Head of Strategic Finance

Job description

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 200,000 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. ## **ROLE OVERVIEW** Benchling is rebuilding biotech for the AI era. Our platform brings together scientific data, workflows, and AI to help biotechnology companies move from research to breakthrough faster. We’re looking for a Head of Strategic Finance to help shape Benchling’s next stage of growth. You will work closely with our CFO, executive team and leaders across the company to translate strategy into financial plans, guide our most important investment decisions, and create a clear view of business performance. This role sits at the intersection of finance, strategy, and company execution. You will own our long-range financial model and planning processes, develop insight into the drivers of our enterprise SaaS business, and bring analytical rigor to decisions across growth, product investment, organizational capacity, and capital allocation. We’re looking for a business-oriented finance leader who can move comfortably between the details and the bigger picture. You should be equally capable of building a rigorous model, challenging an assumption, presenting to the Board, and helping an executive determine what action to take. ## **RESPONSIBILITIES** - Reports to CFO, leading Benchling’s annual planning, forecasting, and long-range financial planning processes. - Partner with the executive team to evaluate company priorities, investment choices, growth opportunities, and tradeoffs. - Build a clear understanding of the drivers of revenue, retention, gross margin, operating leverage, cash flow, and other key SaaS metrics. - Develop financial models and business cases for strategic initiatives, including new products, pricing, go-to-market investments, partnerships, and market expansion. - Create executive and Board reporting that turns financial and operating data into clear insights, risks, and recommended actions. - Establish performance frameworks and operating rhythms that connect company goals, financial plans, and business results. - Partner with Accounting and functional finance leaders to ensure forecasts and management reporting are accurate, consistent, and decision-useful. - Drive continuous process improvement across the team that ensures forecasts grow more and more accurate, reporting more timely and preparation more efficient as the team scales. - Lead and develop a high-performing strategic finance team that can scale with the company. ## **QUALIFICATIONS** - Significant experience in strategic finance, FP&A, or a related finance leadership role within enterprise software or another complex, high-growth business - experience at a growth-stage enterprise SaaS company is a plus - Deep fluency in SaaS business models and the metrics that drive durable growth, retention, and operating efficiency. - Experience supporting a company through significant scale, business-model evolution, or preparation for the public markets. - A tech-forward mindset that enthusiastically explores new tools and processes as means to improve business insight and team experience. - Led company-wide planning, forecasting, and long-range modeling in partnership with executives and functional leaders. - Track record of influencing major business decisions through clear analysis, strong judgment, and business acumen. - Moves from complex financial and operational data to a concise narrative and a clear recommendation. - Effective executive communicator who is comfortable presenting to senior leadership and Boards. - Builds strong relationships across functions and can challenge assumptions while maintaining trust. - Led and developed strong teams, raising the quality of both the work and the people around you. - Operate with high integrity, sound judgment, intellectual curiosity, and a strong sense of ownership. ## HOW WE WORK 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). ## #LI-Hybrid #BI-Hybrid **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.