Research & Development Leadership — CSO, CTO (R&D), VP R&D
More than 296 executive roles classified in Research & Development, with 16 new this week. Chief Scientific Officers, R&D leaders across biotech and tech, and Heads of Research who own the long-horizon technical roadmap.
Tier breakdown
6
Founder26
C-Suite104
VP61
Sr Director99
DirectorWhat this category covers
Research & Development covers Chief Scientific Officers, VPs of R&D, Heads of Research across biotech, pharma, materials, and deep-tech. The unifying signature: ownership of multi-year technical bets that aren't the day-to-day product roadmap.
Includes Chief Medical Officer roles in biotech/pharma when the seat carries scientific direction-setting, plus Heads of Applied Research at tech companies whose work feeds future products rather than current ones.
Across the 296 active roles in this category, the largest tier is VP. The classifier weighs company size, scope, and reporting line — not just the title prefix — so the tier mix reflects real responsibility, not vanity titles.
Sample Jobs (10 of 296)
| Title & Company | Location |
|---|---|
| Director of the Utah Data Coordinating Center The University of Utah Lead an established, full-service academic research organization while shaping its next chapter of growth and impact. The Utah Data Coordinating Center supports complex multicenter research for investigators and sponsors across academia, government, and industry. Director | Salt Lake City, UT Unknown |
| Executive Director, Asset Team Lead Recursion Pharmaceuticals Lead strategic positioning of assets in drug discovery and development, focusing on oncology and immunology/inflammation. Requires PhD and 10+ years of experience. C-Suite | Remote Remote |
| Head of Chemistry | Targeted Protein Degradation ... Page Executive Lead medicinal chemistry and discovery chemistry strategy across multiple drug discovery programs, focusing on targeted protein degradation and molecular glue discovery. VP | China Unknown |
| Group Lead 2 Reliance Industries Limited The Group Lead # Research Scientist is responsible for setting the strategic direction of research programs and leading multiple teams to deliver high-impact innovation aligned with business goals. The role involves driving technology development from concept to commercialization, solving complex and cross-functional challenges, and building strong technical capabilities within the organization. VP | Navi Mumbai Onsite |
| SVP, Research & Insights - Experience Design Salesforce Lead research across Salesforce Experience Design, build continuous intelligence capability, and manage research operations. VP | California - San Francisco, New York - New York Hybrid |
| Head of Economic Research & Data Insights NerdWallet Lead economic research and data insights, partner with Communications, and serve as NerdWallet's primary economic voice. VP | Remote Remote |
| Director of Biostatistics Green Key Resources Lead statistical innovation in pharmaceutical development, collaborate with teams, mentor statisticians, and shape methodologies. Director | Boston, Massachusetts Hybrid |
| Director, Research GoodRx Lead the research function at GoodRx, combining internal and external data to uncover insights about medicine, drug pricing, and the U.S. healthcare system. Develop and support a high-performing team and lead important research projects. Director | Santa Monica, CA; New York City, NY; San Francisco, CA Remote |
| Vice President for Research Desert Research Institute The Vice President for Research at the Desert Research Institute will oversee research strategy, expand research capacity, and cultivate strategic partnerships. The role involves significant leadership responsibilities and requires a distinguished scientific leader. C-Suite | Las Vegas, NV or Reno, NV Onsite |
| Director of Lubricant Lab Operations Energy Recruiters Responsible for supervision, training, technical advising, and guidance of laboratory employees. Leads research and development of new lubricant products. VP | California Onsite |
How classification gets to this category
Research & Development classification follows the same multi-stage pipeline as every other category, with category-specific signal at three stages:
- Title recognition. Direct title hits resolve fast — common variants are recognized immediately, including the senior, VP, and Director-tier flavors.
- Compensation threshold. An exec-tier base-comp floor filters out individual-contributor roles that share the title language. Roles below the floor in unambiguous category titles are flagged for manual review rather than auto-classified.
- JD signals for ambiguous cases. GPT reads the JD for scientific-direction authority, IP/clinical-pipeline ownership, and external scientific stature. The classifier separates true R&D leaders from product-engineering managers using research-flavored titles. See the AI Classification page for the full signal hierarchy.
Negative filters explicitly block adjacent IC and analyst roles whose titles can resemble executive ones. The result: Research & Development as a category in your inbox is the executive cut, not the entry-level cut.
How matching works for your search
Matching on Research & Development is conjunctive. Every dimension you add narrows the result set rather than expanding it.
Example: select Research & Development + Biotech & Life Sciences and you see CSOs and VPs of R&D at therapeutics and devices companies — not engineering managers in tech — your inbox shows the intersection, not the union. You won't see roles that match only one of the filters and not the other.
Tier filtering layers on top. If you only want VP-tier and above in this category, the seniority-tier filter does that cleanly. Restrict further to C-suite only to see the most senior seats, or open it up to Director-tier to widen the funnel during early-stage exploration.
Remote mix