Business Operations, Product & Science

Periodic Labs; Menlo Park (CA); On-site; USD 250,000 - 300,000; Full time

Job summary

Periodic Labs seeks a Business Operations lead to connect research teams, model development, and the broader company roadmap. You will build systems to track progress, allocate resources, and translate scientific milestones into concrete plans.

You will partner with the Head of Research and Principal Scientists to translate long-horizon goals into quarterly operating plans, resourcing decisions, and hiring priorities.

Qualifications

• An undergraduate or graduate degree in physics, chemistry, materials science, computational science, or closely related quantitative discipline - or equivalent depth demonstrated through research or industry experience.
• 4+ years of experience in strategy, operations, product management, chief-of-staff, or a closely related function in technical, research-driven, or AI organizations.

Responsibilities

• Support the operating rhythm of the research organization, including planning cycles, milestone tracking, experiment prioritization, and cross-team coordination.
• Design and maintain systems that provide leadership with real-time visibility into research progress, resource utilization, and risks.
• Translate long-horizon scientific goals into quarterly operating plans, resourcing decisions, and hiring priorities.
• Identify and remove bottlenecks that slow researchers and scientists, acting as a force multiplier for the core work.
• Coordinate compute, lab equipment, and infrastructure allocation across projects with infra and lab operations teams.
• Serve as the operational link between research outputs and product development to align milestones with product needs.
• Drive product planning with founders and product leads: roadmaps, prioritization, cross-functional alignment.
• Create processes and artifacts (roadmaps, logs, templates) to scale product-science collaboration.
• Lead evaluation design, benchmark development, and model assessment for AI-powered applications.
• Lead strategic analyses like competitive assessments and make-or-break decisions for build/buy/partner.
• Support external partnerships and customer engagements from scoping to execution.

Skills

Strategy

Operations

Product management

Chief of staff

Analytical thinking

Communication

Education

Bachelor’s degree or higher

Job description

About Periodic LabsWe’re an AI and physical sciences company building state-of-the-art models to accelerate breakthroughs across materials, energy, and beyond. Backed by world-class investors and growing rapidly, we operate at the pace the frontier requires. Our team brings deep expertise, genuine ownership, and an insatiable drive to push the boundaries of what’s scientifically possible.

About the RolePeriodic Labs sits at the intersection of frontier AI and physical science - and the operational challenges we face reflect that complexity. As Business Operations, you will be the connective tissue between our research teams, our model development roadmap, and the broader strategic and operational needs of the company. You will work cross functionally to accelerate the translation of scientific progress into outcomes that matter.

What You'll Do

• Support the operating rhythm of the research organization - research planning cycles, milestone tracking, experiment prioritization, and cross-team coordination between AI and physical sciences
• Design and maintain systems that give leadership real-time visibility into research progress, resource utilization, and emerging risks across the model development and lab science roadmaps
• Partner with the Head of Research and Principal Scientists to translate long-horizon scientific goals into quarterly operating plans, resourcing decisions, and hiring priorities
• Identify and remove the organizational, process, and tooling bottlenecks that slow down researchers and scientists - acting as a force multiplier for the people doing the core work
• Coordinate compute, lab equipment, and infrastructure resource allocation across research projects, working closely with infra and lab operations leads
• Serve as the operational link between research outputs and product development - ensuring scientific milestones translate into clear product implications and that product needs are legible to research teams
• Drive the product planning process in close partnership with founders and product leads: roadmap development, prioritization frameworks, and cross-functional alignment
• Build the processes and artifacts (roadmaps, decision logs, spec templates, review cadences) that make the product-science collaboration scalable as we grow
• Lead or support evaluation design, benchmark development, and model assessment processes that connect scientific capability to real-world product requirements
• Lead special projects and strategic analyses that don’t fit neatly into any existing function: competitive landscape assessments, build/buy/partner decisions, new capability evaluations
• Support external partnerships, collaborations, and customer engagements that sit at the boundary of research and commercial - from scoping to execution

You Will Thrive in This Role If You Have

• An undergraduate or graduate degree in physics, chemistry, materials science, computational science, or a closely related quantitative discipline - or equivalent depth demonstrated through research or industry experience
• 4+ years of experience in strategy, operations, product management, chief-of-staff, or a closely related function - with at least some of that time spent inside a technical, research-driven, or AI organization
• A genuine ability to read and engage with primary scientific literature, follow technical discussions at the frontier of AI and physical science, and translate what you learn into operational decisions
• Exceptional analytical and structured thinking - you can decompose hard problems, build models under uncertainty, and present findings with conviction and intellectual honesty
• Outstanding communication skills: you write with precision and clarity, and you can adapt your register from a conversation with a principal scientist to a board presentation without losing rigor
• High agency, strong judgment, and the organizational credibility to influence without authority across a team of world-class researchers and engineers
• Experience designing and operating planning and prioritization systems in environments where the work is exploratory, the outputs are uncertain, and the stakes are high
• A genuine belief in the mission - you are drawn to the idea of using AI to accelerate scientific discovery, and that orientation shapes how you approach your work

Especially Strong Candidates May Also Have

• A PhD in a physical science or engineering discipline with research experience at the boundary of computation and experiment - molecular simulation, condensed matter, materials informatics, or similar
• Prior experience in a research operations, technical program management, or science strategy role at an AI lab, national lab, or research-intensive technology company
• Hands-on experience with AI/ML workflows, model evaluation, or the product development lifecycle for AI-powered applications
• A background that spans both the scientific and commercial sides of a technology organization - you've sat in rooms with researchers and with customers, and you know how to bridge these worlds
• Experience building or scaling operational functions from scratch, including hiring, process design, and tooling selection

Minimum education: Bachelor’s degree or similar experience

Location: Menlo Park, CA or Montreal, Canada. (Soon: San Francisco, too)

Compensation: $250,000-$300,000 + equity

Visa sponsorship: Yes, we sponsor visas.

We're building a team of the world's best - the scientists, engineers, and problem-solvers who don't just follow the frontier, they define it. If you're driven to bring AI to life in the physical world and make discoveries that have never been made before, you belong here.