Associate Director, Digital Process & Data Analysis

MSD•Rahway, NJ

3d•$142,400 - $224,100

About The Position

The Associate Director, Digital Process & Data Analysis (DPDA) provides strategic leadership for the organization’s digital reporting, analytics, and process optimization capabilities. This role partners across business and technical teams to define priorities, lead end-to-end reporting solution delivery, and drive integration of purpose-built applications, analytics, and AI-enabled tools. The Associate Director champions data-driven decision-making, establishes governance and best practices, and fosters user adoption through stakeholder engagement, communications, and capability-building initiatives that maximize business value and operational effectiveness. The role leads clinical and operational reporting plans across products, roles, and geographies; coordinates solution requirements, data readiness, development, testing, release, and maintenance; and produces executive-ready insights to support strategic decisions. It manages intake and prioritization for ad hoc analytics, benchmarking participation, data refreshes and source management, usage and reliability KPIs, and incident resolution. The position also strengthens team capabilities and quality practices, promotes continuous improvement, oversees process and domain documentation, and manages access policies, workspaces, and permission models in partnership with technical owners. The position requires significant experience applying clinical operations knowledge and/or analytics expertise to business needs and digital solutions. Relevant backgrounds may include clinical operations, healthcare, analytics, operations leadership, or training and enablement. The role may lead project teams and cross-functional initiatives, mentor specialists, and develop training and operating materials. The primary location is Rahway, New Jersey; travel is 10%. The role is a regular employee position with a day shift and no relocation offered.

Requirements

A non-degree qualification or associate’s degree in Computer Science, Statistics, Pharmacy, Nursing, Biological Sciences, or a healthcare-related discipline, plus 10 or more years of relevant experience; or a bachelor’s degree in one of these fields plus 8 or more years; or a master’s or doctoral degree in one of these fields plus 4 or more years.
Experience applying clinical operations knowledge and/or technical analytics expertise to identify business needs and support delivery of data, reporting, or digital solutions.
Experience leading cross-functional initiatives, facilitating stakeholder alignment, and managing dependencies and risks.
Strong working knowledge of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC).
Advanced knowledge of Good Clinical Practice (GCP) and clinical trial operations.
Strong understanding of database concepts, data quality, lineage, and governance.
Experience with business intelligence reporting and visualization tools and setting standards for dashboard usability, consistency, and adoption across platforms such as Qlik Sense, Power BI, ThoughtSpot, or Tableau.
Understanding of data literacy best practices, including storytelling guidelines, executive readout formats, and review cadences.
Understanding of data preparation and quality governance, including light wrangling and validation, reconciliation patterns, tolerance thresholds, UAT signoff criteria, and escalation paths.
Understanding of standardization and controls for spreadsheet-based analysis and quality assurance.
Understanding of technical enablement and change management program practices.
Understanding of analytics and programming concepts and ability to collaborate with technical partners to validate data and prototype solutions.
Ability to connect business outcomes to technical deliverables.
Ability to communicate strategically with technical and business stakeholders, tailor narratives and visuals, influence understanding and alignment, and explain technical concepts in plain language.
Ability to take ownership and initiative, set direction for ambiguous work, empower others, and provide clear guidance and timely checkpoints.
Ability to elicit and document business needs and translate them into requirements, user stories, or solution concepts.
Ability to anticipate complex risks and interdependencies and present options, trade-offs, recommendations, and decision implications.
Ability to shape cross-functional collaboration, drive alignment and accountability, and ensure commitments are met.
Ability to balance competing priorities and adjust focus and sequencing based on urgency, impact, capacity, and timing.
Ability to foster feedback and continuous improvement and maintain trust through consistent execution, transparent communication, and concise updates.
Ability to engage vendors, leadership, and industry forums professionally and credibly, including under pressure.
Required skills listed: Business Analysis, Business Intelligence (BI), Business Process Improvements, Change Management, Dashboard Development, Data Analytics, Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC), Stakeholder Management, Storytelling, and User Acceptance Testing (UAT).

Nice To Haves

Significant responsibility in clinical operations; deep experience in one or more clinical operations areas is preferred.
Healthcare, analytics, or operations leadership, or training and enablement background.
People leadership experience, including coaching, feedback, and talent development, or demonstrated leadership through mentoring and matrixed teams.
Experience designing and delivering training programs and developing enablement materials and operating guides.
Preferred skills listed: Requirements Gathering and Strategic Planning.

Responsibilities

Drive clinical and operational reporting plans across products, roles, and geographies, and implement standards and adoption tactics for purpose-built applications, self-service analytics, and other products with stakeholders.
Engage business stakeholders to understand and document needs and translate them into clear requirements and technical deliverables.
Lead delivery governance for key solutions, including requirements definition, data readiness coordination, development oversight, testing, release, and maintenance.
Consolidate portfolio trends, risks, and opportunities into executive-ready insights, narratives, and visualizations to inform strategic decisions and prioritization.
Run intake and prioritization for ad hoc analytics, ensure timely and accurate responses, and turn recurring requests into reusable assets or self-service capabilities.
Coordinate industry benchmarking and translate findings into practical performance targets and recommendations for process or investment adjustments.
Align refresh schedules and data source management to business priorities; monitor usage and reliability KPIs; communicate changes and incidents; coordinate cross-team resolution; and drive preventive improvements.
Establish and enforce documentation and development standards, mentor specialists and senior specialists, and model effective stakeholder engagement.
Review quality trends across teams, assign ownership and remediation timelines for systemic issues, and embed validation practices in delivery processes.
Evaluate emerging technologies and reporting methods, pilot promising approaches, and institutionalize practices that reduce time-to-insight and increase impact.
Oversee process documentation and completeness for archiving and decommissioning processes.
Own domain documentation governance, maintain a single source of truth linked to release processes, audit adherence, resolve inconsistencies, and require updates after changes.
Oversee access policies, workspace structures, and permission models in partnership with technical owners.
Lead cross-functional initiatives, facilitate stakeholder alignment, and manage dependencies and risks.
Design and deliver training programs, enablement materials, and operating guides to scale processes and data literacy across teams.
Apply clinical operations knowledge and/or technical analytics expertise to identify business needs and support data, reporting, and digital solution delivery.
Lead through coaching, feedback, talent development, mentoring, and matrixed-team leadership as applicable.
Drive process improvement and change management.