Executive Director, Digital Enablement

Vaxcyte•San Carlos, CA

1d•$288,000 - $335,000•Remote

About The Position

This is a newly created role responsible for ensuring that digital and AI capabilities enhance Vaxcyte's launch functions. The primary focus will be on building the digital infrastructure, AI capabilities, and commercial technology roadmap from the ground up for Vaxcyte's first product launch. The role acts as an enabler across various commercial teams, including Marketing, Sales, Medical Affairs, Market Access, Commercial Operations, and Data and Analytics, aiming to reduce friction, improve intelligence, and provide a competitive advantage. The Executive Director will collaborate with these partners to understand business needs and implement system capabilities. This position sits within the Commercial organization and works closely with the IT Commercial Lead, who manages implementation, data security, and technical aspects. The role owns strategy through execution, ensuring launch functions are fully enabled. It also supports the digital, data, and AI needs of Medical Affairs while respecting their scientific strategy and independence, operating within the company's compliance framework.

Requirements

BA/BS degree in a scientific discipline, business, marketing, or technology required. MBA or other advanced degree highly desired.
Minimum of 15+ years of industry-related experience with 5+ years in commercial or commercial-facing roles within pharmaceutical, biotech, or vaccine organizations, including direct exposure to product launch.
Demonstrated experience operating with a product management discipline: owned a product roadmap, managed a backlog, worked in iterative delivery cycles, and measured outcomes.
Experience building or leading a commercial digital or commercial excellence function, with accountability for adoption and business results.
Deep understanding of the commercial technology ecosystem, including CRM (e.g., Salesforce, Veeva), marketing automation platforms, data and analytics platforms, and HCP-facing digital channels.
Deep understanding of frontier AI models and their applications in business.
Proven ability to translate in both directions: commercial strategy into technical requirements, and technical constraints into business options.
AI fluency: genuine working knowledge of generative AI, predictive analytics, next-best-action tools, and AI-assisted content workflows.
Experience launching U.S. vaccines and/or specialty biologics (highly preferred).
Familiarity with revenue management infrastructure including chargebacks, rebates, and gross-to-net systems.
Familiarity with Sunshine Act compliance, MLR review workflows, and promotional materials management.
Ability to travel 20% of the time for commercial and cross-functional team engagements.

Nice To Haves

MBA or other advanced degree
Experience launching U.S. vaccines and/or specialty biologics

Responsibilities

Develop a phased commercial digital vision for the US adult launch covering pre-launch, launch, and growth phases, with defined milestones and measurable outcomes.
Own and maintain a commercial product roadmap for digital capabilities like CRM, marketing technology, field enablement, analytics, and AI tools, treating each as a product with a defined use case, user, success metric, and release schedule.
Map the end-to-end commercial experience from the field rep perspective to provider and executive touchpoints, identifying areas where digital creates leverage and where complexity should be avoided.
Define and prioritize AI use cases for field force effectiveness, marketing operations, customer segmentation, content production, and performance analytics, sequenced by business impact and data readiness.
Ensure technology decisions are driven by defined commercial use cases, with architecture following strategy and vendor selection following requirements.
Serve as the commercial voice in digital and technology planning, ensuring commercial priorities drive decisions.
Translate commercial strategy into technical requirements for IT, vendors, and data teams, and technical constraints into actionable business options for commercial leaders.
Partner with Marketing to build the martech stack, performance marketing capability, content infrastructure, and streamline MLR review for faster content delivery.
Partner with Sales and Field Force Excellence to equip the field with CRM, call planning, territory management, and mobile tools, and identify AI applications for enhanced effectiveness.
Partner with Medical Affairs to build capabilities for digital engagement, scientific exchange, congress engagement, and KOL mapping.
Partner with Market Access and Commercial Operations to establish contract management, chargeback and revenue management, and Sunshine Act compliance workflows, identifying AI applications for anomaly detection and scenario modeling.
Serve as the primary liaison to the IT Commercial Lead (ITCL), ensuring technology implementation aligns with commercial strategy.
Examine every commercial launch capability area for AI-driven improvements, building an organization that prioritizes AI for better outcomes.
Approach commercial capability decisions with an AI-first lens, evaluating AI as an alternative to headcount, process, or traditional software.
Define and lead the AI capability roadmap for commercial and medical affairs, identifying areas where AI enhances current work, enables new possibilities, or should be questioned.
Deploy AI-powered strategic tools for the commercial leadership team, such as virtual advisory simulations and intelligence briefing workflows.
Champion AI literacy and adoption across commercial functions, building fluency for field and marketing teams.
Establish AI governance guardrails for commercial contexts in partnership with Legal and Compliance.
Lead commercial evaluation of CRM, marketing automation, data, and AI vendor options, determining build vs. buy vs. rent strategies.
Maintain a composable, modular platform philosophy where components are replaceable without requiring a full stack rebuild.
Ensure commercial sign-off on scope, functionality, and success criteria for vendor contracts before execution.
Define the commercial data strategy, including data needs, procurement timelines, and activation/governance across platforms.
Partner with the ITCL to create the data architecture for tracking and reporting commercial progress, ensuring performance metrics are captured and actionable.
Partner with IT and Finance to ensure a commercial view within the master data management framework for a shared customer record.
Drive adoption of performance analytics and reporting tools across the commercial team.