The C-Level Hiring Guide · COO
A rare hire before Phase 3, and almost mandatory by the time of commercial launch. With one big exception: a scientist-founder CEO. There the COO is what lets the founder stay CEO, and it is due a full stage earlier than the matrix would say. This page covers both cases and the package.
Two jobs share the title
Both are called COO. The first exists because of the CEO. The second exists because of the size.
Runs the operation beside a scientist CEO so the founder keeps the science and the story. Gates the CEO conversation: hire this person and the CEO question stays latent into Series C.Series B, only with a scientist-founder CEO. In a spin-out, a stage earlier.
Keeps the company running while the CEO faces investors, regulators and acquirers. Sites, functions, the operating rhythm.Phase 3 and commercial. Part of the full operating C-suite.
The seat, stage by stage
Six stages, one seat. The label is the state of the seat at that stage; the line under it is what the seat has to deliver. All ten roles on one timeline.
Not yetSeed, preclinical. The founder runs the operation on the side.
Watch, if the CEO is a scientistSeries A, heading for IND. A watch item only with a scientist CEO. It never counts as live on its own. In an academic spin-out the question arrives here.
First, if the CEO is a scientistSeries B, Phase 1b/2. Live only when a scientist-founder runs the company. Past about thirty people the founder who also runs the operation becomes the bottleneck, and you see it as missed milestones.
WatchSeries C, Phase 2. The COO begins to appear when the CEO is the bottleneck. Otherwise the functions report to the CEO and the seat waits.
FullPhase 3, pre-commercial. Part of the full operating C-suite. The COO runs the company; the CEO runs the outside.
FullFiled, approved, selling. Operations across sites and markets.
What makes the question live
The COO question is almost always a CEO question in disguise, and that is exactly why it is worth reading early.
Carrying both the science and the operation gets harder as the team grows. Hire the COO and the CEO question stays latent. Skip it and it arrives at Series C as a succession conversation with less room.
Sites in Europe and the US, functions reporting into one calendar. The operating rhythm needs an owner who is not also raising the round.
A company that pre-bought its whole Series B bench, COO included, before the A closed, has nothing to fix here. The seat is right-sized, and I say so.
Which shape
The COO seat has no fractional rule in my engine, but the market has one, and it works for a defined period.
One day a week to professionalise operations in a founder-led company, without statutory officer responsibility.Early operational scaling before headcount justifies the role.
Between an operations lead leaving and the permanent hire, or through a restructuring.A defined build with an end.
The operating partner beside a scientist CEO, or the full COO from Phase 3.Never place a variety-driven leader in this seat. It feeds predictability and contribution and starves the need to be the face.
The package
Base, bonus, equity, change of control, severance. The structure is the same in every market. The numbers and the contract law are not.
What the package covers
The one number everyone quotes and the least informative one. It moves with market (Boston and Basel differ), stage and whether the company is listed. Private biotechs pay double-digit percentages below listed peers at C-level.
A target as a percentage of base, paid on milestones the board can verify. I tie it to outcomes, never to activity. Listed US biotechs set targets around 40 to 50 percent of base for non-CEO roles and 60 to 66 percent for the CEO (Bedford Group, FY2023 proxy data).
In a private company a percentage of the fully diluted shares, usually options, vesting over four years with a one-year cliff, refreshed at the next financing rather than annually. Listed companies grant an annual value, increasingly a mix of options and restricted stock.
Often the real negotiation. Candidates walk over trigger terms and unvested equity more often than over base. Double trigger (deal plus loss of the job) is what governance advisers and proxy firms prefer; over 85 percent of listed US biotechs allow some acceleration.
Private companies write one number in months of salary. Listed US companies: twelve months for the CEO is the norm, nine to twelve for the others, and eighteen months of salary plus target bonus on a change of control for the CEO (Pearl Meyer; Bedford). Notice periods in Europe are a contract matter, see the country layer below.
Sign-on appears from Phase 1 and 2 onward, rarely preclinical. Relocation is the honest conversation more often than people admit. Outside commitments (board seats, advisory work, an academic post) get settled before the offer, not after.
Ranges, with sources
Numbers move every quarter, so treat these as the shape of the market, not as an offer. Medians and ranges, native currency, source and year in the last column.
| Market and stage | Base | Bonus | Equity | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US, listed (small cap) | Base median $444K to $525K | Target 44 to 48% of base | Annual grant median $240K to $2.41M | [1] |
| US, private | no reliable public figure | no reliable public figure | no reliable public figure | [2] |
| Europe, listed | argenx COO CHF 615K | argenx 50% | no reliable public figure | [3] |
| Europe, private | Michael Page 2026, sector-wide: €170K to €400K, average €285K | no reliable public figure | no reliable public figure | [4] |
No public survey covers venture-backed European biotech at C-level. The listed-company figures above are mid and large caps and overstate what a Series B company pays. Sector-wide German data exists (Michael Page 2026: C-level in healthcare and life sciences €170K to €500K, depending on the role), but it mixes industries. On a call I give you the range from my own mandates, for your stage and your city.
What I tie it to. The one line that matters more here than elsewhere: decision rights in writing. Which decisions the COO makes alone, which with the CEO, which go to the board. A COO without that line is a chief of staff with a bigger title.
[1] Bedford Group Transearch, Biotech Compensation Report 2024 (FY2023 data, 189 Nasdaq-listed biotechs under $2B market cap). [2] J. Thelander Consulting, private-company compensation data, 2024 to 2026. [3] argenx remuneration report FY2025. [4] Michael Page Gehaltsreport 2026, C-level healthcare and life sciences (sector-wide).
The country layer
The Geschäftsführer is an organ of the company, not an employee: a service contract, no protection under the Kündigungsschutzgesetz, no statutory severance. Because the statutory notice period is disputed, the contract has to fix it. Terms of two to five years are common, a post-contract non-compete runs at most two years, D&O cover is standard. Removal as organ does not end the service contract; both have to be handled.
Vorstand members are appointed for at most five years (section 84 AktG). The Corporate Governance Code caps severance at two years of pay and the remaining term, and asks boards not to agree change-of-control payments.
Statutory notice runs from one month in the first year to three months after ten years, and most executive contracts set more; Idorsia's executives sit on twelve months. In listed companies severance for board and executive committee members has been prohibited since 2023, and shareholders vote on aggregate pay.
Six to twelve months of notice at the executive level, defined-contribution pensions, and tax-advantaged option schemes (EMI, CSOP) in place of US ISOs. Listed companies put the remuneration report to an annual advisory vote.
At-will employment with the economics written into the offer: severance, change-of-control terms and acceleration carry the protection a European notice period would. Four-year vesting with a one-year cliff is the market standard.
How I read the seat
The COO is the right home for a leader who builds the machine and does not need to be the face.
Predictability, connection and growth at Series C; predictability and contribution at Phase 3. It starves variety, and it starves the hero kind of recognition. That is a feature. A person who needs the stage will not stay.
Add an operations lead who runs the day to day while the founder keeps the science and the story. Later: a COO who has taken a company through this stage while the founder keeps investors, partners and the science.
Including this one. The COO is not a layer between the CEO and the functions by default. Whether functions report through the COO is a decision, written down, and revisited at the next stage.
You already have a COO
The person who ran the operation beside a scientist CEO at sixty people is not automatically the COO who runs three sites and a launch. The check is the same as for every seat: does the next stage feed what drives them? If it does, the title stays and the scope grows. If it starves them, the honest moves are a site or functional lead beside them, or a COO who has done this stage, agreed early.
Operating partner, or the COO at scale?
Let's talk
Sixty minutes on a call, no brief and no pitch. I name the role, the reason and whether it should be permanent or fractional.