Reporting to the Vice President GM, Arcfield Canada, the Director, Business Development is responsible for leading the organization's strategic growth initiatives within the Canadian defence and aerospace market. Working closely with the Vice President and the Senior Leadership Team, this role develops and executes the business development strategy that drives sustainable revenue growth, expands market presence, and strengthens Arcfield Canada's competitive position.
The Director is responsible for identifying, qualifying, capturing, and winning new business opportunities across the Canadian defence, aerospace, engineering, logistics, and mission support sectors. This includes developing long-term customer relationships, cultivating strategic industry partnerships, leading capture activities, and maintaining a robust multi-year opportunity pipeline aligned with Arcfield Canada's Annual Operating Plan (AOP) and long-term strategic objectives.
As a senior leader, the Director serves as a trusted advisor to executive leadership by providing market intelligence, competitive analysis, and strategic recommendations while identifying opportunities to leverage the broader capabilities of Arcfield to meet evolving customer needs. This position requires a highly collaborative leader with extensive knowledge of Canadian defence procurement, exceptional customer relationship skills, and a demonstrated record of successfully capturing complex government contracts.
Key Responsibilities
Strategic Growth & Market Leadership
- Develop and execute Arcfield Canada's long-term business development strategy in alignment with corporate growth objectives.
- Build, maintain, and continuously refine a multi-year qualified opportunity pipeline that supports both annual revenue targets and long-term strategic growth.
- Conduct ongoing assessments of the Canadian defence, aerospace, and government marketplace to identify emerging customer requirements, procurement priorities, and competitive trends.
- Monitor changes within the Department of National Defence (DND), Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC), Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED), and the broader political and economic environment to identify opportunities and mitigate business risks.
- Develop market entry strategies for new capability areas and identify opportunities to introduce broader Arcfield capabilities that align with Canadian customer needs.
- Provide executive leadership with strategic recommendations regarding market opportunities, competitive positioning, investments, and growth priorities.
- Develop and maintain executive-level customer engagement strategies, fostering trusted relationships that position Arcfield as a preferred partner for future opportunities.
- Represent Arcfield Canada at industry associations, conferences, customer engagements, and networking events to strengthen the company's market presence.
Business Development & Capture Leadership
- Lead the full business development lifecycle, including opportunity identification, qualification, positioning, capture planning, proposal strategy, pricing strategy, contract award, and customer transition.
- Develop and execute comprehensive capture strategies for strategic pursuits using Arcfield's Business Acquisition Process (BAP).
- Lead opportunity gate reviews and ensure all pursuits meet corporate investment criteria.
- Establish and execute customer engagement strategies, call plans, and executive relationship plans.
- Direct competitive assessments, Price-to-Win (PTW) analyses, win themes, and value propositions for priority pursuits.
- Lead the development of responses to Letters of Interest (LOIs), Requests for Information (RFIs), Requests for Qualifications (RFQs), Requests for Proposals (RFPs), unsolicited proposals, and executive presentations.
- Identify, negotiate, and maintain strategic teaming agreements, subcontractor relationships, and industry partnerships that strengthen competitive positioning.
- Ensure customer intelligence, pipeline data, pursuit status, and forecasting remain current within Salesforce and other corporate systems.
Leadership & Collaboration
- Lead, coach, mentor, and develop the Business Development team by establishing clear performance expectations, providing regular feedback, and supporting professional growth.
- Foster a high-performance culture focused on accountability, collaboration, innovation, and customer success.
- Collaborate with Program Management, Engineering, Contracts, Supply Chain, Finance, and Operations to develop winning pursuit strategies and successful customer solutions.
- Work closely with corporate leadership and cross-functional teams to identify strategic growth opportunities, leverage organizational capabilities, and align business development initiatives across the company.
- Support annual strategic planning by providing market intelligence, customer insights, pipeline forecasting, and recommendations on future growth opportunities.
Performance Management & Business Growth
- Maintain a qualified rolling opportunity pipeline valued at a minimum of seven (7) times the Annual Operating Plan (AOP) revenue target.
- Deliver a minimum of three (3) net-new prime contract bids annually, including both organic growth and strategic market expansion opportunities.
- Contribute to achieving or exceeding the organization's annual Book-to-Bill ratio target of 1.3 or greater.
- Monitor proposal success rates, capture effectiveness, pipeline health, and business development investments to maximize return on investment.
- Conduct win/loss analyses and implement lessons learned to continuously improve capture strategies and proposal quality.
- Prepare regular reports and presentations for executive leadership on business development performance, market trends, pipeline health, customer engagement activities, and strategic growth initiatives.
Required Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree in Business Administration, Engineering, Commerce, Public Administration, or a related discipline.
- Minimum ten (10) years of progressive business development and capture management experience within the Canadian defence or government sector.
- Minimum five (5) years of leadership experience managing and developing business development professionals.
- Demonstrated success leading the capture and pursuit of complex government contracts from opportunity identification through contract award.
- Strong knowledge of Canadian defence procurement, including DND, PSPC, ISED, Industrial and Technological Benefits (ITB), and Government of Canada procurement processes.
- Extensive experience developing capture plans, customer engagement strategies, competitive analyses, and proposal strategies.
- Experience negotiating teaming agreements, strategic partnerships, and subcontractor arrangements.
- Strong working knowledge of Salesforce or a comparable Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platform.
- Excellent executive communication, negotiation, presentation, and relationship management skills.
- Strong strategic thinking, business acumen, financial analysis, and decision-making capabilities.
- Ability to travel approximately 25% of the time within Canada and occasionally internationally as business requirements dictate.
Preferred Qualifications
- Master's degree in Business Administration (MBA), Engineering, Public Administration, or a related discipline.
- Previous experience with the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), Department of National Defence (DND), Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC), or another federal government department.
- Established network of relationships within the Canadian defence, aerospace, and government contracting community.
- Demonstrated history of successfully capturing major defence, aerospace, or government contracts within the past five years.
- Strong understanding of Integrated Logistics Support (ILS), In-Service Support (ISS), engineering services, aerospace sustainment, and defence modernization programs.
- Experience managing business development budgets, discretionary investments, sales forecasting, and pipeline management.
- Knowledge of Price-to-Win methodologies, Shipley capture processes, and advanced proposal management practices.
- Bilingualism (English and French) is considered an asset.
