The main flavors
Strategic partnerships. High-value, low-volume deals with a handful of named companies. Think platform integrations, co-marketing, or marquee alliances. Long cycles, executive exposure, heavy cross-functional coordination. Closest to corporate strategy with a commercial edge.
Channel / alliances. Building and managing the partners who resell, refer, or co-sell your product. More repeatable and program-like; success looks like partner-sourced pipeline growing quarter over quarter. Strong fit for MBAs who like building systems and enablement.
Platform / ecosystem BD. Recruiting developers, third-party builders, or marketplace participants onto your platform. Often technical-adjacent; you're growing the supply side of a network. Common at companies whose product is a platform others build on.
Embedded / OEM partnerships. Getting your product built into someone else's. Long, technical, contract-heavy deals; closest to corporate development in deal mechanics.
"Sales by another name." At some companies BD is simply early-stage or outbound sales. Real and valuable work, but know it before you take it, because the skills and comp are sales, not strategy.
Signals to read from the outside
How to tell what a specific BD role actually is before you ever talk to them:
- Who they report to. BD under a CRO/Sales leader leans commercial and quota-driven; under a CEO, Strategy, or Product leader leans strategic.
- Comp structure in the posting. A heavy variable/OTE split signals sales-like BD. A salary-weighted package signals strategic BD.
- The verbs in the job description. "Quota," "pipeline," "outbound" point to sales-flavored. "Structure," "negotiate," "ecosystem," "strategic" point to partnerships.
- Whether partnerships are named publicly. Companies that announce marquee integrations and alliances usually have a real strategic BD function.
Types of companies that hire BD
- Platform companies (where others build on top of you) — the richest ecosystem and partnerships roles.
- Infrastructure and API-first companies — embedded/OEM and integration deals.
- Marketplaces — supply- and demand-side BD to grow both sides of the network.
- Enterprise software — channel and alliances programs alongside direct sales.
Company stage changes everything: at seed/Series A, BD is improvised and you'll define the function; by Series B–C, you're building the first repeatable partner motion; post-IPO, you inherit a structured org with named partner tiers and more internal process.
Find and talk to people in the role
- Map the function before you network. On LinkedIn, look at titles, who they report to, and how the team is structured at 4–5 target companies. BD orgs vary so much that this research is half the battle.
- Use Haas alumni first. Ask them the un-Googleable question: "Is BD here strategic or sales-flavored, and who does it report to?"
- Ask deal questions, not job questions. "Walk me through your most complex deal last year" surfaces the real work faster than "what's a typical day."
Self-assessment checklist
Before you commit the hunt:
- Am I energized by long cycles where the payoff is months away?
- Can I stay motivated when a deal stalls outside my control?
- Do I prefer creating new revenue lines over optimizing existing ones?
- Am I comfortable with a comp structure that may be partly variable?
- Do I genuinely understand the product enough to argue why a partner should integrate with it?