Head of External Manufacturing Product & Project Leadership

Roche•Indianapolis, IN

About The Position

At Roche you can show up as yourself, embraced for the unique qualities you bring. Our culture encourages personal expression, open dialogue, and genuine connections, where you are valued, accepted and respected for who you are, allowing you to thrive both personally and professionally. This is how we aim to prevent, stop and cure diseases and ensure everyone has access to healthcare today and for generations to come. Join Roche, where every voice matters. The Position The Head of External Manufacturing Product & Project Leadership is a senior executive role within the External Manufacturing (EM) Leadership Team. This position provides overarching disciplinary and strategic leadership for the entire product and project management lifecycle within the external network. The core mandate is to harmonize product strategy, project execution, and process excellence across the global organization. By overseeing both Product and Project Leadership heads, this role ensures that strategic investment decisions are translated into high-quality technical execution, ultimately driving the efficiency and reliability of Roche’s external manufacturing sub-networks. The Head of EM Product & Project Leadership exerts strategic influence by navigating the complex intersection of global network strategy and technical execution. As a key member of the External Manufacturing Leadership Team, this position serves as a high-level diplomat and decision-maker, responsible for negotiating multi-million dollar resource allocations and securing executive alignment across R&D, Quality and Procurement. Beyond internal steering, the role acts as a primary technical authority in "Executive-to-Executive" engagements with strategic global suppliers, ensuring that external partners’ capabilities evolve in lockstep with Roche’s enterprise goals. By arbitrating systemic conflicts and resolving high-stakes trade-offs between competing global priorities, this leader harmonizes the organizational fabric to drive technical excellence and long-term business resilience. The Opportunity You combine people management, strategic product/project oversight, and resource stewardship to drive the success and evolution of Product & Project Leadership within the External Manufacturing (EM) organization. You own the strategic technical roadmap for the product & project organization, ensuring product strategies and execution plans align with long-term business objectives such as COGS reduction, supply security, and portfolio agility. As a member of the EM Leadership Team and peer to the Head of MSAT and External Manufacturing Leads, you collaborate to define a 3–5 year strategy that ensures technical capabilities evolve ahead of market demands. You translate high-level strategic goals into actionable mandates for Product & Project Leadership, overseeing project prioritization to focus resources on initiatives with the highest value for Roche. You oversee processes to establish a unified, "best-in-class" operational framework for product and project management within EM, ensuring alignment with the global Quality Management System (mQMS) and regulatory requirements. You break down silos, standardize workflows, tools and KPIs across global sites (e.g. Rotkreuz, Mannheim, Suzhou), accelerating "time-to-market" and improving project velocity. As a catalyst for Digital and Agile transformation, you implement advanced methodologies like analytics for supplier capacity and agile portfolio management to maintain a competitive edge. You act as the primary technical interface at the senior executive level, frequently engaging with Senior Leadership in Procurement, Global Supply Chain, Quality, OPPM, and SPBO to secure investments, eliminate roadblocks, and drive best practices. You engage strategically with CEOs and senior management of key external suppliers and partners at an elevated governance level, driving "Executive-to-Executive" alignment on technical roadmaps and manufacturing capabilities. You manage the global capacity model for Product & Project Leadership, deploying senior talent across squads and projects based on complexity, risk, and business importance. You oversee the budget (OPEX/CAPEX) for external manufacturing projects, ensuring ROI and adherence to multi-million-dollar budgets, while defining and monitoring key metrics (e.g., Portfolio Health, Resource Utilization, Quality-by-Design benchmarks) to assess network health and performance. You lead a team of 6 direct reports (all people leaders) with a total organization size of 40–50 people while inspiring teams to innovate, collaborate, and deliver patient-focused results with a high-performance mindset. By embodying Roche’s core values of Integrity, Courage, and Passion, you build trust through transparent communication and unwavering integrity while constructively challenging the status quo to foster dialogue, embrace diverse perspectives, and turn challenges into opportunities. You empower teams to unlock their potential and develop talents, fostering a culture of high performance and psychological safety that encourages transformational growth and achieves ambitious divisional goals. You navigate complexity and ambiguity with resilience, creating systems-level solutions to enhance operational efficiency and prepare the organization for future demands. You consistently demonstrate transformational leadership by driving organizational alignment, advocating for change initiatives, and fostering an enterprise mindset that holds you accountable for outcomes beyond your immediate area of responsibility.

Requirements

You have a bachelor's degree in a relevant scientific or engineering discipline.
You have a minimum of 5 years of progressive leadership experience, including a proven record of managing and developing other senior leaders.
You bring 8–10 years of experience in the medtech or other highly regulated industries, emphasizing technical expertise.
You have designed and scaled global technical organizations, implementing agile models and cross-functional "Squad" structures.
You have built High-Performing Organizations (HPOs) that prioritize psychological safety, accountability, and Roche's VACC leadership principles.
You have deep expertise in the end-to-end lifecycle of external manufacturing, including supplier selection, technical transfers, and long-term capacity planning in highly regulated environments (e.g., IVD/Medical Devices/Pharma).
You translate enterprise-level goals (e.g., multi-year CAPEX and COGS targets) into actionable technical execution strategies.
You have expert knowledge of global regulatory requirements (e.g., ISO 13485, GMP, GDP) and extensive experience representing technical organizations in major health authority inspections.
You bring exceptional executive presence and communication skills, enabling you to influence discussions at the Board or Executive Committee level.
You approach challenges with a "systems thinking" mindset, solving complex problems and navigating ambiguity with clear decision-making.
You possess strong commercial and financial acumen, effectively managing significant budgets and understanding ROI and external supplier contract levers.
You are fluent in English and are able to sustain global travel, with a willingness to travel frequently as required.

Nice To Haves

An advanced degree (Master’s/PhD) in a related field is highly desirable.
Senior-level certifications in Portfolio Management (e.g., PfMP) or Change Management (e.g., Prosci) are beneficial for the role.

Responsibilities

You combine people management, strategic product/project oversight, and resource stewardship to drive the success and evolution of Product & Project Leadership within the External Manufacturing (EM) organization.
You own the strategic technical roadmap for the product & project organization, ensuring product strategies and execution plans align with long-term business objectives such as COGS reduction, supply security, and portfolio agility.
As a member of the EM Leadership Team and peer to the Head of MSAT and External Manufacturing Leads, you collaborate to define a 3–5 year strategy that ensures technical capabilities evolve ahead of market demands.
You translate high-level strategic goals into actionable mandates for Product & Project Leadership, overseeing project prioritization to focus resources on initiatives with the highest value for Roche.
You oversee processes to establish a unified, "best-in-class" operational framework for product and project management within EM, ensuring alignment with the global Quality Management System (mQMS) and regulatory requirements.
You break down silos, standardize workflows, tools and KPIs across global sites (e.g. Rotkreuz, Mannheim, Suzhou), accelerating "time-to-market" and improving project velocity.
As a catalyst for Digital and Agile transformation, you implement advanced methodologies like analytics for supplier capacity and agile portfolio management to maintain a competitive edge.
You act as the primary technical interface at the senior executive level, frequently engaging with Senior Leadership in Procurement, Global Supply Chain, Quality, OPPM, and SPBO to secure investments, eliminate roadblocks, and drive best practices.
You engage strategically with CEOs and senior management of key external suppliers and partners at an elevated governance level, driving "Executive-to-Executive" alignment on technical roadmaps and manufacturing capabilities.
You manage the global capacity model for Product & Project Leadership, deploying senior talent across squads and projects based on complexity, risk, and business importance.
You oversee the budget (OPEX/CAPEX) for external manufacturing projects, ensuring ROI and adherence to multi-million-dollar budgets, while defining and monitoring key metrics (e.g., Portfolio Health, Resource Utilization, Quality-by-Design benchmarks) to assess network health and performance.
You lead a team of 6 direct reports (all people leaders) with a total organization size of 40–50 people while inspiring teams to innovate, collaborate, and deliver patient-focused results with a high-performance mindset.
By embodying Roche’s core values of Integrity, Courage, and Passion, you build trust through transparent communication and unwavering integrity while constructively challenging the status quo to foster dialogue, embrace diverse perspectives, and turn challenges into opportunities.
You empower teams to unlock their potential and develop talents, fostering a culture of high performance and psychological safety that encourages transformational growth and achieves ambitious divisional goals.
You navigate complexity and ambiguity with resilience, creating systems-level solutions to enhance operational efficiency and prepare the organization for future demands.
You consistently demonstrate transformational leadership by driving organizational alignment, advocating for change initiatives, and fostering an enterprise mindset that holds you accountable for outcomes beyond your immediate area of responsibility.