Director Program Management

Job Title: Director Program Management

Job Number: 32363

Location: Remote, 

Job Description

The Director, Program Management is responsible for directing the strategic and operational planning and delivery processes within the companies emerging drug development team(s). This leadership role serves as a partner working closely with the Project Team Leader and cross-function program development team providing program management excellence to ensure robust cross-functional planning and alignment, facilitate decision-making and drive the implementation, monitoring, and reporting for one or more programs. The Director, Program Management must be able to both guide the development of a unified strategic vision and drive the team to successfully execute on the agreed strategy.
They will provide content expertise on the timing, costs and resources required to deliver to the defined program strategy, anticipate potential obstacles in the program and facilitate risk: benefit discussions driving the team to a clear direction and path forward. In this role, the Director program management will act as an operational leader to help the team achieve established objectives, facilitate governance interactions, and organize the needed tactics to make the program and associated projects a success. The Director PM will be responsible for one or more programs with significant complex cross-functional and/or cross-program initiatives within the company pipeline.

Responsibilities

• Strategic and tactical partner to the program team leader and line function representatives accountable to establish and deliver aligned cross functional plans across all relevant development functional groups into a cohesive development plan to deliver the agreed target product profile and overall program.
• Work closely with the Project Team Leader to facilitate the elaboration, approval and execution of the global program strategy and facilitate decision-making process through to senior leadership team via the company’s governance process.
• Coordinate and drive development process planning activities of the program team including milestone setting, strategic integrated development plans, long range plans, budget inputs and go/no go criteria as appropriate.
• Ensure transparency and understanding of the approved plan horizontally and vertically throughout the organization. Prepare and manage governance interactions to the Executive Team in partnership with the program leader and ensure timely input of program status/risks/issues throughout the organization.
• Maintain the overall development plans for assigned program(s). Drive the cross-functional team to deliver to agreed goals.
• Maintain all project management tools. Facilitate team meetings/agendas/minutes/action items including decision and action logs.
• Coordinate team goal setting and tracking to ensure adherence to plan and agreed end of year milestones.
• Manage set up of sub-teams and provide guidance on sub-team management. Participate in subteam meetings as appropriate to ensure alignment to the holistic program plan.
• In an alliance management role, liaise with partners, CDMOs, etc. ensuring contractual obligations are met, and a healthy relationship is maintained. Participate in diligence in securing new relationships with partners, as needed.

Required Skills

• At least 10 years of experience within one or more functional role(s) in pharmaceutical R&D drug development, biotechnology drug development, or related industry. 
• At least 5 years of cross-functional program/project management experience.
• Excellent leadership skills with a history of delivering in a dynamic environment.
• Independent creative thinker and enabler requiring minimum oversight.
• Demonstrated ability to provide effective project management leadership in terms of setting project plans for the lifecycle of a program from discovery through launch.
• Proven track record of planning and managing complex programs in different phases of development including cross functional deliverables (Research, CMC and Commercial).
• Solid understanding of the processes in drug development and appropriate regulatory guidelines
• Strong influencing and interpersonal skills including negotiation, managing meetings and group dynamics, ability to balance concerns of line management with objectives of cross-functional team.
• Technical proficiency includes demonstrated proficiency in the use of project planning tools and systems (e.g. Microsoft Project, Smartsheet, Jira), resource forecasting, and the use of reporting tools.
• Demonstrated understanding of program risk management and mitigation in order to simulate the likely obstacles to program progression.
• Strong organizational skills with the ability to deal with competing priorities; high level of problem-solving capability