Feeling Sidelined? How Senior R&D Leaders Stay Relevant as Biotech Transitions to Clinical
Your role isn’t diminished—it’s evolving. Here's how to lead strategically when discovery shifts to development.
When a biotech company transitions from early-stage discovery into the clinic, something disorienting happens—especially if you're in R&D.
You start to feel sidelined.
Not because you’ve stepped back. Not because you’ve stopped delivering. But because the center of gravity has shifted.
In the early days, science was the engine. R&D drove the vision, the story, the investor confidence. You were the hub: decisions ran through you, insight started with you, and progress depended on your presence.
But once the therapy enters the clinic, everything starts to orbit elsewhere.
Clinical becomes the sun.
Budgets tighten. Priorities shift. Conversations that once happened informally now show up in cross-functional updates and sanitized slide decks. You hear things secondhand. You’re reacting to decisions you used to lead.
One senior R&D leader I coached said it plainly:
“I used to know everything the minute it happened. Now I find out from the slides—like everyone else.”
It can feel like being edged out of the company you helped build.
But this shift isn’t a demotion. It’s a milestone.
Getting to the clinic was always the goal. Now, your leadership has to evolve to meet the next challenge.
Clarify Your Role in the New Orbit
You don’t need to be in every room to shape where the company goes next.
Now, your value is in translation: turning deep scientific insight into strategic direction. Championing what gets prioritized. Ensuring the long-term science doesn’t get buried under short-term delivery.
You’re not less relevant. You’re differently relevant.
Influence Without Owning Everything
This phase doesn’t require you to know everything. It requires you to elevate what matters most.
You’re no longer optimizing experiments. You’re guiding enterprise-level bets.
Where to focus now:
Prioritize high-impact scientific initiatives
Frame insights in the language of strategy and risk
Advocate for resources where the science creates real value
Let go of the illusion that influence = control
Influence comes from clarity—not constant involvement.
Stay Connected to What the Science Needs
The clinical engine can move fast—or painfully slow when you’re waiting on data. And that data drives everything—from investor confidence to board-level decisions.
R&D leaders must remain the conscience of the science:
Surfacing risk early
Protecting long-term thinking
Championing early innovation—even when no one’s asking for it
When companies lose that focus—when they stop investing in what's next—the pipeline thins, optionality shrinks, and the long-term value story weakens. Discovery doesn't just slow down. It disappears from view.
The Leadership Shift That Matters Most
You may not be in every meeting anymore.
You may not hear things the moment they happen.
But your leadership isn’t fading. It’s evolving.
This is what senior R&D leadership looks like when your company transitions to clinical.
You still carry the scientific vision.
You still shape how the science speaks to strategy.
And in many ways, your influence now matters more than ever—because it guides what the company bets on next.
So if you’ve felt off-balance in this new phase, know this:
You’re not being edged out.
You’re being invited up.
Your role has changed.
Your value hasn’t.
