Portfolio Leader, Commercial Professional Services

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 The Portfolio Leader of Commercial Professional Services (EMEA) owns the commercial performance of Benchling's services portfolio across EMEA, with a focus on the Strategic and SMB segments. This role spans bespoke strategic implementations, standardized and packaged services, and the Implementation Partner ecosystem. This is a senior individual contributor role. The role does not manage the implementation teams directly. It owns the commercial motion, the delivery frameworks, the partner program, and the capacity model that make EMEA commercial services run. The role is accountable for EMEA services bookings, for the delivery health of engagements regardless of who staffs them, and for the frameworks that keep bespoke, packaged, and partner delivery working together. RESPONSIBILITIES - Commercial Services Performance - Commercial ownership: Own EMEA services bookings across bespoke, packaged, and partner-delivered work. Forecast accurately and manage to target. - Strategic delivery: Drive delivery quality on custom-scoped EMEA implementations for Strategic and SMB accounts, ensuring engagements land on time, on budget, and against committed customer outcomes. - Customer outcomes: Drive time-to-value and adoption on delivered engagements, measured by customer results. - Commercial Motion, Scoping, and Services Attach - Scoping-to-delivery pipeline: Own the EMEA motion that moves an opportunity from qualification through scoping, SOW, and handoff to delivery. Keep it repeatable and low-friction. - SOW and pricing governance: Set the standards for scoping quality, pricing, and margin. Review and approve custom SOWs against commercial and delivery-risk thresholds. - Services attach: Partner with EMEA Sales to maximize the rate at which software deals attach the right services, scoped correctly the first time. - Delivery model selection: Decide the optimal mix of bespoke, packaged, internal, and partner delivery for each engagement to balance margin, speed, and quality. - Packaged and Scaled Services Program - Program ownership: Own the EMEA packaged and standardized services portfolio (small projects, maintenance, advisory, and add-ons) end to end. - Packaged delivery oversight: Provide oversight for packaged-service customers, keeping projects within timelines and managing support issues proactively. - Repeatability: Keep offerings standardized, profitable, and relevant to the EMEA market from SMB through Strategic accounts. - Partner Governance and Capacity Expansion - Partner lifecycle: Own the governance, oversight, and operational relationship with EMEA implementation partners. - Enablement and certification: Define and run onboarding and certification for Partner Implementation Managers, using packaged and scaled work as the initial training ground for the Benchling Implementation Methodology. - Joint delivery model: Define and champion the ways of working between internal and partner consultants. - Capacity strategy: Deploy certified partner resources alongside Benchling consultants to scale capacity without sacrificing quality. - Process, Methodology, and Accountability - Methodology stewardship: Ensure adherence to the Benchling Implementation Methodology across bespoke delivery, the packaged services program, and all certified partners in EMEA. - Framework: Build the frameworks, playbooks, and governance that scale quality and consistency. - Metrics and reporting: Establish and monitor KPIs for utilization, realization, margin, partner performance, enablement efficacy, and project velocity, and report on them to EMEA CX leadership. QUALIFICATIONS - Experience: 7+ years in Professional Services, Consulting, or Delivery, with deep expertise owning complex commercial engagements end to end. Experience owning a services portfolio, program, or commercial outcome as a senior individual contributor or player-coach. - Commercial fluency: Proven ownership of bookings, revenue, and margin outcomes, including scoping, pricing, forecasting, and estimate-at-completion discipline. - Influence and persuasion: Track record of driving results and enforcing standards across teams the role does not manage. - Scale focus: Experience with high-volume standardized services (packaged services, advisory, or smaller project delivery) alongside custom enterprise engagements. - Partner management: Demonstrable experience enabling and governing third-party consulting or system integration partners on technical implementations. - EMEA context: Experience delivering across EMEA markets, time zones, and languages. Multilingual capability is a plus. - Technical acumen: Familiarity with the software development lifecycle, implementation methodologies (e.g., agile), and cloud/SaaS environments. 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.