Director, Global Collaborations Business Operations & Strategy

Summit Therapeutics•Palo Alto, CA

1d•Onsite

About The Position

The Director, Global Collaborations Business Operations & Strategy, is a pivotal leader role that sits at the center of Summit’s external partnerships execution, driving the operational, project, and strategic work required to bring combination studies to life with partner pharmaceutical companies. This individual is the primary operational lead for partner-sponsored combinations studies, but also a strategic contributor to externalized operational strategy, clinical study design strategy, and complementing Search & Evaluation diligence. This leader will work in partnership with the Alliance Management Lead, together forming a core team that owns each external collaboration end-to-end. While the Alliance Management Lead stewards the partner relationship and joint governance, this Director delivers operational depth, cross-functional coordination, and strategy-to-execution translation across each combinations study program. Position reports to the VP, Business Development & Strategy Alliances, and will be a key member of a comprehensive team working across the arc of external focused growth, strategy to execution. Internally, the Director will mobilize and align a broad global, cross-functional team — Clinical, Research, Biomarker, Program Management, Medical Writing, Regulatory Affairs, CMC/Supply, Quality, Legal, Finance, and others — engaging leaders, SMEs, and executives to ensure every function is focused and synchronized to deliver on partnered programs. The Director role brings visibility, broad scope of work and real ownership: the ideal candidate thrives in a high-agency environment, leads through influence, and brings both the operational rigor and strategic acumen to help Summit build an exceptional external growth engine.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in relevant field required
Minimum of 12+ years of experience in drug development in biopharma with demonstrated experience delivering required responsibilities from multiple functional roles; for example, program leadership, alliance management, clinical operations and/or business development.
Prior oncology drug experience in late-stage development and/or commercial stage required; strong understanding of oncology drug development, scientific platforms, and global dynamics.
Hands-on experience leading pharma or biotech drug development clinical trial collaboration start-up & management with external partners required.
Direct experience leading study start-up, kick-off and maintenance in collaborations
Proficient user of MS Office suite (e.g., PowerPoint, Word, Excel, Project), experience using electronic document management systems, document review tools and can quickly build presentations for leaders/teams.
Excellent communicator in public-speaking, meeting facilitation and email communication.
Ability to excel in a fast-paced, demanding and diverse environment that includes global virtual meetings outside standard business hours.
Ability to travel to collaboration or business meetings, to include semi-frequent travel to hub office locations in Summit territories or collaboration partner sites.
This globally oriented role may require unconventional work hours to meet EU, US and Asia time zones as part of weekly activities.
Role is primarily office-based.

Nice To Haves

Advanced degree preferred (MBA, Masters, etc.)
dual scientific and business background is a strong plus
Prior experience with technology tools (e.g. Smartsheets, MS Project) in planning, maintenance and communication of information is highly desirable.

Responsibilities

Own operational leadership for externally sponsored combination studies.
Assess partner sponsor readiness before activation, establish joint oversight structures, track execution against agreed milestones, and hold both sides accountable to quality and timeline commitments.
Represent our scientific, operational, and contractual interests in all partner-led studies; engage directly with partner counterparts to resolve start-up gaps, enrollment risks, and compliance issues before they escalate.
Lead the communication and deliverables for global start-up for externally sponsored combination studies, finalizing study design strategy, supporting documents and materials for partner, protocol and amendment alignment, supply planning, quality and PV agreements, operational progression, issues resolution and reporting and/or dashboards.
Lead the operational onboarding of new collaboration partners.
Establish joint working norms, communication cadences, and escalation frameworks from day one to set each partnership up for durable execution success.
Serve as the operational integrator for every combination study.
Convene and align functions around shared timelines, role clarity, and joint deliverables in partnership with Alliance Management.
Drive operational or study decisions and resolve conflicts across functions without direct authority.
Leading with influence, engage the right leaders and SMEs at the right time, frame issues clearly, and move teams to resolution with a bias for speed and accountability.
Represent combination study performance to VP and C-suite leaders in portfolio reviews, development meetings, and executive briefings translating ground-level program status into clear, strategic program narratives.
Function as the Alliance Management Lead's operational counterpart and closest working partner.
Provide real-time program intelligence, synthesize partner performance insights, and ensure the Alliance Management Lead is always equipped with the operational picture needed for governance and executive conversations.
Prepare joint briefings for JSC, JDC, and governance meetings; coordinate escalation routing so that working-team issues are resolved at the operational level and strategic issues are surfaced with clear context and recommended paths forward.
Support alliance health by contributing operational input to alliance reviews, milestone tracking, and obligation calendars.
Provide secondary alliance management coverage when needed to maintain continuity and partner confidence.
Bring an operational and collaboration lens to indication prioritization, combinations planning, and clinical study strategy decisions, ensuring that what the team decides is executable within the partnership framework.
Support Search & Evaluation activities by providing operational assessments of prospective partner companies and combination opportunities evaluating study design feasibility, operational infrastructure, timeline realism, and fit with our collaboration model.
Implement the collaboration contract in both strategy and operations translate agreed terms, governance structures, and resource commitments into how studies are designed, resourced, and run.
All Other duties as assigned.