Director, AI Ecosystem & Partnerships

Pfizer • New York City, NY

4d • Hybrid

About The Position

As Director, AI Ecosystem & Partnerships, you own the operational execution of the external partner layer of a flagship AI transformation program. The program runs seven AI-native commercial experiments simultaneously -- spanning oncology, consumer, market access, medical, and commercial development -- and each depends on a different combination of specialized external capabilities: diagnostic data platforms, HCP engagement tools, ambient clinical AI, consumer health apps, and commercial development infrastructure. You get pointed at a partner and own the execution end-to-end: the deal, the contracting, the integration, the performance. You build the AI-native workflows and cross-functional coordination processes that make partnership execution happen at a speed this industry has not operated at before. This is not a role you run from a distance. Complex AI work moves only as fast as its weakest coordination point. In a portfolio of parallel experiments running on live commercial brands, the bottleneck is almost never the technology -- it is the partner agreement that has not closed, the data access that has not been negotiated, the integration that no one owns. This role removes those blockers before they show up on a program dashboard. When the same partner appears across three experiments simultaneously -- as several key platforms do in this portfolio -- someone has to own the relationship at the program level, not just inside each experiment in isolation. You create the external access infrastructure every mission team depends on but cannot build themselves. What you build becomes the commercial AI partnerships template for the organization.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree with 8+ years of experience; OR Master's degree with 7+ years; OR Ph.D. with 5+ years
• Demonstrated track record owning complex, multi-party external partnerships end-to-end -- sourcing through contracting through performance management -- in a healthcare or life sciences context
• Experience negotiating commercial agreements with technology or data vendors, including managing Legal and procurement processes under time pressure
• Working fluency in AI or digital health platforms -- able to assess technical capabilities, data quality, and integration feasibility without a technical translator
• Demonstrated ability to build AI-native workflows, tools, or automation to accelerate operational execution -- not just direct others to build them
• Experience managing multiple concurrent high-stakes relationships with strong discipline on tracking, escalation, and stakeholder communication
• Ability to engage credibly with senior internal stakeholders (SVP and C-suite level) and senior external partner counterparts
• Strong written and verbal communication; able to make the status and risk of a complex partnership portfolio legible to executive leadership quickly
• Candidates must be authorized to be employed in the U.S. by any employer. U.S. work visa sponsorship (such as TN, O-1, H-1B, etc.) is not available for this role now or in the future.
• This position requires permanent work authorization in the United States.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in pharma or regulated commercial environments, including familiarity with promotional review, data governance, and privacy constraints relevant to AI partnerships
• Existing relationships or deep familiarity with the AI and digital health vendor landscape -- data platforms, HCP engagement tools, clinical AI networks, or patient health applications
• Experience managing partnerships in a portfolio context where multiple concurrent experiments share the same external partners
• Agile or equivalent delivery methodology experience
• Candidate demonstrates a breadth of diverse leadership experiences and capabilities including: the ability to influence and collaborate with peers, develop and coach others, oversee and guide the work of other colleagues to achieve meaningful outcomes and create business impact.

Responsibilities

• Build the tools, workflows, and cross-functional coordination processes that make partnership execution happen at a speed that does not exist in the current model. Partnerships in this program are measured in days, not months -- and the processes to close them that fast do not exist yet. You invent them. You are an AI builder: you use agents, automation, and AI-native tooling to compress the time from first partner conversation to signed agreement to integrated capability. When the process is the bottleneck, you fix the process.
• Source, evaluate, and bring to term every external partnership the program requires. Own the full arc -- initial outreach through scoping through legal and procurement through signed agreement. Coordinate with Legal, Finance, Compliance, and IT to clear the contracting path at pace. You are not the contract reviewer; you are the person who moves it forward.
• Design and run structured partner evaluation events -- pitch days, proof-of-concept sprints, capability demonstrations -- to give mission teams real signal on partners before commitments are made. Own the criteria, the process, the scoring, and the go/no-go recommendation to mission leadership. When the program needs to make a partnership call under time pressure, you have already done the work to make it a clean decision.
• When the same partner appears in multiple experiments simultaneously -- as several key platforms do across this portfolio -- you own the relationship at the program level and coordinate mission-level terms. Prevent duplicate outreach, inconsistent commitments, or conflicting asks that erode negotiating position. Maintain a single source of truth on every active partner across all seven experiments.
• Once agreements are live, hold partners accountable. Track delivery against committed terms, data quality, integration timelines, and performance SLAs. Run quarterly partner reviews. Escalate performance issues early -- do not let a lagging partner become a mission-level blocker that lands in program leadership's lap at the last minute.
• Work fluently with Legal, Compliance, MLR, and Privacy to clear the specific constraints that apply to AI partnerships in a regulated commercial pharma context -- data sharing agreements, promotional-material compliance, regulatory disclosure requirements, and data governance. You understand these constraints well enough to anticipate them, not just react.
• Maintain the partnership dashboard: status, risk, contract timeline, and delivery performance across the full program. Report into the governance cadence and escalate risks proactively. Surface trends in the external partner landscape that may create new options or risks for the portfolio before they surface elsewhere.

Benefits

• 401(k) plan with Pfizer Matching Contributions and an additional Pfizer Retirement Savings Contribution
• paid vacation, holiday and personal days
• paid caregiver/parental and medical leave
• health benefits to include medical, prescription drug, dental and vision coverage
• Relocation assistance may be available based on business needs and/or eligibility.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director
• Education Level: Ph.D. or professional degree