Application Guide
How to Apply for Senior / Staff Product Manager
at Recursion
🏢 About Recursion
Recursion is pioneering the industrialization of drug discovery by combining automated cell biology, AI, and massive datasets to decode biology and find new medicines faster. Unlike traditional biotech, they treat drug discovery as an information science problem, using their unique platform to generate petabytes of biological data and apply machine learning at scale. This makes them a unique opportunity for product managers who want to build products that directly accelerate scientific discovery and impact human health.
About This Role
This role involves developing the product vision and roadmap for Recursion's molecular design platform, specifically focusing on tools that help scientists design better drug candidates. You'll act as the critical translator between cheminformaticians/AI scientists and engineers, turning complex scientific needs into actionable product plans that standardize workflows and build scalable infrastructure. This is impactful because you'll directly contribute to eliminating bottlenecks in drug discovery and industrializing the process of finding new medicines.
💡 A Day in the Life
A typical day might involve morning stand-ups with cheminformatics and engineering teams to review molecular design tool progress, followed by deep work sessions translating scientist feedback into product requirements for the platform. You'd likely spend afternoons collaborating on roadmap prioritization, analyzing usage data of existing tools, and planning user research sessions with AI scientists to identify new bottlenecks in the drug discovery workflow.
🚀 Application Tools
🎯 Who Recursion Is Looking For
- Has 3-5+ years of PM experience launching complex technical products with significant AI/ML components, specifically involving building, deploying, and improving machine learning systems in production
- Demonstrates proven ability to bridge scientific and technical domains, with experience translating complex domain requirements (ideally in life sciences, chemistry, or drug discovery) into clear product specifications
- Shows deep systems-thinking skills applied to workflow standardization and infrastructure scaling, with examples of eliminating bottlenecks in technical or scientific processes
- Exhibits strong customer-centric approach with experience conducting user research with technical/scientific users and using feedback to drive product development in iterative cycles
📝 Tips for Applying to Recursion
Highlight specific experience with molecular design, cheminformatics, or drug discovery platforms in your resume - even if tangential, show how your PM skills apply to scientific domains
Quantify your impact on AI/ML product launches with metrics around model deployment, system performance, or user adoption of technical tools
Research Recursion's specific molecular design challenges by reviewing their publications, blog posts, or presentations about their platform to show genuine understanding
Prepare examples of how you've standardized complex workflows or eliminated bottlenecks in previous roles, particularly in technical/scientific environments
Demonstrate your ability to translate between scientific and technical teams with concrete examples of creating product specs from complex domain requirements
✉️ What to Emphasize in Your Cover Letter
["Your specific experience with AI/ML products in production and how you've improved machine learning systems over time", 'Examples of bridging scientific/technical domains and translating complex requirements into actionable product plans', "How you've applied systems thinking to standardize workflows and scale infrastructure in previous roles", "Why you're passionate about industrializing drug discovery and how your PM approach aligns with Recursion's mission"]
Generate Cover Letter →🔍 Research Before Applying
To stand out, make sure you've researched:
- → Recursion's OS platform and how they generate/use biological data - understand their data flywheel approach
- → Their specific molecular design capabilities and published work on cheminformatics/AI in drug discovery
- → Their recent partnerships or pipeline developments to understand business context and priorities
- → Their engineering and AI/ML blog posts to understand their technical stack and challenges
💬 Prepare for These Interview Topics
Based on this role, you may be asked about:
⚠️ Common Mistakes to Avoid
- Applying with generic AI/ML PM experience without showing how it applies to scientific domains or drug discovery context
- Focusing only on feature development without demonstrating systems thinking for workflow standardization and infrastructure
- Using generic customer development examples instead of specific experience with technical/scientific users as customers
📅 Application Timeline
This position is open until filled. However, we recommend applying as soon as possible as roles at mission-driven organizations tend to fill quickly.
Typical hiring timeline:
Application Review
1-2 weeks
Initial Screening
Phone call or written assessment
Interviews
1-2 rounds, usually virtual
Offer
Congratulations!