Director, Commercial Data Management Governance

Ionis•Boston, MA

5d•Remote

About The Position

Ionis is seeking a Director of Commercial Data Management & Governance to establish and lead the governance and business ownership of commercial data across systems, supporting reliable analytics and reporting. The role will create a trusted, consistent semantic layer of metric and business-rule definitions and establish foundational capabilities in master and reference data governance, data quality, metadata and lineage, and privacy and access controls. The position partners closely with IT, which owns data integration and engineering, and with commercial and cross-functional teams to ensure data is reliable, consistent, compliant, and fit for purpose across customer (HCP/HCO), product, payer, prescription, specialty/distribution, and de-identified patient domains. This is a newly established capability in a fast-moving, resource-conscious commercial organization. The Director will translate business needs into practical requirements, standards, and controls; exercise wide latitude in setting objectives and resolving complex, ambiguous data challenges; and advise senior leaders on commercial data governance. The role’s decisions will influence launch readiness, commercial effectiveness, compliance, and the ability of multiple functions to work from trusted data. The position reports to the Executive Director, Commercial Effectiveness and Omnichannel Operations. Remote work is available, with a preference for Boston, Massachusetts.

Requirements

Extensive experience in data governance, data management, data quality, or commercial data operations, with recognized subject-matter expertise.
Significant life sciences, pharmaceutical, or biotechnology experience supporting commercial data.
Demonstrated experience establishing or maturing a data governance program, standards, or stewardship model.
Experience leading cross-functional initiatives and driving adoption through influence.
At least 15 years of related experience with a bachelor’s degree, or 12 years with a master’s degree, or equivalent experience.
Deep understanding of commercial pharmaceutical data domains and sources, including customer master (HCP/HCO), reference data, prescription/Rx, specialty pharmacy/hub, claims, and payer data.
Ability to define and operationalize governance policies, standards, and stewardship models.
Understanding of master data management concepts, including match/merge, survivorship, hierarchies, affiliations, and identity resolution, sufficient to partner with an MDM function.
Familiarity with commercial pharmaceutical data compliance and privacy requirements, including HIPAA, PDMA, PDRP/opt-out, Open Payments/aggregate spend, state privacy laws, and third-party data-use restrictions.
Ability to act as a business data owner, translate commercial needs into requirements, and oversee integration work owned by technical teams.
Experience establishing and governing certified metric and business-rule definitions (a semantic layer) for consistency across dashboards, systems, and use cases.
Excellent communication, influence, and stakeholder-management skills, including the ability to align technical and business partners and drive adoption.
Working understanding of CRM (such as Veeva) and the Databricks analytics platform as they relate to governed data.

Nice To Haves

Exposure to MDM and data governance tools such as Veeva Network, Reltio, Informatica, Collibra, or Alation.
Familiarity with SQL for profiling, validating, and troubleshooting commercial data.
Familiarity with access-governance or data-security tools such as Immuta or Databricks Unity Catalog.
Experience establishing commercial data management and governance ahead of or through a product launch.
Experience with incentive compensation, alignment/targeting, or field reporting data.
Data governance or data management certification, such as CDMP (DAMA) or equivalent.

Responsibilities

Stand up and lead a commercial data governance operating model, including policies, standards, stewardship roles, and a cross-functional governance council.
Define and maintain governance policies, standards, and procedures across commercial data domains.
Establish a business glossary, data ownership and stewardship model (RACI), and clear decision rights across Commercial, IT, and partners.
Prioritize governance work according to commercial value, including launch readiness, field deployment, analytics, and reporting needs.
Serve as business owner of commercial data across CRM, the data warehouse, and analytics and reporting layers, ensuring it is accurate, consistent, complete, and fit for purpose.
Translate analytics and reporting needs into data requirements, definitions, and acceptance criteria, and provide business oversight of IT-owned integration and engineering work.
Partner with IT to ensure data flows, transformations, and integrations produce reliable, well-structured data; validate outputs and align technical delivery with business needs.
Establish controls, review checkpoints, and change-management practices for new sources, systems, and use cases.
Establish and govern a certified library of metric and business-rule definitions, including Rx and prescriber metrics, call and activity, targeting and segmentation, and alignment logic.
Own standards, documentation, versioning, and change control for metric and business-rule changes, including approvals and communication of restatements.
Arbitrate and reconcile conflicting definitions across teams and tools in partnership with Commercial Analytics and reporting owners.
Set business and governance standards for customer master data and partner with IT’s MDM function on integrating and maintaining third-party reference sources.
Provide the commercial perspective on match/merge, survivorship, and hierarchy rules; validate affiliations, alignments, and identity resolution for analytics and reporting needs.
Govern product, payer, and territory/alignment reference data for consistency across CRM, analytics, and reporting.
Establish data quality standards, metrics, monitoring, and remediation workflows across critical commercial data domains.
Partner with IT data stewards to profile data, define quality rules, resolve issues at the source, and track improvement.
Establish and govern a data catalog, business glossary, and metadata and lineage practice, documenting lineage from source systems and third-party feeds through analytics and reporting.
Partner with Legal, Compliance, and Privacy to implement controls supporting applicable privacy, transparency, reporting, opt-out, and consent requirements.
Govern data classification, access entitlements, and appropriate-use standards for sensitive commercial and third-party data, including contractual data-use restrictions.
Support audit readiness and maintain documentation of data controls and data-use agreements.
Serve as a governance partner to Commercial Analytics, Field Operations, Market Access, Patient Services, Trade & Distribution, Omnichannel, IT, and external data vendors.
Chair the data governance council and develop awareness, training, and change management to embed a data-governance culture.
Build formal networks with decision makers across Commercial, IT, Legal, Compliance, and Privacy; represent Ionis with external data partners, vendors, and industry forums as appropriate.
Advise senior commercial and cross-functional leaders on critical and ambiguous commercial data issues, and develop a long-term governance strategy and roadmap.
Demonstrate and uphold behaviors aligned with Ionis’s Culture, Core Principles, and Working with Each Other policy.