Company Description
Bicycle Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing a novel class of medicines, referred to as Bicycle® molecules, for diseases that are underserved by existing therapeutics. Bicycle molecules are fully synthetic short peptides constrained with small molecule scaffolds to form two loops that stabilize their structural geometry. This constraint facilitates target binding with high affinity and selectivity, making Bicycle molecules attractive candidates for drug development. The company is evaluating BT8009, a Bicycle® Toxin Conjugate (BTC®) targeting Nectin-4, a well-validated tumor antigen; BT5528, a BTC targeting EphA2, a historically undruggable target; and BT7480, a Bicycle Tumor-Targeted Immune Cell Agonist® (Bicycle TICA®) targeting Nectin-4 and agonizing CD137, in company-sponsored clinical trials. Additionally, the company is developing Bicycle® Radio Conjugates (BRC™) for radiopharmaceutical use and, through various partnerships, is exploring the use of Bicycle® technology to develop therapies for diseases beyond oncology.
Bicycle Therapeutics is headquartered in Cambridge, UK, with many key functions and members of its leadership team located in Cambridge, MA.
Culture is key and all Bicycle employees actively embrace and role model our company values:
- We are Adventurous. We believe it’s the way to deliver extraordinary results for our patients.
- We are Dedicated to our Mission. You can’t change the world if you don’t have determination.
- We are One Team. We only succeed when we work together.
Job Description
Reporting to the VP, Head of HR the Associate Director, Talent Acquisition will lead and develop our global talent acquisition offering whilst being hands on i.e., managing a requisition load. This role is critical in driving the talent acquisition strategy and ensuring we attract, hire, and retain the best talent to support Bicycle’s growth and innovation. The role holder will be responsible for shaping and executing a strategy that sets us up for significant commercial and sales growth ahead of our first drug launch. The ideal candidate will have a strong background in talent acquisition strategy and operations, team leadership, and ideally a deep understanding of the biopharmaceutical sector.
- Develop and execute an over-arching talent acquisition strategy that is linked to the business strategy and workforce plans
- Lead, mentor and develop a small but high performing talent acquisition team
- Collaborate with HR Head, leadership team/s, finance to understand resourcing and capability needs now and in the future, and develop a robust hiring plan
- Shape and implement Bicycle’s Employee Value Proposition (EVP) and deliver employer branding initiatives that position Bicycle as a desirable biopharma employer for top talent
- Oversee the delivery of end-to-end recruitment lifecycle across all functions and all geographies (UK & US at present); directly manage a requisition load, inclusive of executive hiring
- Continuously improve TA systems, process and tactics to ensure a highly efficient, highly collaborative TA offering e.g., tech, data, innovative sourcing, talent pipelining etc
- Provide external talent insights that contribute to workforce planning and decision making e.g., via talent mapping
- Develop approach to a more flexible resourcing model e.g., contingent workers, contractors, consultants etc
- Provide talent acquisition insights and metrics to HR and leadership, inclusive of providing TA inputs into HR dashboard/reporting requirements
- Work in close partnership with colleagues in the wider HR team to provide a well-rounded and joined-up service to internal clients.
Qualifications
Essential:
- Demonstrable talent acquisition team leadership experience
- Proven experience in both high-touch, boutique TA offerings, as well as scale-up and high-volume recruitment planning and delivery
- Strong technical talent acquisition skills, including sourcing strategy, EVP development, permanent and contingent hiring, talent mapping/insights etc
- Must be an excellent communicator, collaborator, have the ability to influence senior stakeholders, and take an enterprise-first view
- Life sciences sector experience, although equally complex and highly competitive ‘adjacent’ industries will be considered
- International TA experience
- Appreciation for broader HR discipline e.g., talent management, reward, HR operations etc.
Desirable:
- Biopharmaceuticals or biotech experience
Additional Information
- State-of-the-art campus environment with on campus restaurant and Montessori nursery
- Flexible working environment
- Competitive reward including annual company bonus
- Employee recognition schemes
- 28 days annual leave in addition to bank holidays + option to buy up to 5 additional days annually
- Employer contribution to pension (employee does not have to contribute)
- Life assurance cover 4x basic salary
- Private Medical Insurance, including optical and dental cover
- Enhanced parental leave policies
- Group income protection
- Employee assistance program
- Health Cash Plan
- Access to company subsidized gym membership
- Eligibility for an option grant to subscribe to shares in Bicycle Therapeutics plc.
- Cycle to work scheme
Bicycle Therapeutics is committed to building a diverse workforce that is representative of the communities we serve. We recognize that diverse and inclusive teams build a stronger and more innovative company. Therefore, all qualified applicants will be considered for employment, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, colour, gender, sexual orientation, age, disability status, marital status, or veteran status.
What We Do
We are Bicycle Therapeutics, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company. We didn’t wait for the next advance against cancer. We created it.
Based on groundbreaking work conceived in the laboratory of Sir Greg Winter with the help of Professor Christian Heinis, we are pioneering the development of bicyclic peptides, or Bicycles® – a novel class of versatile, chemically synthesized medicines. Bicycles are fully synthetic short peptides constrained to form two loops which stabilize their structural geometry. This constraint is designed to confer high affinity and selectivity, and the relatively large surface area presented by the molecule allows targets to be drugged that have historically been intractable to non-biological approaches. Bicycles represent a unique therapeutic class, combining the pharmacological properties normally associated with a biologic with the manufacturing and pharmacokinetic advantages of a small molecule, yet with no signs of immunogenicity observed to date.
Bicycles can be used as Bicycle conjugates to deliver toxin payloads and to precisely target local immune activation within tumors and as Bicycle T-cell modulators, which activate cytotoxic T-cells while circumventing the limitations of antibody and biologic therapies and better enabling combination therapy. Our lead product candidate, BT1718, is a Bicycle toxin conjugate currently being investigated in a Phase I/IIa open label dose escalation and expansion clinical trial sponsored by Cancer Research UK. BT1718 targets Membrane Type 1 Matrix Metalloproteinase (MT1-MMP), also known as MMP-14, which is highly expressed in many solid tumors.
Our strategic collaborations are based on the ability of Bicycles to address a wide variety of targets. Through collaborations with AstraZeneca, Oxurion, Innovate UK and the Dementia Discovery Fund, we work with companies that have deep therapeutic expertise outside of oncology to enable us to more efficiently develop novel medicines for patients.
