suite of services serving the Real Estate ecosystem
Co-Develop a sales plan for the assigned territory and report weekly on progress against that plan to senior management.
Demonstrated ability to craft clear, concise, and compelling value propositions for services and solutions, tailored for both internal alignment and external positioning.
Lead the deployment of sales techniques and strategies to integrate services and resources across all lines of services and geographies.
Maintain deep knowledge of core service offerings and effectively position their application within target markets to influence decision-makers
Create, sustain, and grow relationships with new and existing clients through regular, open communication; ensure performance standards and client satisfaction are consistently met, and proactively communicate and troubleshoot issues as they arise
Account Ownership; Strategic Account Management
Support the deployment and drive the use of industry-specific systems, technology development, and lead overall sales strategy for the industry.
Innovate and grow the real estate industry practice through collaboration, teaming, and differentiation.
Have conversational knowledge of other major service offerings outside of your team(s) with intersection into your target market(s); to leverage Firm strategy of providing or enhancing value for an integrated-reinforcing marketplace.
Maintain strict compliance with CRM (Salesforce) requirements by consistently documenting opportunity notes and all related activities, and keeping an accurate, up-to-date pipeline of qualified opportunities in accordance with firm protocols.
Attain closed business deal ($) goals associated with both new accounts and existing client accounts (as appropriate), to ensure a profitable return to Firm each fiscal year
Perform regular, aggressive and prompt follow up on all Firm-generated leads assigned from campaigns, or ad hoc requests from practice leadership
Collaborate with other Firm Industry, Service & Geography BD leaders and practice leaders for an integrated Go-to-Market (GTM) approach
Perform account planning and key account research to optimize BD efforts and account penetration
Make primary out-reach efforts, coordinated with marketing personnel on campaigns including prospect calls, emails and other mechanisms to secure appointments with COI individuals
Coach, develop and lead sales professionals (as well as industry resources) within the industry(s), and support other sales professionals with service or geographic alignment.
Demonstrate strong problem-solving, critical thinking, and thought leadership skills.