Russell is an award-winning general contractor and real estate development firm providing construction leadership and development for complex commercial projects across industrial, manufacturing, office, retail, health care, higher education, K-12, and government markets. Ranked #240 on the ENR Top 400, Russell has delivered more than $7 billion in projects across 34 states since its founding in 1983.
Headquartered in Davenport, Iowa, with regional offices in St. Louis and Springfield, Missouri, and Leawood, Kansas, Russell team members live where they work — a commitment that fuels the company's culture of building great people, relationships, and communities.
Ask our team members what they value most about Russell, and culture tops the list. Employees describe Russell as more flexible than any place they've worked — supported, empowered to do their best work, and backed by real career development. Russell's reputation for culture, flexibility, and growth makes it a place to build a career, not just take a job.
Reporting to the President and serving on the senior leadership team, the Senior Vice President of Business Development owns Russell's business development engine — pipeline, pursuits, and revenue accountability across all markets — in close partnership with Marketing and Preconstruction. This role is accountable for profitable revenue growth, sharpening our forecasting, pursuit selection, and pipeline discipline while strengthening the relationship-driven, seller-doer culture that already wins.
This position may be based out of any of our four offices.
Roles & Responsibilities
Business Development
Own enterprise business development goal attainment; set company, market, and individual business development goals with the executive team.
Lead the business development team with coaching, measurables, and accountability; lead Market Presidents on business development scorecards, pursuit collaboration, and client relations in their geographies.
Lead sales processes for seller-doers in collaboration with the Chief Operating Officer.
Own sales forecasting and pipeline planning as inputs to business planning and resource decisions.
Champion go/no-go discipline and pursuit selection criteria.
Drive CRM utilization and data integrity across all client-facing roles; manage the business development budget.
Personally engage key clients and participate in pursuits — client calls, proposals, and interviews.
Marketing Partnership
Partner with the VP of Marketing & Client Relations to align pursuit strategy, proposals, and interview preparation with business development priorities.
Provide business development input to brand positioning, market research, and client experience initiatives; share pipeline data to inform marketing investment.
Preconstruction Partnership
Collaborate with the COO and VP of Preconstruction covering pursuit selection, estimate responsiveness, and interview performance.
Ensure a clean handoff from pursuit strategy into preconstruction and from award into operations.
Leadership
Coach and develop direct reports; drive accountability for outcomes and build succession depth.
Contribute as a member of the leadership team to strategic planning and enterprise decisions.
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10+ years of progressive revenue, business development, or client-facing leadership in construction, AEC, or a closely adjacent B2B relationship-sales environment (development, engineering, design-build, commercial real estate services).
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Experience leading a business development team with goals, scorecards, and accountability — and evidence of growing revenue through others, not only personal production.
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Working fluency in how construction work is won: qualifications-based selection, RFP/RFQ pursuits, interviews, and relationship-driven negotiated work.
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Comfort with CRM-driven pipeline management and sales forecasting.
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Executive presence with clients, boards, and civic leadership; willingness to travel regularly across Russell's four markets.
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Direct experience with preconstruction or estimating environments preferred.
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Experience partnering closely with a marketing function on pursuits and brand strategy is a plus.
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Existing client relationships in the Midwest and in Russell's core sectors.
