Manager, Special Projects
AI in this role
Seeking a ruthlessly efficient, 0-1, adaptable Special Projects Manager to join LatchBio!
LatchBio
The convergence of laboratory automation, high-throughput assays, and machine learning is moving the medium of biological discovery to silicon. At LatchBio, we are building AI and data infrastructure to accelerate biopharma R&D.
Present snapshot
We are 80 engineers and operators in San Francisco solving the data bottleneck in biology.
Data in biotech has increased 10,000x over the past 10 years.
AI in biopharma will 20x in 7 years. $200m to $4b, 54% CAGR.
We build ubiquitous software, storage, pipelines, & machine learning for all of biology.
50+ new biotech companies onboarded in the past 12 months. $28M Series A from Lux Capital, Coatue, and General Catalyst.
Operations Manager
We are building a company at the intersection of biology and computation. The surface area of problems is expanding fast: finance, compliance, legal, hiring, vendors, product development, AI partnerships, infrastructure cost, real estate, internal systems.
Your job is to be a force multiplier with the COO and Chief of Staff. You will operate as their true body double: sit in the ambiguity, size up messy problems, impose structure, and move them to resolution without waiting for permission.
You are not here to do discrete tasks. You are here to absorb, think, decide, and solve to conclusion with autonomy.
Who you are:
Quick study. You can quickly learn how to redline a customer contract, model complex finances, optimize an infrastructure bill, or figure out a plan to hire 60 engineers in 90 days.
Think in terms of bottlenecks. Bug. Solution. Deadline. Nothing gets prioritized unless it’s an active or impending company bottleneck.
Executive mindset. You can crush tiny details, but you never lose sight of how interconnected each detail is to the unified strategy of every team in the company.
High-agency and independent, with integrity. You don’t wait for direction. You propose. You execute. You update. You close loops. You know when to outsource thinking and when we can handle stuff on our own.
You know your audience. Technically literate and able to communicate ideas, plans, and details with engineers, salespeople, scientists, ops people, designers, product people, etc.
Magician? The best operators can create something spectacular out of some messy context. You should love that and be able to pull off the trick.
What you should excel at
0→1 Operational Architecture. You can build the first version of anything, especially things you don’t really know much about. Something exists but is fragile? You optimize it properly.
Financial Ownership. You track burn, forecast runway, pressure-test EBIT margins, analyze, and create real-time clarity on tradeoffs and bottlenecks.
Risk and Compliance Navigation. You can read contracts (MPAs, DPAs, SOWs, partnerships), assess risk, redline, and maintain structured oversight of obligations. You evolve policies, controls, and documentation as we grow without slowing velocity.
Scaling Without Bureaucracy. You understand how a 30-person company must operate differently than a 200-person company and you can design systems that add clarity and accountability without killing speed.
Cross-Functional Leverage. You move fluidly across HR, hiring, finance, compliance, legal, product, and engineering. You connect dots others miss and prevent silos from forming.
Adaptive Execution. When priorities shift (and they will), you recalibrate quickly.
What we look for
Experience operating in a human data, AI, or SaaS startup
Technical, finance, or intense operational background
Extremely concise communication
Bias toward action and iteration over perfection
Genuinely enjoying this kind of work and bringing your personality to the team
What it’s like to work at Latch
Benefits:
Salary: $160K - $200K
Unlimited PTO policy
$10,000 signing bonus
$3,000 bonus for each new hire you originally sourced
Every lunch and dinner is paid for ($18K annual value)
100% premium covered on Blue Shield’s platinum health plan ($0 premium, $0 deductible) and 50% premium coverage for dependents. 100% coverage for top-tier Guardian dental and vision plans. ($15K value)
Ambitious equity incentives
401(k) plan options
Company-sponsored professional development
Work visa sponsorship ($15K value)
Team-wide science reading groups
Who You’ll Work With the Most:
This role is fully in-office Monday through Friday. You’ll work closest with:
You can learn more about us at any of these places!
Our hiring process consists of a few quick-moving steps, which should take no more than three weeks:
Hiring Process
How we score this
Manager, Special Projects at LatchBio scores 24 out of 100 on AI centrality, which makes it AI Level 1 of 4 (Little AI) on this board. The level measures how much of the work is AI, not seniority.
AI Level 1. The work itself involves no AI, or AI only appears as scenery, such as a company tagline.
- AI Level 480 to 100
- AI Level 360 to 79
- AI Level 240 to 59
- AI Level 10 to 39
Bands come from how often the tools, models and workflows of the role are named in the posting itself. Open the description and count.
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