Director / Senior Director, Sales & Business Development

Position Overview

Adaptive Biotechnologies is a leader in immune medicine and aims to translate the massive genetic code of the adaptive immune system to improve human health. Adaptive has built a robust immune medicine platform that includes proprietary T cell receptor and B cell receptor sequencing technologies.

The Immune Medicine (IM) business includes a growing portfolio of customers at top tier academic institutions and biopharmaceutical and biotechnology companies that incorporate Adaptive’s immunosequencing technologies in different areas of research, including in oncology, autoimmunity, infectious diseases and neurodegenerative disorders. The Immune Medicine team at Adaptive supports customers in incorporating immune receptor data in basic research to better understand disease, host immune response and accelerate the development of innovative drugs.

The Director/Senior Director, Sales & Business Development will execute on IM’s commercial growth strategy. As a player/manager, this role is responsible for generating sales, achieving revenue targets and managing a sales team. This role is accountable for sourcing, structuring, negotiating, closing deals and growing a book of business that includes fee-for-service (FFS) life sciences research offerings and strategic partnerships. This book of business is comprised of a portfolio of pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies as well as academic institutions. The successful candidate will have exceptional sales savvy, negotiation and contract-management skills plus strong deal-making capabilities. This candidate will be responsible for growing existing and securing new accounts that grow research sales revenue to continue to embed Adaptive as the preferred partner and ‘go-to’ immune sequencing platform.

This candidate will demonstrate strong analytical & quantitative skills, critical thinking ability, high attention to detail, ability to derive insights from data and translate into a “story” that can be presented to both technical and non-technical audience. Leaders at Adaptive demonstrate behaviors consistent with Adaptive’s Core Values and Leadership Principles. Critical functions of this sales role include establishing individual goals, aligning those individual goals with broader team objectives and ensuring those objectives drive the achievement of business unit and corporate goals. As a leader, this role will provide thoughtful coaching and consistent feedback to team members to drive performance excellence and accountability, as well as support the group’s growth and development. Leaders at Adaptive create an environment of belonging, respect, and open and honest communication every day.

Leaders at Adaptive demonstrate behaviors consistent with Adaptive’s Core Values and Leadership Principles. Critical functions of your role include helping establish individual team member goals, aligning those individual goals with broader team objectives, and ensuring those objectives drive the achievement of company goals. Providing thoughtful coaching and consistent feedback to your team members will drive performance excellence and accountability, as well as support your team members’ growth and development. Leaders at Adaptive create an environment of belonging, respect, and open and honest communication every day.

This role reports to the Chief Commercial Officer, Immune Medicine.

Key Responsibilities and Essential Functions

• Directly generate IM sales revenue and new bookings.
• Own and manage a growing book of business.
• Drive prospecting, negotiating and closing FFS deals with existing and new customers.
• Manage contracts, contract negotiations (e.g., CDAs, MSAs, SOWs) with new and existing customers.
• Manage sales engagements and negotiations of agreements and statements of work.
• Partner with finance, legal and R&D to execute agreements.
• Develop and deepen relationships with biotechnology, pharmaceutical, academic institutions, CROs, and technology partners.
• Partner closely with Commercial and Lab Operations to meet and exceed customer needs.
• Develop team members, provide timely and constructive feedback and actively manage team member career growth and development.
• Communicate accurately, clearly and succinctly to Adaptive’s leadership and customers.

Position Requirements

For Director:

• Bachelor’s degree with 15+ years of progressive experience in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical or life sciences industry or a similar combination of education and commercial experience; an advanced degree is preferred.
  • Master's degree with 12+ years of progressive experience, or
  • PhD with 8+ years of progressive experience
• 5+ years of progressive experience in sales or commercial leadership in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical or life sciences industry with a proven track record of individually generating revenue by negotiating and closing deals.
• 4+ years' experience supervising a sales team with a track record of growing revenue.

For Senior Director:

• Bachelor’s degree with 17+ years of progressive experience in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical or life sciences industry or a similar combination of education and commercial experience; an advanced degree is preferred.
  • Master's degree with 14+ years of progressive experience, or
  • PhD with 10+ years of progressive experience
• 5+ years of progressive experience in sales or commercial leadership in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical or life sciences industry with a proven track record of individually generating revenue by negotiating and closing increasingly complex deals.
• Experience actively managing and developing sales teams with a track record of growing revenue.

For both Director & Senior Director:

• Strong understanding of research markets and drug development (e.g., genomics, immunology, cell biology, reagents, platforms, data).
• Extensive network with strong relationship building skills.
• Executive presence with the ability to influence senior leadership and C-suite levels.
• Strong presentation, strategic and analytic skills.
• Self-starter mindset; independent thinker with strong ability to solve complex business problems.
• Highly collaborative, results-driven and comfortable operating in fast-paced environments.
• Extensive experience working with multidisciplinary teams (R&D, Legal/IP, Finance, Operations).
• Strong communication, interpersonal skills and good business judgment.
• Ability to work in a matrix environment and leverage cross-functional resources.
• Ability to create a cohesive team culture that achieves individual and team success.

Working Conditions

This position will be field based, may require up to 40% travel and a willingness to work according to global hours when needed to support global customers.

Compensation

Salary Ranges:

Director: $183,400 - $275,000

Senior Director: $206,400 - $309,600

Other compensation elements include:

• equity grant
• bonus eligible