Pharmaceutical Sciences, Technology & Innovation Lead (Sr. Director)

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Job Description

Objectives/Purpose:

• This is a senior business, scientific, and technology leadership role in Pharmaceutical Sciences, R&D, accountable for shaping and maintaining an integrated PharmSci technology and innovation strategy and translating it into a prioritized multi-year roadmap aligned to business priorities, lifecycle needs, and enterprise objectives.

• The role provides leadership across CMC technology innovation, platform strategy, and implementation, ensuring that critical technology capabilities, standard platforms, and innovation opportunities are advanced in a coordinated, scalable, compliant, and value-focused manner across PharmSci.

• The role serves as the integration point across PharmSci technical functions, enterprise enabling functions (e.g. DD&T), and external partners to connect innovation, technology development, standardization, and deployment into a coherent portfolio that supports pipeline progression, industrialization, lifecycle robustness, and long-term capability build.

• Working closely with senior stakeholders within and beyond the PharmSci leadership team, the role ensures that technology and innovation strategies are anchored in business outcomes and supported by fit-for-purpose governance, cross-functional collaboration, strong network partnerships, and measurable adoption and value realization.

Accountabilities:

• Maintain the integrated PharmSci technology and innovation strategy across key CMC domains (e.g., DS/DP processing, analytical/PAT/APC, device and packaging technologies, platform capabilities, digital-enabled workflows, and knowledge/data-enabling capabilities) and translate it into a prioritized multi-year roadmap aligned to business priorities and lifecycle milestones.

• Drive the PharmSci technology portfolio from early opportunity identification and external/internal scouting through prioritization, piloting, maturation, standardization, implementation, scale-up, and lifecycle adoption, ensuring innovation efforts are connected to practical business value and sustainable deployment.

• Act as the primary PharmSci integrator across technical functions, enterprise enabling teams (e.g. DD&T), and delivery partners to ensure that technology solutions, digital enablers, and data capabilities are aligned to business needs, scalable, compliant, and sustainable.

• Establish and run cross-functional governance for PharmSci technology and innovation initiatives, including intake, prioritization, resource and investment planning, dependency management, decision cadence, and escalation with clear options and trade-offs.

• Provide leadership for implementation aspects of CMC innovation by connecting scientific opportunity with operational readiness, industrialization requirements, manufacturability, platform deployment, and business adoption across the development lifecycle.

• Drive portfolio performance management across technology and innovation initiatives by defining success metrics, tracking value realization, monitoring business outcomes (e.g., speed, robustness, right-first-time, risk reduction, productivity, readiness, quality, sustainability), and integrating reporting into the broader performance management framework.

• Ensure interface alignment across Research/CMC, development, manufacturing, quality/compliance, regulatory, and external partners so that innovation and technology solutions are feasible, scalable, inspection-ready, and supportive of lifecycle robustness.

• Build and maintain a strong internal and external collaboration network across vendors, academia, consortia, peer companies, and enterprise partners, and translate these relationships into actionable partnership models, technology choices, capability build, and strategic opportunities for PharmSci.

• Lead change management, readiness, and adoption at scale in close collaboration with PharmSci stakeholders, including role-based learning pathways, capability uplift, implementation support, and measurable adoption outcomes for standardized technologies and platforms.

• Support PharmSci functional leaders by providing common frameworks, playbooks, and decision tools for technology selection, readiness, scalability, manufacturability, regulatory risk, lifecycle cost, sustainability impact, implementation planning, and value realization.

Core Elements Related to this Role:

• Strategic leadership: sets direction, governance, and portfolio discipline, while also ensuring critical CMC innovation and platform choices are translated into practical implementation and scaled use

• Balanced innovation and technology management: connects scouting, piloting, external collaboration, standardization, and deployment into lifecycle-ready technology choices

• Platform-level thinking across CMC core technology domains with explicit focus on harmonization, reuse, and scalable standards

• Networked leadership across scientific functions, enterprise enablers, and external ecosystem partners to accelerate innovation, capability build, and business impact

Dimensions and Aspects:

Technical/Functional (Line) Expertise

• Strong end-to-end understanding of the CMC lifecycle, ideally spanning the Research/CMC interface through development, scale-up, tech transfer, manufacturing, quality, and regulatory implications.

• Strong understanding of CMC technology strategy, platform development, and implementation, including how innovation opportunities are translated into robust, scalable, and lifecycle-ready capabilities.

• Significant understanding and practical application of advanced processing concepts, including process technologies relevant to development, industrialization, manufacturability, control strategy, and lifecycle robustness.

• Strong knowledge of technology platform standardization, operational readiness, implementation pathways, and the balance between innovation flexibility and cross-functional harmonization.

• Good understanding of digital and data-enabling capabilities, including where they accelerate CMC innovation, strengthen execution, and support scalable platform deployment in a regulated environment.

• Deep familiarity with industrialization and lifecycle readiness, including operational feasibility, control strategy implications, compliance expectations, and scalable implementation paths.

Leadership

• Sets direction and aligns senior stakeholders around a coherent integrated technology and innovation roadmap tied to business and pipeline outcomes.

• Demonstrates credible leadership across scientific, technical, operational, and strategic environments, including leadership of lab- and/or manufacturing-based teams within the CMC domain.

• Leads across both direct authority and influence models, connecting functions, sites, enterprise partners, and external collaborators around shared platform and innovation priorities.

• Drives change at scale through governance, communication, implementation support, capability building, and performance visibility.

• Decision-making and Autonomy

• Makes complex trade-off decisions across value, risk, speed, technical feasibility, compliance, capacity, standardization needs, and lifecycle implications.

• Operates with high autonomy within agreed governance and escalates with clear options, rationale, and business impact.

• Resolves cross-functional conflicts and dependency bottlenecks and ensures decisions translate into implementation and measurable outcomes.

Interaction

• Extensive engagement with PharmSci functional leaders, Research/CMC interface stakeholders, Quality/Compliance, Manufacturing interface groups, Regulatory, Supply, Procurement/External, Finance, and relevant enterprise enabling teams.

• Represents PharmSci in enterprise technology, capability, and governance forums.

• Represents PharmSci in selected external industry, technology, academic, and regulatory forums.

Innovation

• Applies a structured technology advancement approach that links opportunity scouting, collaboration networks, piloting, evidence generation, implementation, and scale decisions to the broader PharmSci technology and innovation strategy.

• Evaluates emerging technologies, external capabilities, and new ways of working with focus on practical value, scalability, lifecycle fit, and cross-site or cross-program leverage.

• Promotes knowledge sharing, standard platform adoption, and reuse of learnings across functions, sites, and programs.

Complexity

• Operates across multiple technical domains, geographies, and governance layers with competing priorities, enterprise dependencies, and varied maturity across functions and sites.

• Balances innovation speed and business urgency with regulated environment expectations, inspection readiness, lifecycle robustness, and long-term scalability.

• Integrates business, scientific, technical, operational, data, and external ecosystem considerations into decisions that affect both immediate delivery and long-term operating model maturity.

Education, Behavioral Competencies, and Skills:

• Master's degree with 19 - 21+ years relevant industry experience or PhD with 13 - 15+ years relevant industry experience.

• Advanced degree in engineering, pharmaceutical sciences, biotechnology, life sciences, or related discipline, or equivalent experience.

• Demonstrated senior leadership experience in the CMC domain, including leadership of lab-based and/or manufacturing-based teams and credible engagement across technical, operational, and strategic topics.

• Mandatory: strong CMC domain-specific understanding, including end-to-end lifecycle leadership from the Research/CMC interface through development, manufacturing, and quality.

• Mandatory: significant understanding and application of advanced processing concepts and their implications for development, scale-up, manufacturability, robustness, and control strategy.

• Mandatory: demonstrated experience leading technology innovation, platform development, standardization, and/or implementation in complex regulated environments.

• Mandatory: robust understanding and demonstrated application of DDT/IT operations and product delivery frameworks, including enterprise architecture, SDLC, agile/product delivery models, and operating constructs required to deliver and sustain digital products at scale.

• Strong understanding of how digital, data, and enabling capabilities support CMC innovation, platform deployment, and lifecycle execution, including ability to work effectively with enterprise delivery and governance frameworks.

• Proven experience translating complex business, scientific, and operational needs into scalable technology and innovation roadmaps delivered through cross-functional and enterprise organizations.

• Strong portfolio/program leadership capability, including prioritization, governance, dependency management, stakeholder alignment, value realization, and adoption at scale.

• Strong business case framing and decision-making capability across value, risk, feasibility, compliance, readiness, standardization, and lifecycle impact.

• Proven ability to build and manage internal and external partnerships, collaboration networks, and technology ecosystems.

• Demonstrated change leadership, including capability building, implementation support, training programs, and adoption playbooks with measurable uplift.

This position is currently classified as “hybrid” in accordance with Takeda’s Hybrid and Remote Work policy.

Takeda Compensation and Benefits Summary

We understand compensation is an important factor as you consider the next step in your career. We are committed to equitable pay for all employees, and we strive to be more transparent with our pay practices. 

For Location:

Boston, MA

U.S. Base Salary Range:

$212,000.00 - $333,190.00

The estimated salary range reflects an anticipated range for this position. The actual base salary offered may depend on a variety of factors, including the qualifications of the individual applicant for the position, years of relevant experience, specific and unique skills, level of education attained, certifications or other professional licenses held, and the location in which the applicant lives and/or from which they will be performing the job. The actual base salary offered will be in accordance with state or local minimum wage requirements for the job location. 

U.S. based employees may be eligible for short-term and/ or long-term incentives. U.S. based employees may be eligible to participate in medical, dental, vision insurance, a 401(k) plan and company match, short-term and long-term disability coverage, basic life insurance, a tuition reimbursement program, paid volunteer time off, company holidays, and well-being benefits, among others. U.S. based employees are also eligible to receive, per calendar year, up to 80 hours of sick time, and new hires are eligible to accrue up to 120 hours of paid vacation. 

EEO Statement

Takeda is proud in its commitment to creating a diverse workforce and providing equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, parental status, national origin, age, disability, citizenship status, genetic information or characteristics, marital status, status as a Vietnam era veteran, special disabled veteran, or other protected veteran in accordance with applicable federal, state and local laws, and any other characteristic protected by law.

Locations

Boston, MA

Worker Type

Employee

Worker Sub-Type

Regular

Time Type

Full time

Job Exempt

Yes

It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.