Associate Director, Digital Process & Data Analysis

Merck•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. The role partners across business and technical teams to set priorities, lead end-to-end reporting solution delivery, and integrate purpose-built applications, analytics, and AI-enabled tools. It champions data-driven decision-making, establishes governance and best practices, and encourages user adoption through stakeholder engagement, communications, and capability-building initiatives that maximize business value and operational effectiveness. The Associate Director oversees solution delivery and product/data support, including reporting plans, stakeholder requirements, delivery governance, executive insights, analytics intake and prioritization, industry benchmarking, data refreshes, and reliability measures. The role also strengthens team capability, quality practices, continuous improvement, process documentation, documentation governance, and access and permission models. The position calls for leadership across business intelligence standards, data literacy, data preparation and quality, spreadsheet-based analysis, SDLC, GCP, clinical trial operations, database governance, technical enablement, and change management. It requires strategic communication and cross-functional leadership, along with the ability to guide ambiguous work, align stakeholders, manage risks and priorities, and influence improvements across teams. The primary location is Rahway, New Jersey. The role has a 1st-shift schedule and requires 10% travel. Relocation is not offered. The stated primary-location salary range is $142,400–$224,100, with eligibility for an annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable. The employee status is regular.

Requirements

One of the following education and experience combinations: non-degree or associate degree in a listed relevant discipline and 10+ years of relevant experience; bachelor’s degree in a listed relevant discipline and 8+ years of relevant experience; or master’s or doctorate in a listed relevant discipline and 4+ years of relevant experience.
Relevant disciplines include Computer Science, Statistics, Pharmacy, Nursing, Biological Sciences, or a healthcare-related discipline.
Strong working knowledge of the Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC).
Advanced knowledge of Good Clinical Practice (GCP) and clinical trial operations.
Strong understanding of database concepts, data quality, lineage, and governance.
Understanding of technical enablement and change-management program best practices.
Understanding of analytics and programming concepts, with the 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.
Strong ownership and initiative, including the ability to set direction for ambiguous workstreams, empower others, provide guidance, and establish 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.
Proficiency in fostering cross-functional collaboration, alignment, accountability, and delivery of commitments.
Advanced ability to balance competing priorities and sequence work according to urgency, impact, capacity, and timing.
Ability to foster feedback and continuous improvement, sustain trust through consistent execution and transparent communication, and model high-quality standards.
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, 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 experience, or training and enablement experience, will be considered.
Proven ability to lead cross-functional initiatives, facilitate stakeholder alignment, and manage dependencies and risks.
Experience applying clinical operations knowledge and/or technical analytics expertise to identify business needs and support delivery of data, reporting, or digital solutions.
Experience designing and delivering training programs and developing enablement materials and operating guides to scale processes and data literacy.
People leadership experience, including coaching, feedback, and talent development, or demonstrated leadership through mentoring and matrixed teams.
Track record of process improvement and change management.
Preferred skills listed: Requirements Gathering and Strategic Planning.
Experience setting domain-wide standards for BI dashboard usability, consistency, and adoption across platforms such as Qlik Sense, Power BI, ThoughtSpot, or Tableau.
Experience with data-literacy practices, data preparation and quality governance, spreadsheet analysis and QA standardization, and technical enablement and change management.

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 in partnership 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 that inform strategic decisions and prioritization.
Manage intake and prioritization for ad hoc analytics, ensure timely and accurate responses, and convert 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 with 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, assign ownership for systemic issues with remediation timelines, 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 associated with archiving and decommissioning.
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.
Set domain-wide standards for dashboard usability, consistency, and adoption across BI platforms.
Define data-literacy practices, including storytelling guidelines, executive readout formats, and review cadences.
Establish governance for light data wrangling and validation, including reconciliation patterns, tolerance thresholds, UAT signoff criteria, and escalation paths.
Guide standardization of templates, checklists, and controls for spreadsheet-based analysis and quality assurance.
Collaborate with technical partners to validate data and prototype solutions, and connect business outcomes to technical deliverables.
Lead and guide cross-functional work, align stakeholders, manage dependencies and risks, and influence adoption of improvements and project priorities.