Associate Director, North West
Department: Policy
Location: Cheshire
Salary: Band 4, £47,000-£55,000
Deadline: 02.09.2025
About the CBI
Founded 60 years ago and representing some of the biggest names in business, household brands and globally traded corporations that employ people in all sectors and across every region and nation of the UK, the CBI is the voice of business. The CBI represents 850 members who themselves comprise 1,100 separate registered companies and 150,000 trade association members. Find out more about some of the businesses in membership here.
The CBI is committed to ensuring a safe, supportive and inclusive people-centric culture where our people can excel to achieve their full potential and be their best authentic selves in an environment where ethical values and respectful behaviours are at the very heart of who we are in our everyday interactions.
Role Summary
We are looking for an enthusiastic and confident professional who is adept at building relationships with senior business leaders to join the CBI team. You will join at an exciting time, as the CBI builds its membership to strengthen the voice of business to policy makers.
Based at our Daresbury office, and reporting to the CBI’s Regional Director for the North West, this is an exciting opportunity to join a team tasked with driving the ambitious growth plans of the business. It will be your job to help develop our membership base by managing external relationships with a portfolio of existing CBI members and driving new membership sales.
As Associate Director you will have front-line responsibility for a diverse portfolio of CBI member relationships primarily located across North West England, as well as working to support national membership within the wider commercial and English regions team.
You will liaise daily with the CBI’s policy, campaigns, products, and events teams for up-to-date product information; build external relationships with existing members; and support both the recruitment and onboarding of new CBI members.
As Associate Director you will also work with the Regional Director to plan and deliver a programme of regional events and secure sponsorship with support from CBI’s events team.
This role is pay Band 4, with a salary range of £47-55K, depending on experience,
plus a car allowance.
The role offers hybrid working with an expected minimum of two days per week in the office plus travel around the North West region to visit member workplaces and attend events - two which at times may fall outside of standard working hours.
Given the role requires car travel, you will need a full driving licence.
We also offer flexible working options to enable you to balance your work and home responsibilities.
Key responsibilities
Managing CBI member relationships:
- Maintaining and deepening relationships with CBI members across North West
England, ensuring they are kept informed of regional and national opportunities to
shape CBI and government policy and participate in CBI activities. - Driving increased membership retention and satisfaction by delivering a compelling and efficient membership offer based on policy, networking and intelligence.
- Developing a deep understanding of those issues impacting the competitiveness of member companies and being able to articulate how the CBI can influence these policies to the benefit of our members.
- Increasing the value of the membership portfolio with a strong focus on the delivery of high-quality account management, uplifting membership values, and cross-selling commercial sponsorship opportunities.
- Maintaining accurate records by tracking activity on the CRM system and ensuring relevant information is shared with the appropriate stakeholders.
- In collaboration with colleagues across the Commercial team, support member relationships outside of the North West region in line with agreed priorities.
Recruitment of new members to the CBI:
- Contributing to the North West team’s overall recruitment targets by supporting the sales activities of the wider Commercial team.
- Assisting the sales process, drawing on member insight to both help identify potential targets and leading on these relationships where appropriate.
- Cross-selling CBI’s policy intelligence and events into a commercial offer to members within your portfolio, including flagship events and specialist policy products.
Developing specialist expertise to help deepen the CBI’s member offer:
- Reflecting the composition of your membership portfolio or your policy interests,
working with teams from across the CBI to gain greater experience and knowledge in
your area of expertise. - Deploying this expertise to help improve the CBI’s offer around either specific sectors of the economy or distinct policy areas. This can be through helping to influence policy agendas, sharing insight on new developments, or by providing access to new member networks.
Success criteria:
- Level of engagement with members, including meetings, events, and proactive and reactive outreach to support and work towards annual retention targets.
- Level of renewals and uplifts within the wider team in line with annual targets.
- Positive and productive relationships with member companies from their perspective.
- Level of senior engagement in member companies.
- Maintenance of the CBI’s profile and authority within the North West region.
- Consistently displaying high levels of leadership behaviours and collaboration with colleagues across the CBI.
- Demonstrating and fostering good practice in account management administration including CRM use.
Knowledge and experience
What an individual must know or understand to be able to fulfil the role’s requirements:
- At least 5 years of account management experience (or equivalent).
- Experience working with senior external stakeholders.
- Demonstrate clear understanding of the principles and application of best practice account management.
- Strong relationship-building and networking skills.
- A full, clean driving licence.
- Awareness and understanding of the economic, social and other pressures on business.