Associate Director, US Launch Excellence

Job Description

Global Commercial & Launch Excellence | US Launch Excellence | Oncology Launches

Shape launch strategy into coordinated action. Build clarity across complex workstreams. Help launch teams anticipate what is next and deliver with excellence.

The Opportunity

Our Human Health business is preparing for an important period of innovation and potential launches. The Associate Director, US Launch Excellence will serve as the commercial launch partner in the US Oncology business unit, with primary focus on launches in the hematology portfolio.

This role sits at the intersection of strategy, planning and execution. You will partner with marketing leadership and cross-functional teams to create integrated launch plans, connect decisions and dependencies across workstreams, strengthen readiness and help teams move from strategy to coordinated action. Success requires strategic judgment, disciplined orchestration and the ability to influence without direct authority.

What You Will Do

Lead integrated launch planning and readiness

• Partner with marketing leadership and launch teams to translate brand, customer and go-to-market strategy into integrated, adaptable launch plans with clear outcomes, milestones, dependencies and ownership.
• Orchestrate readiness across core and extended launch workstreams, connecting functional plans and ensuring the team sees the full launch picture rather than isolated activities.
• Establish transparent mechanisms to assess progress, surface gaps and support timely decisions through launch plans, readiness indicators, dashboards and key performance indicators.
• Support pre-launch measurement, launch monitoring and post-launch hypercare to enable rapid learning and course correction.

Anticipate risk and improve decision quality

• Proactively identify and interrogate critical paths, risks, assumptions and cross-functional dependencies; facilitate mitigation, trade-off and escalation discussions before issues affect readiness.
• Lead scenario planning and prioritization to focus team attention and resources on the activities most critical to launch success.
• Bring an outside-in and enterprise perspective, applying excellence practices while tailoring the approach to the asset, market, and oncology customer ecosystem.

Operate as a strategic launch partner

• Serve as a trusted thought partner and launch excellence subject matter expert who asks the right questions, challenges constructively and engages the right functional experts.
• Design and facilitate effective core and extended launch team meetings and other readiness forums that drive alignment, decisions, accountability and follow-through.
• Build strong partnerships across Marketing, Medical Affairs, Market Access, Patient Support, Data & Analytics, Digital, Field and Learning & Development, as well as Global teams and Centers of Excellence.
• Help clarify global-to-US inputs, ownership and handoffs so US teams can build on enterprise work and avoid unnecessary duplication.

Advance launch excellence capabilities

• Capture and apply launch learnings, reusable practices and knowledge to strengthen future Oncology and US Human Health launches.
• Improve launch ways of working across people, process and technology, including thoughtful use of digital and AI-enabled capabilities within company policies.
• Contribute to the evolution of the launch planner from primarily program coordination toward a strategic partner who strengthens team thinking, integration and execution.

What You Bring

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Marketing, General Management, Biotechnology or a related field.
• Minimum of 5 years of commercial experience in the biopharmaceutical, pharmaceutical, biotechnology or life sciences consulting industry, including experience in marketing, sales, strategy and planning, commercial operations or a related function.
• Demonstrated ability to develop strategy and translate it into executable plans across a broad, cross-functional stakeholder group in a matrixed organization.
• Strong program and project management capabilities, including managing multiple complex initiatives, milestones, risks and interdependencies simultaneously.
• Proven ability to influence without direct authority, build commitment and drive accountability across functions and organizational levels.
• Excellent written, verbal, facilitation and presentation skills, including the ability to synthesize complexity and communicate clearly with senior stakeholders.
• Willingness to travel as needed for business meetings and conferences.
• Ability to meet the on-site expectations defined for the role and location in the approved requisition.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience leading or materially supporting a branded new product, indication or commercial program launch in the pharmaceutical or biopharmaceutical industry.
• Oncology experience, including familiarity with complex patient, provider, access and account pathways.
• Experience across integrated go-to-market planning, patient support, market access, field readiness, customer experience or launch measurement.
• Demonstrated use of data and insights to inform priorities, readiness decisions, KPIs and performance optimization.
• Experience with scenario planning, Agile ways of working, launch governance, knowledge management or post-launch hypercare.
• Experience working across global and market teams or in an alliance environment.

Critical Skills and Competencies:

• Strategic acumen: Connects market, customer and enterprise context to the few priorities that matter most, then translates strategy into action.
• Launch orchestration: Creates structure across complex workstreams while maintaining focus on integration, outcomes and critical dependencies.
• Constructive challenge: Uses sound judgment and thoughtful questions to test assumptions, expose gaps and improve decisions.
• Stakeholder leadership: Builds trust, aligns perspectives and mobilizes teams through influence rather than authority.
• Risk and systems thinking: Anticipates downstream implications, understands interdependencies and helps teams act early.
• Executive communication: Synthesizes complex information into clear, concise and decision-oriented narratives.
• Learning agility: Adapts quickly, seeks outside-in perspectives and applies lessons across launches.
• Ownership and follow-through: Creates clarity, maintains momentum and ensures decisions translate into accountable action.

Why This Role Matters

You will have the opportunity to shape readiness for a growing Oncology pipeline, partner with leaders across the enterprise and help evolve how launch excellence is delivered. The role offers broad exposure, meaningful strategic influence and the chance to build capabilities that extend beyond a single asset or launch.

Required Skills:

Adaptability, Adaptability, Agile Project Management, Building Trust, Business Agility, Business Management, Commercial Operations Management, Data-Driven Decision Making, Developing Proposals, Employee Performance Evaluations, Environmental Scanning, Executive Leadership, Executive Reports, Feasibility Studies, Financial Acumen, Goal Setting, Influencing Skills, Influencing Without Authority, Learning Agility, Market Research, Pharmaceutical Market, Portfolio Management, Product Ownership, Progress Monitoring, Project Management {+ 8 more}

Preferred Skills:

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US and Puerto Rico Residents Only:

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As an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer, we provide equal opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, or other applicable legally protected characteristics.  As a federal contractor, we comply with all affirmative action requirements for protected veterans and individuals with disabilities.  For more information about personal rights under the U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment laws, visit:

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The primary location for this posting is:

USA - Pennsylvania - North Wales (Upper Gwynedd)

Where required by law, the compensation range for this role is provided below.

The salary range for the primary location of this role is:

$142,400.00 - $224,100.00

This range reflects the Company's reasonable expectation of the base salary applicable to this role at the time of posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs. The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits. Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.

Additional location(s): Please note the salary range above applies to the Primary Location of the position. Where a role has other listed locations, different compensation guidelines may apply. You may find the salary ranges for additional locations below. If the salary range is not listed for the location you are applying to, our Talent Acquisition team will provide further information to you relevant to your location.

Additional location(s) Compensation Information:

San Francisco Residents Only: We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

Los Angeles Residents Only: We will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local laws, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance

Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully 
Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company.  No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails. 

Employee Status:

Regular

Relocation:

Domestic

VISA Sponsorship:

No

Travel Requirements:

10%

Flexible Work Arrangements:

Hybrid

Shift:

Not Indicated

Valid Driving License:

No

Hazardous Material(s):

n/a

Job Posting End Date:

10/27/2026

*A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.