United States of America: Business Development Specialist, Strategic Information

Organization: Management Sciences for Health
Country: United States of America
Closing date: 28 Mar 2015

OVERALL RESPONSIBILITIES
The Business Development Specialist for Strategic Information’s primary responsibility is tracking and communicating intelligence on and announcements of new business opportunities to relevant stakeholders across MSH’s four levels (Corporate, Center, Country, and Project). S/he also plays a critical role in keeping MSH up-to-date on shifting market and customer trends as it relates to MSH’s organizational practices, priority technical and health areas, and target bilateral and multi-lateral funders. The Specialist routinely monitors news sites and other public sources for strategic information, maintaining MSH’s corporate business information systems and communicating information to stakeholders in a timely manner. The BD Specialist also tracks events of interest to MSH business development, attending and reporting out to the larger organization as necessary. The BD Specialist assists in preparing MSH senior leadership, including Country Representatives, and other staff for external business development meetings and in preparing marketing materials for travelers. S/he assists with capacity building support to MSH Country Leadership Teams including contributing to management of Technical Exchange Networks (TENs).

In addition, the BD Specialist may support proposal development by working in collaboration with the staff of the Business and Resource Development (BRD) unit, the Cost Proposal Unit, Human Resources, and Technical Centers to ensure the successful completion and responsiveness of MSH’s competitive, solicited and unsolicited proposals. S/he provides coordination support for the development of proposals, is responsible for a number of proposal deliverables, and ensures submission of the proposal. The BD Specialist also plays a support role in coordinating MSH positioning activities for specific new business opportunities. These activities may require travel to the field. The BD Specialist may have lead responsibility for special BRD-related projects or initiatives as required.

SPECIFIC RESPONSIBILITIES

Strategic Information Tracking and Communications (Daily)

1. Tracking and sharing new business opportunities;
2. Monitoring news sites and other sources for timely strategic information to be shared with the four levels of leadership at MSH (Corporate, Center, Country, and Project);
3. Maintaining corporate business information systems, working closely with others to ensure intelligence on competitors, partners, projects, funders is saved in the appropriate databases;
4. Assisting with research and analysis of countries, funders, business opportunities, projects and programs;
5. Tracking events of interest to new business development;
6. Attending and reporting out on events, including traveling to both international and domestic meetings and conferences as necessary;
7. Assisting MSH senior leadership, including Country Representatives, with capacity building, external business meetings, preparation of marketing materials for travelers, and coordination of events hosted by BRD;
8. Maintain comprehensive guidelines for new business tracking at MSH; train other staff in new business tracking as required.
9. Coordinate with other MSH departments including the Global Marketing, Partnerships, and Communications team and the Technical Centers to ensure coverage of all potential priority funding sources.
10. Assist with internal communications and information sharing around new business at MSH.
11. Assisting with general department administrative duties as needed.

Proposal Coordination and Development (as assigned)

1. Coordinate Proposal Process: In support of a Proposal Manager, coordinate proposal development process and all internal and external inputs to the proposal, including:
2. Develop and manage a calendar and outline for the technical and cost proposals. - Coordinate team communications through meetings and email, and ensure clarity of roles and responsibilities of team members. - Collect and track proposal-related information, and disseminate information to team members. - Compile questions to donors.
3. Support Communications with Partners: As assigned by the Proposal Manager, communicate with partner organizations about MSH proposal policies, procedures, standard forms, and requirements and facilitate communications within the proposal team. Solicit partner and collaborator inputs and assist in planning joint business opportunities. Contribute to building local partners’ capacity through working with them to complete proposal deliverables.
4. Technical Proposal: Coordinate logistics for strategy meetings. Draft management plans, institutional capability and past performance statements, staffing sections, CVs, and implementation plans as needed.
5. Cost Proposal: Facilitate communication between the cost and technical team members to ensure the technical strategy/proposal is integrated with the corresponding cost proposal.
6. Annex/Attachments, Diagrams, and Figures: Work with technical team to develop annexes/attachments, diagrams, and figures to meet the requirements of a solicitation and showcase the work of MSH. Collect personnel and technical documents which appear in the annex/attachments. As requested, prepare and coordinate past performance references and skills matrices. As assigned, responsible for developing organizational charts, results framework, and other graphics and charts.
7. Technical Proposal Reviews: Coordinate reviews of proposal drafts by internal and external reviewers. Ensure reviewers’ availability and provide background documentation, set up review meetings as needed, and compile comments to deliver to the proposal team. May also be assigned to review drafts for issues of presentation, compliance of response, and responsiveness to bid document.
8. Proposal Production: As needed, may be responsible for production of the final technical proposal, including proposal formatting using Word and saving proposals in PDF, as well as printing and binding the final document and ensuring the proposal package is complete.
9. Finalization and Submission of Proposal: Responsible for ensuring the proposal is complete, compliant, and delivered on time. This includes coordinating with editor and production staff to ensure copy-edit and formatting of the technical proposal, ensuring and scheduling final sign off, ensuring that all materials are included in the final proposal, managing delivery arrangements through shipping or travel, and ensuring the client acknowledges receipt of the proposal.
10. Proposal Close Out: Organize electronic proposal documents according to BRD procedure. Coordinate after action review. Update proposal-related materials in BRD file systems.
11. Following Notification of Award: Ensure partners, proposed candidates, and the proposal team members are all notified of the proposal result. Coordinate final proposal debrief and compile summary notes including recommendations for process improvements.
12. Development of Concept Papers: in support of Proposal Manager and Technical Strategy Lead, may assist in the development of concept papers.

Positioning Activities (as assigned)

1. Coordination of positioning activities for assigned bids: In support of the Technical Strategy Lead and Proposal Manager, may develop and coordinate positioning activities, manage logistics and payment of consultants involved in positioning activities, conduct research and draft materials as necessary, monitor trends and information pertinent to a specific bid, a specific donor or a geographic region.
2. Support Proposal Manager in cultivating relationships with specific partners and coordinate regular communications with strategic partners, including IQC partners, as necessary.
3. Other duties as required.

QUALIFICATIONS

1. Bachelor’s Degree required.
2. Minimum of 3 to 5 years of work experience, with specific experience in international public health desirable.
3. Ability to initiate and organize work, establish priorities in a time-sensitive environment, and meet deadlines with attention to detail and quality.
4. Ability to synthesize and summarize large volumes of information quickly and communicate main points to relevant stakeholders.
5. Strong interpersonal and English language skills; demonstrated ability to interact professionally with culturally diverse staff, clients, and consultants.
6. Demonstrated writing skills. Experience in proposal development desirable.
7. Knowledge of or interest in proposal management standards.
8. Demonstrated intermediate to advanced computer skills using databases and Microsoft Office Suite applications with the ability to learn new software packages. Experience with Salesforce.com desirable.
9. Willingness to work nights and weekends during proposal preparation.
10. Foreign language capabilities in French, Spanish, Portuguese, or Arabic are a plus.
11. Availability to travel up to 10%.

How to apply:

To apply for this position, please submit your resume to: https://jobs-msh.icims.com/jobs/8025/business-development-specialist%2c-strategic-information/job