Associate Director AI Activation

MSD • Rahway, NJ

1d • Hybrid

About The Position

The Associate Director, AI Activation & Data Science is part of the AI Activation team within Digital Human Health (DHH), supporting Specialty, Pharma & Infectious Diseases business units. This highly technical AI leadership role applies hands-on expertise in AI solutions—including generative AI, large language models (LLMs), and agentic systems—to pharmaceutical commercial challenges. Working with brand, marketing, Market Engagement (ME), and commercial analytics colleagues, the Associate Director ensures solutions address business needs and delivers strategic AI programs from prototype through production, with measurable business value and appropriate responsible AI, compliance, and governance standards.

The role owns technical design and end-to-end delivery of strategic AI initiatives, establishes scalable architectures and guardrails, and develops evaluation and operational practices for AI systems. It also partners with business teams to identify and prioritize use cases, guides vendors and external delivery partners, and builds AI capability through mentoring and practical standards. The position requires a master's degree or PhD in a relevant technical discipline and prior pharmaceutical or healthcare industry experience.

Requirements

• At least 5 years of experience in AI/ML engineering, applied data science, or a related technical field.
• At least 2 years of hands-on experience building generative AI or LLM-based solutions.
• Prior pharmaceutical or healthcare industry experience.
• Deep expertise in LLMs and generative AI, including RAG, embeddings and vector databases, agent frameworks such as LangChain, LangGraph, or Semantic Kernel, prompt engineering, and fine-tuning.
• A track record of taking AI solutions from prototype to production at enterprise scale, including solution architecture, APIs, cloud services for AI and agents, and MLOps/LLMOps.
• Experience with cloud services such as Google Cloud Vertex AI or Amazon Bedrock.
• Experience designing AI evaluation frameworks and guardrails grounded in responsible AI principles and governance.
• Advanced Python and SQL skills.
• Experience with Databricks or similar platforms and strong software engineering practices such as Git, testing, and CI/CD.
• A solid foundation in machine learning and statistics.
• Ability to explain complex AI concepts in plain business language to non-technical stakeholders and senior leaders.
• Product mindset focused on user needs, adoption, and measurable business value.
• Ability to align brand, ME, IT, and cross-functional stakeholders on priorities and manage scope while maintaining strong relationships.
• People and/or matrix leadership experience, including leading cross-functional teams, global collaborators, and external delivery partners and vendors.
• Strong organizational and project management skills; resilience and adaptability in ambiguity and a fast-moving AI landscape.
• Master's degree or PhD in Computer Science, Data Science, Engineering, Mathematics, Statistics, or a related technical discipline.

Responsibilities

• Own the technical design and end-to-end delivery of DHH-wide strategic AI initiatives, from ideation and prototyping through deployment and adoption.
• Design and build generative AI and agentic solutions, including LLM applications, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), multi-agent workflows, tool and API integrations, and simulation or scenario-planning capabilities.
• Define scalable AI architectures, reusable components, and delivery guardrails that enable operationalization and broader use across Market Engagement teams.
• Establish evaluation approaches covering accuracy, groundedness, reliability, latency, cost, and safety, and monitor AI performance in production.
• Lead MLOps/LLMOps practices, including versioning, CI/CD, monitoring, and model lifecycle management, in partnership with IT and platform teams.
• Track developments in AI models, frameworks, and tools and assess internal and external capabilities for adoption.
• Run targeted AI pilots in prioritized areas such as field and customer engagement tools, targeting support, forecast validation, barrier analysis, and causal inference; rapidly prototype and validate business value.
• Partner with brand, ME, and commercial analytics teams to understand business needs and translate them into technical requirements and solution designs.
• Activate and guide external delivery partners and vendors, set technical standards, and review solution quality.
• Apply a structured approach to prioritizing AI requests and guide teams toward approved enterprise AI tools and platforms.
• Champion responsible AI practices and ensure solutions meet data privacy, security, model validation, and enterprise governance standards.
• Mentor team members and build technical AI capability across the business, establishing best practices for prompt engineering, agent design, and AI development.
• Explain complex AI concepts in business language to non-technical stakeholders and senior leaders, and align brand, ME, IT, and cross-functional stakeholders on priorities.
• Manage scope by redirecting out-of-scope requests while maintaining stakeholder relationships.
• Lead cross-functional teams, global collaborators, and external delivery partners and vendors; manage work effectively amid ambiguity and a fast-moving AI landscape.

Benefits

• Medical, dental, and vision healthcare and other insurance benefits for employees and family.
• Retirement benefits, including 401(k).
• Paid holidays, vacation, compassionate days, and sick days.
• Eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director