Head of Scientific Development Solutions Engineering

We are rebuilding biotech for the AI era.
When a breakthrough is delayed the world waits. Getting a molecule from discovery to patients or a crop from lab to field involves thousands of slow manual disconnected steps. AI has the potential to change this compressing decades of R&D work into years. But that only happens when clean structured scientific data and AI are built into how science gets done.
Benchling is the AI platform for biotech R&D. Scientists use Benchling to design experiments capture structured data and run AI agents and models directly in their workflows. Over 200000 scientists around the world trust Benchling to power their most important work from academic labs to Sanofi Moderna and more than half of the world's top 50 biopharma.
We’re building an AI scientist for our customers. We can’t do that if we haven’t built the muscle ourselves. AI fluency is the foundation we build on; it's core to how we work and we're committed to helping every new hire integrate it into their day-to-day. As part of our interview process you'll complete a brief AI-focused exercise or discussion so we can understand how you think about and use AI to drive impact in your role. Feel free to reference any tools platforms or workflows you use today.

 The Scientific Development Solutions (SDS) Group is a family of engineering teams that deliver products and solutions to biologists centered on the conduct of complex lab operations; development qualification and execution of rigorous SOPs; analysis of complex time-series data; and biological and IT-driven workflows for sample management analytical chemistry and more. SDS solutions are frequently (but not exclusively) sought out by Benchling’s customers with GLP / GMP regulatory concerns.

As the group lead for SDS engineering you will be responsible for all software engineering work throughout our SDLC – specification development testing deployment and operational maintenance (SRE) work – for the Procedures Studies and Workflows products split across two teams. Benchling runs an agile process and each of these various aspects of the SDLC are all typically in flight in a continuous fashion.

You will work closely with senior engineering leadership a group-level product management counterpart as well as engineering leaders PMs and designers supporting teams within your group and across the organization. Group leads typically directly manage one engineering scrum themselves (i.e. 5–10 engineers) while additional teams within the group report to other managers who will report to you. The SDS group sits within the Applications pillar of Benchling’s Software Engineering dept and you will report to the Head of Engineering for Applications along with two other senior group leaders.

In addition to the day-to-day management of the team and its execution engineering group leads attend to more horizontal demands of the broader engineering organization and Benchling as a whole such as setting and maintaining standards for engineering quality; running and improving our interviewing hiring and onboarding processes; and continuously improving our overall SDLC.

• Manage a group of 2–3 engineering scrum teams; up to one team may be directly reporting to you with other teams reporting to other line managers in your organization

• Translate strategy into execution by developing and executing quarterly plans with clear metrics and targets.

• Define and execute on a software engineering roadmap across your teams that encompasses new product and new feature development quality improvements for both internal and external stakeholders and bugfixes and software maintenance activities. Work closely with Product Mgmt and Design counterparts to articulate an achievable roadmap that meets our customer needs.

• Recruit hire and onboard exceptional full-stack engineers and engineering managers to staff your organization; mentor team members and act as a bar-raiser for talent.

• Build a strong partnership with stakeholders across the engineering organization and other functions across the company.

• Contribute to engineering-wide organizational improvements as part of the management team.

• 10–15 years overall experience in software engineering and engineering management roles.

• 5+ years overall experience in SaaS or the broader high-tech commercial software sector.

• 5+ years of engineering management experience including 3+ years of indirectly managing other teams through subordinate engineering managers.

• Experience driving complex multi-quarter roadmaps to completion with multiple technical projects and products.

• Experience building and deploying cloud-based web applications ideally on both the front- and back-end.

• Track record of growing high-trajectory early-to-mid-career engineers into leaders with company-wide impact.

• Familiarity with software engineering management productivity tools (e.g. Jira or other bug database) as well as observability tools for logging metrics and alerting.

• Interest in / curiosity about biotech! Prior experience with biotech pharmaceutical or other life sciences business sectors or education is not required but is absolutely a plus.

We offer a flexible hybrid work arrangement that prioritizes in-office collaboration. Employees are expected to be on-site 3 days per week (Monday Tuesday and Thursday).

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Benchling welcomes everyone.

We believe diversity enriches our team so we hire people with a wide range of identities backgrounds and experiences.
We are an equal opportunity employer. That means we don’t discriminate on the basis of race religion color national origin gender sexual orientation age marital status veteran status or disability status. We also consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records consistent with applicable federal state and local law including but not limited to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance.

What We Do

Biotechnology is rewriting life as we know it from the medicines we take to the crops we grow and the household goods that we rely on every day. But moving at the new speed of science requires better technology. Benchling’s mission is to unlock the power of biotechnology. The world’s most innovative biotech companies use Benchling’s R&D Cloud to power the development of breakthrough products. Help us bring modern software to modern science. We’re on Team Science We believe in the promise of science and the teamwork required to fulfill that promise. Whether your background is in science engineering business or another field you’re on Team Science if you believe in the power of science to solve the world’s most pressing problems.

Why Work With Us

Everyday at Benchling you’re surrounded by talented people who are really excited about the work they’re doing and the impact they’re having. It’s truly uplifting to work on a product that you can believe in and to work alongside colleagues who are energized by the shared vision of a future with less disease and greater sustainability.

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