Director of Service Business DevelopmentReports To: Chief Operating Officer
Location: Regional Corporate / Division Support
FLSA Status: Exempt (Executive / Administrative)
Employment Type: Full-Time
Position SummaryThe
Director of Service Business Development is responsible for driving profitable growth across Watson Electrical Construction's commercial, industrial, and residential electrical service businesses, with particular emphasis on Watson's third-party commercial service channels.
This leadership role develops new customers, expands existing relationships, negotiates new and renewed service agreements, builds strategic referral and business partnerships, and creates a consistent pipeline of service, repair, maintenance, emergency response, and small-project opportunities. The position is accountable for improving the commercial quality of service revenue by advancing pricing toward competitive market rates, strengthening contract terms, and pursuing sustainable account profitability while maintaining strong customer relationships.
Essential Duties & Key Responsibilities1. Business Development & Customer Growth- Strategy & Execution: Develop and execute the comprehensive business development strategy for commercial, industrial, and residential electrical service.
- Account Acquisition: Identify, pursue, and secure new commercial and industrial accounts, including facility managers, property managers, general contractors, industrial customers, institutions, commercial developers, and multi-location businesses.
- Residential Market Expansion: Grow residential service through customer acquisition, referral relationships, strategic partnerships, community presence, repeat business, and scalable referral channels with builders, REALTORS®, property managers, home inspectors, restoration companies, and other home-service providers.
- Relationship Building: Develop long-term customer relationships that generate recurring electrical service, preventive maintenance, emergency response, repair, alteration, addition, and small-project opportunities across commercial, industrial, and residential markets.
- Account Penetration: Expand existing Watson accounts by identifying additional locations, services, maintenance needs, and customer opportunities.
- Multi-Location Agreements: Develop and expand regional and multi-location service agreements with qualified commercial and industrial customers.
- Retention & Reactivation: Develop strategies to reactivate inactive customers, strengthen customer retention, and increase repeat business.
- Market Intelligence: Monitor market activity, competitors, customer needs, and emerging commercial, industrial, and residential service opportunities within Watson's geographic markets.
- Brand Representation: Represent Watson at customer meetings, industry associations, networking opportunities, community events, and other business-development activities.
- Operations Support: Support Division Managers and Service Managers with business development and customer relationship efforts while maintaining clear separation from their operational responsibilities.
2. Service Agreements, Pricing & Account Profitability- Contract Negotiation: Lead the development, renewal, and commercial negotiation of third-party service agreements, with a focus on strengthening customer relationships, improving contract economics, and aligning labor and service pricing with prevailing market rates.
- Account Evaluation: Evaluate existing third-party service accounts for pricing, contract terms, service mix, and profitability; develop strategies to appropriately reprice, renegotiate, expand, or restructure relationships as agreements renew or opportunities arise.
- Market Pricing: Maintain awareness of market pricing, competitive service rates, customer expectations, and commercial terms to support informed pricing and negotiation strategies.
- Financial Collaboration: Partner with Finance and appropriate leadership to understand account-level revenue, gross margin, pricing performance, and profitability when developing or renegotiating service agreements.
- Margin Improvement: Identify legacy or underpriced service relationships and develop customer-specific strategies to move pricing toward sustainable market levels while protecting valuable long-term relationships.
- Commercial Authority: Negotiate commercial terms within established company authority and coordinate appropriate internal review and approval for exceptions or significant contractual commitments.
3. Pipeline, Sales Activity & Market Development- Pipeline Management: Build and maintain a measurable pipeline of commercial, industrial, and residential service opportunities and referral sources.
- CRM & Field Systems: Use CRM and ServiceTitan (or other company-designated systems) to document business development activity, customer opportunities, pipeline status, lead sources, and results with disciplined follow-up.
- Marketing Alignment: Partner with Marketing on targeted campaigns, customer communications, lead generation, referral development, and market-development initiatives.
- Cross-Divisional Synergy: Leverage relationships and information across Watson divisions to identify cross-selling, account-expansion, and multi-location opportunities.
- Financial Prioritization: Use financial judgment to prioritize opportunities that support profitable growth rather than revenue growth alone.
- Executive Reporting: Provide regular updates to executive leadership regarding pipeline activity, market opportunities, new-account development, account expansion, significant prospects, and business-development results.
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)- Revenue & Profitability: Commercial, industrial, and residential service revenue growth and gross profit from new and expanded business.
- Account Acquisition & Retention: New commercial, industrial, and residential accounts secured; reactivation of inactive accounts; customer retention rates.
- Account Growth & Recurring Revenue: Increased spend within existing customer accounts and total recurring service and maintenance contract revenue.
- Pipeline Health: Pipeline value, qualified opportunities, win/conversion rate, and data accuracy within tracking systems.
- Lead Conversion: Residential lead generation and conversion metrics.
- Partnership Development: Success in establishing referral networks and strategic partnerships.
- System Discipline: CRM and ServiceTitan log accuracy, activity metrics, and follow-through discipline.
- Contract Quality: Volume of new third-party commercial service agreements, successful contract renewals, repricing activity, and overall margin improvement on renegotiated terms.
Minimum Qualifications & Experience- Professional Experience: Progressive business development, sales, account management, customer development, or leadership experience in electrical contracting, commercial or industrial construction, residential home services, facilities services, or a related industry.
- Market Expertise: Strong understanding of commercial, industrial, and residential electrical service markets, customer needs, and service-based business development.
- Financial Acumen: Strong financial judgment with an understanding of revenue, gross margin, customer profitability, and profitable growth metrics.
- Negotiation Skills: Demonstrated ability to negotiate service agreements, pricing, renewals, and commercial terms while balancing customer relationships, competitive positioning, and account profitability.
- Communication & Collaboration: Excellent communication, networking, relationship-management, organization, and collaborative skills across corporate and division leadership.
- Software Proficiency: Experience with CRM or field-service management platforms; ServiceTitan experience highly preferred.
- Licensure & Driving Record: Must possess a valid driver's license and maintain a clean motor vehicle record in accordance with company insurance standards.
Physical Requirements & Work Environment (ADA Compliance)The physical and environmental demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
- Physical Demands:
- Constantly required to operate standard office equipment such as computers, phones, copiers, and mobile devices.
- Frequently required to sit for extended periods, communicate clearly, and exchange accurate information verbally and in writing.
- Occasionally required to stand, walk, reach, bend, stoop, and move about office, construction, and customer job sites.
- Ability to safely operate a motor vehicle for regional travel up to 25%-50% of the time.
- Ability to occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds (e.g., promotional materials, presentation tools, computer equipment).
- Work Environment:
- Primary duties are performed in a standard professional office setting and remote/field environments.
- Field site visits may occasionally involve exposure to outdoor weather conditions, active construction environments, noise, dust, and electrical/industrial job sites where personal protective equipment (PPE) may be required.
