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Most Australian building products companies underestimate what a sales rep departure actually costs them. The agency fee gets budgeted. The other six cost components rarely do. At Specified Select Group we place sales reps into building products manufacturers across the country. We see who leaves, who stays, and what the companies that hold onto good people are doing differently. The patterns are consistent. Here’s what we tell our clients when they ask how to keep their best

The Australian lighting BDM role has changed substantially in the past 5 years. Cheap imports have collapsed margins in decorative lines. NCC Section J is tightening. DALI-2 has become the standard digital lighting control. Specifier-led commercial work is where the project values sit. We place sales talent across architectural, commercial, controls and emergency lighting in Australia. The briefs we see have evolved faster than most hiring slates have. Here’s what we see in 2

Most State Manager briefs that land on our desk are mislabelled. Half are actually National Sales Manager briefs in disguise. The rest are senior BDM roles dressed up with a stronger title to make the salary band easier to sign off. The cover sheet reads “State Sales Manager, Sydney.” By the end of the briefing call, it’s clear the company needs someone running three states and a team of nine, or it’s clear there isn’t a team at all and the business wants a glorified key acco

Hiring a residential BDM and putting them into a commercial-spec role is the most expensive mistake we see in building products sales hiring. The cycle they were built for runs in weeks. The one they’ve been thrown into runs in months. Six to nine months later, the rep is gone, the pipeline’s empty, and the business has spent between $150,000 and $300,000 working out it needed a different person. It’s a channel question, not a tier question. Most hiring briefs we work to in A

By James Bowesman, Specialist Recruiter, Specified Select Group Three different recruiters can write the same building products sales role three different ways, and the same job will pay anywhere from $90,000 to $180,000 base depending on the title chosen. The shortlist that turns up at interview depends entirely on what you called the role on the ad. We see this play out across cladding, waterproofing, lighting, flooring and construction chemicals, and we built this short gu

When a building products manufacturer briefs us on a new sales hire, the first question we ask is whether they need a Specification Manager or a Business Development Manager. The two roles get used interchangeably in conversation, on org charts, and in job ads. They are not interchangeable in practice. Different buyers. Different cycles. Different KPIs. Different pay structures. Different markers of success at the twelve-month review. This is the short version of how we tell

At Specified Select, we see the same pattern every quarter. A manufacturer hires a BDM. The plan looks reasonable on paper. Eighteen months in, the BDM walks. The plan, the team and the client all blame each other. Most building products comp plans are paying reps for the wrong job. The structure was built for a sales cycle that doesn’t exist in this market. Below is the design pattern we’ve seen work for our manufacturer and importer clients in lighting, building envelope, c

The Lacrosse Tower fire in Melbourne triggered an apportionment of around $12 million in liability across the fire engineer, the building surveyor, and the architect. The sales rep who specified the cladding wasn’t named in the orders. That detail matters. Because every cladding, roofing, and facade sales conversation in Australia now happens in the shadow of that ruling. And the rep who can defend a specification through to installation is a different category of hire from t

There are roughly 60 architectural lighting BDMs working across Australia. Maybe 80 if you include the people who used to do the role and could come back. That’s the entire candidate pool for every specification-led lighting role in the country. If you’re hiring at scale on a 12-week timeline, you’re hiring the wrong person. If you’re hiring at scale on an 18-month timeline, you’re hiring the right person. But you need to build the role around the candidate, not the other way

Australia is delivering the largest civil and infrastructure pipeline in its history. Infrastructure Australia’s 2025 Market Capacity Report puts the public pipeline at $242 billion across the next five years, with broader construction activity around $1.14 trillion. The Civil Contractors Federation has flagged a workforce shortfall heading toward 300,000 workers by 2027. At Specified Select, we recruit sales talent into Australian civil products manufacturers and distributor

At Specified Select Group, we recruit sales talent into Australian building products, lighting and Architecture & Design companies across Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. The single most common reason a hire fails in this sector is not the candidate. It is a role that was not defined clearly enough, in a business that was not ready to set the person up to win. The fix is a diagnostic we walk hiring managers through before any search begins. Two dimensions, ten questions, four

Most salespeople accept commission structures without running the numbers. The employer says "OTE is $160k" and everyone nods. Nobody asks what that actually means after tax. Nobody asks what happens if you hit 80% instead of 100%. Nobody asks what percentage of the team actually hit target last year. The gap between what you're promised and what lands in your account is where bad career decisions live. We've placed sales talent across building products, lighting, and A&D bus

Most hiring managers think a bad sales hire costs them one salary. The real number is closer to $200,000. That's not a scare tactic. It's what you get when you add up the salary you paid someone who underperformed, the revenue they didn't generate, the cost of replacing them, the management time spent on the process, and the damage to client relationships built over years. We've placed sales talent across building products businesses in Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane for yea

I built a 7-part series on LinkedIn for salespeople in building products, lighting, and A&D. Not the generic "optimise your profile" advice. Practical, specific guidance for people who sell building products in Australia. Each part covers a different aspect of using LinkedIn properly, whether you're trying to win more business, build your profile in the market, or find your next role. Here's what the series covers. Part 1: Clean Up Your LinkedIn Network (Or It'll Cost You) Yo

If you've been selling windows, cladding, lighting or insulation for a few years, you probably already know most of this. But stick around. There might be something here worth thinking about before your next career move. I've been recruiting sales talent in the Australian building products industry for over a decade now. That's a lot of conversations with BDMs, Account Managers, Specification Managers and Sales Directors across Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. Some of those co

The Candidate Job Search Tracker: Run Your Search Like a Recruiter Your job search is a project. Treat it that way and you will win more interviews with less noise. I built a simple tracker so you can manage your pipeline like a recruiter, not a hopeful applicant. Get your copy now https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1e_hMuQxQU2SBL2kCOiDEjJktSbP5K2_UlvdrqquhAHc/copy It works for any job search. How to save your own copy Click the link above Choose Make a copy Rename the fi

We are back in events season! Instead of a static PDF, I now publish a live Google Sheet that is easier to scan and filter. This tool helps teams across Melbourne , Sydney , and Brisbane plan travel, marketing, and meetings. If you work in building products recruitment or sales recruitment , this will save you time and uncover new opportunities. Open the live calendar: https://lnkd.in/gJY-gnzs What’s Inside Confirmed dates with direct links to organisers Predicted futur

AI can make profile optimisation faster and smarter. I shared this easy copy-ready prompt. Here’s the full prompt, plus practical tips to get the most from it. A quick easy tool to optimise your linkedin profile for any salesperson.

AI can make plan reading faster and smarter for sales teams. This simple ChatGPT prompt reads drawings like a seller, surfaces sales angles and suggests next steps. I used it for a technical BDM role in protective coatings and the result was outstanding.

AI can slash your prep time. This Gemini prompt gave me a ready-to-use briefing for a technical BDM role in protective coatings—no scrolling, no fluff.