Director of Business Development

Millions of people around the world depend on Surfline’s products to enrich their experiences in and around the ocean. Since 1985, our company has connected people with the ocean. Starting with surfers and expanding to offshore cruisers, anglers and a myriad of other ocean enthusiasts, we’ve made it our mission to deliver peak maritime experiences. We provide those who work and play in the ocean with all the advanced tools, personalized insights and immersive content to make their lives better -- supplying them with the information they need to make smarter decisions, seek out new experiences and gain valuable knowledge.

We are dedicated to bringing people together across the globe, and we champion and encourage those who bring different perspectives, ideas, and creativity. At Surfline, we recruit, employ, train, compensate, and promote regardless of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, disability, gender identity, gender expression, age, veteran status, and any other protected status.

Surfline Coastal Intelligence turns decades of ocean and coastal data into insight that helps communities, engineers, and agencies make better decisions about the coast. As Director of Business Development, you will set the partnership strategy for SCI and develop the team that carries it out, deciding which markets, partner categories, and pilots earn our investment. You will own the SCI revenue plan, personally lead our most strategic relationships, and turn evidence from the field into clear direction for product, data science, and executive leadership, shaping where SCI goes next.

Under Surfline’s “Work from Anywhere” policy, this position may be performed on a full-time remote basis, with California-based candidates strongly preferred.

• Own the SCI partnership strategy and revenue plan across municipalities, engineering firms, and agencies.
• Hire, coach, and lead Business Development Managers who drive revenue from discrete categories.
• Leverage B2B/G partnerships experience to refine and scale the SCI government partnerships strategy.
• Set the discovery standard so every engagement uncovers partner problems before proposing solutions.
• Define the pilot framework used across SCI, including hypotheses, success metrics, and decision points.
• Turn field learnings into clear roadmap input for product, data science, and executive leadership.
• Lead market sizing and segmentation that guides where SCI invests along core market coastlines.
• Build a shared system for documenting engagements so patterns consistently refine SCI’s core strategy.
• Allocate team time and resources by strategic fit, scalability, and long term value, not deal size.
• Negotiate SCI’s most complex agreements involving data rights, public procurement, and multiyear terms.
• Align the dispersed SCI team around partner needs so technical capabilities reach the right markets.
• Forecast pipeline and revenue for executive leadership with honest assessments of each stage.
• Help make the final call on which categories to pursue, pause, or exit based on field evidence.
• Serve as SCI’s senior external voice with agency leaders and at conferences and industry events.

• Experience closing complex agreements involving data rights, public procurement, and multiyear contracts.
• Strong fluency with government budgets, grants, and municipal buying cycles across many jurisdictions.
• Proven success leading B2B/G revenue growth and building the teams that deliver it.
• Experience hiring and developing business development talent across a geographically dispersed team.
• The judgment to set strategy with incomplete data and adjust quickly as evidence arrives.
• Patience and stamina to lead a team through long public sector cycles without…