Associate Director / Director, In Vivo Pharmacology

Gordian Biotechnology•South San Francisco, CA

10d•$180,000 - $250,000•Onsite

About The Position

This is a leadership role with real laboratory presence, focused on making three connected in vivo workstreams succeed: Screens, Target validation, and Drug discovery. The role serves as Gordian’s design authority for in vivo experiments, responsible for model selection, modality, dose, route, controls, timepoints, group size, and statistical power. The position involves using pilots to retire risk, establishing exposure and pharmacodynamics before efficacy, and troubleshooting experimental designs. The individual will choose among oligonucleotides, AAV, and small molecules, and will bring in or build new disease models, delivery routes, and readouts when existing capabilities are insufficient. This role requires understanding the in vivo strengths and limitations of different modalities to make correct choices and challenge specialists. The position also involves leading a team of nine scientists, research associates, and a Vivarium Manager, with four direct reports, focusing on developing team members into independent study designers. Additionally, the role includes owning vivarium performance and IACUC compliance through the Vivarium Manager, encompassing capacity planning, husbandry standards, protocol maintenance, and inspection readiness. Approximately 80% of the value is in strategy, design, troubleshooting, and management, with the remaining 20% in regular laboratory presence for training, observation, and direct understanding of experimental progress.

Requirements

Track record of success in high-agency work, consistently creating momentum rather than waiting for direction.
Desire to do best work alongside exceptional teammates and be energized by environments where people push each other to think more clearly, work at a higher standard, and grow.
Desire to play a key role in an early-stage startup validating new targets for intractable diseases of aging in a fast-paced environment.
Deep obesity and metabolic in vivo expertise.
Personally run and interpreted rodent obesity and metabolic efficacy studies (DIO and/or genetic models) inside a program where the result drove a real decision.
Understanding of what it takes to make results trustworthy.
5+ years of industry discovery program experience (10 preferred) with responsibility for program-level deliverables.
Technical judgment earned through personal experience.
Personally run rodent studies (dosing, blood collection, takedowns, tissue harvest) for long enough to teach technique and diagnose study issues.
Ability to demonstrate a method at the bench.
Exceptional study design skills, including sizing groups from power calculations, choosing appropriate controls and timepoints, and clearly stating what a design will and will not conclude.
Ability to recognize when a proposed study is larger than the question requires.
Default to using pilots before large cohorts and establishing exposure and PD before running efficacy.
Fluent in small molecule in vivo pharmacology.
Understanding of what oligonucleotide and AAV approaches can and cannot deliver in vivo well enough to choose between modalities.
Experience managing scientists and technical staff.
Experience training people on technique.
Ability to communicate effectively so that decisions follow.
Ability to explain a result and its limits to chemistry, computational, or executive colleagues.
Ability to tell a program lead 'no' with clear reasoning.
Credibility presenting and defending data to external partners.

Nice To Haves

In vivo experience with oligonucleotides (ASO or siRNA).
In vivo experience with AAV and gene therapy.
Direct experience with HFpEF, CKD, or atherosclerosis models.
Advanced phenotyping: echocardiography, invasive hemodynamics, indirect calorimetry, EchoMRI or DEXA, or glucose clamps.
Experience building or scaling a vivarium or an in vivo group from small scale.
Partner- or BD-facing experience presenting preclinical data.
A peer-reviewed publication record in metabolic or cardiovascular physiology.

Responsibilities

Ensure in vivo experiments that generate novel target hits are executed cleanly and on schedule.
Own the validation of screen hits with indication and ex vivo experts, define defensible evidence standards, and recommend which targets are strong enough to enter drug discovery.
Design pharmacodynamic and efficacy studies for targets in discovery, including small-molecule programs, and establish the evidence needed for program decisions.
Serve as Gordian’s design authority for in vivo experiments, including model, modality, dose, route, controls, timepoints, group size, and statistical power.
Use pilots to retire risk and establish exposure and pharmacodynamics before efficacy.
Troubleshoot and redesign proposed experiments that cannot answer their question.
Choose among oligonucleotides, AAV, and small molecules based on experimental requirements.
Bring in or build new disease models, delivery routes, and readouts when existing capabilities are insufficient.
Lead a team of nine scientists, research associates, and a Vivarium Manager, with four direct reports.
Develop team members from strong executors into scientists who can design and own studies independently.
Own vivarium performance and IACUC compliance through the Vivarium Manager, including capacity planning, husbandry standards, protocol maintenance, and inspection readiness.
Maintain regular laboratory presence to train the team, observe experiments, catch problems early, and gain first-hand knowledge.
Learn Gordian’s platform and our obesity, heart failure, and kidney programs within the first month.
Establish management cadence, lead the weekly in vivo meeting, and take over vivarium operations and IACUC status within the first month.
Approve every in vivo study design before it starts by the second month.
Present Gordian's in vivo data and study plans and answer design questions in partner meetings by the second month.
Write and sign off on the in vivo sections of partner proposals and study plans by the second month.
Implement a written design review for every new in vivo study before animals are ordered by the third month.
Own the validation plan and timeline for targets under the major pharma partnership and present results at partner reviews by the third month.
Ensure obesity, heart failure, kidney, and small-molecule programs are delivering to schedule by the six-month mark.
Prevent avoidable study repeats through stronger design by the six-month mark.
Add at least one new in vivo capability by the six-month mark.
Have multiple scientists independently owning experiments from design through interpretation by the six-month mark.