Description

Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP (Calfee), a full-service corporate law firm with offices in Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, and Washington, D.C. has an opportunity for a client development manager to join its Cleveland or Cincinnati office.

As a Client Development Manager, you will be expected to perform in a fast-paced environment, adapt to changing priorities, effectively partner with attorneys and staff at all levels and deliver high-quality and accurate materials supporting the firm’s business development efforts.

With other colleagues on the Client Development Team, you will be responsible for responding to and managing pitches, presentations and proposal (RFPs, RFQs, surveys) responses from start to finish. This will include organizing and conducting proper kick-off calls, determining response requirements, assigning responsibilities, compiling and organizing information, creating new or editing existing content, quality control, and ensuring on-time delivery.

You will be responsible for helping to maintain and augment content in the proposal response database (currently using Qorus Docs), which includes collaborating with the Marketing and Client Development team and attorneys to identify, create, manage and update information that effectively communicates how Calfee successfully serves our clients. 

In addition, you will be responsible for conducting business intelligence research and competitive intelligence research, using online research tools like PitchBook and the firm’s Client Relationship Management System (CRM; Intapp DealCloud), and summarizing findings to help attorneys identify and analyze potential targets and opportunities. 

Additionally, you may be asked to help support the firm’s ranking submission process (e.g., Chambers, IFLR 1000, WTR 1000, Benchmark Litigation, etc.), including researching client organization information and working with the Team to develop, draft, edit and review submissions. 

The successful candidate will be creative, open to collaborating with others, will bring new or inventive ideas to the table, and work well as a team player and as an individual contributor.

Qualifications:

• 5 -7+ years of pitch and proposal management in a law firm environment (strongly preferred) or professional services environment.
• Bachelor’s degree in Technical Writing, English, Marketing, Communication or related discipline.
• Exceptional writing skills with the ability to craft thoughtful and compelling content.
• Unwavering attention to detail and excellent editing and proofreading skills.
• Demonstrated experience managing multiple projects under tight deadlines, including prioritizing work from a multitude of sources while maintaining the highest quality standards.
• Thrive while working in a deadline-driven, team environment as well as working independently and managing your own workload.
• Excellent interpersonal communication (verbal and written) skills, with strong commitment to providing quality client service to internal and external firm clients.
• Ability to navigate different leadership and communication styles at all levels of the organization.
• Highly organized, proactive and collaborative.
• Demonstrate integrity in handling proprietary, confidential and sensitive firm and/or client/prospective client information
• Strong knowledge of Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel; Adobe Acrobat experience preferred.
• Database experience and knowledge of management systems preferred.
• Proposal graphics experience a plus.
• CRM system experience (specifically Intapp DealCloud) a plus.

We offer a competitive compensation and benefits program and an excellent work environment. We are an Equal Opportunity Employer.

Requirements

Responsibilities: 

• Lead and manage the development of proposals, pitch materials, responses to Requests for Proposals (RFPs), presentation decks and/or supporting materials based on client/prospect requirements and attorney requests.
• Project management of proposal responses (e.g. RFPs, RFQs and surveys) and other client/prospect pitch and presentation materials, including developing and driving project timelines, coordinating internal stakeholders, facilitating meetings and effectively utilizing internal resources.
• Collaborate with key stakeholders to build compelling, customized pitch/proposal materials and messaging.
• Work with subject matter experts to prepare original content for proposals and presentations and/or review and revise text prepared by experts. Potential to also collaborate with subject matters experts to create new content for the external website, including practice and/or industry pages and blog posts.
• Review and edit final text for grammar, tone, style, clarity, and consistency, adhering to the firm’s Brand Style Guide and AP Style Guide specifications.
• Facilitate/support final proposal production as required, often collaborating with the firm’s Document Services department.
• Provide business and competitive intelligence research reports and analytical summaries as requested by attorneys.
• Assist in the development and maintenance of a matter/experience database derived from attorney-driven ranking submissions and other sources for use in RFPs, proposals, and the firm’s website (i.e., practice group descriptions and attorney biographies).
• Maintain and enhance the proposal response database (Qorus Docs), which includes ensuring all proposal response content is current, identified with proper content owner, tagged to enable intuitive categorization and uploaded to the database.
• Infrequent to no travel required, mostly between the firm’s Ohio offices.

Further responsibilities include:

• Document pitch/proposal/research activity metrics through tracking and/or CRM system.
• Peer review/proof-reading and providing feedback on other team members’ work.
• Support ongoing activities to develop, improve and maintain client development workflows, supporting infrastructure, documents, and materials.
• Assist with the development of improved systems and processes for measuring the success of client development initiatives.