Sr. Director, New Product Planning, Oncology

Moderna • Cambridge, MA

8d • $196,700 - $353,400 • Hybrid

About The Position

Moderna is seeking a Senior Director of New Product Planning to shape product and development strategy for early oncology programs, from discovery through clinical proof of concept. The role connects each program’s mechanism of action with disease biology to identify opportunities for meaningful clinical benefit and changes to treatment decisions. Working with program leaders and colleagues across Research, Development, Commercial, and Manufacturing, the Senior Director translates those opportunities into target product profiles, indication and development choices, and portfolio prioritization recommendations.

The position requires leading program and portfolio strategy and integrating scientific, clinical, and market evidence. The Senior Director frames choices, guides cross-functional debate, and presents recommendations to senior leaders about which opportunities to advance and where to focus investment and resources before development paths are fully defined.

The role also involves assessing oncology science and disease biology, understanding patient treatment pathways and the competitive landscape, and leading disciplined strategy processes with program teams. The Senior Director helps define efficient paths to proof of concept, target product profiles, clinical and evidence-generation plans, and the evidence needed for development, regulatory approval, physician adoption, reimbursement, and access. Moderna operates a 70/30 work model, with 70% in-office collaboration.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree or higher in a scientific, medical, business, or related field.
• At least 10 years of experience in the pharmaceutical or biotechnology industry, including significant experience in new product planning, research strategy, program leadership, global marketing, portfolio strategy, or a related function.
• Demonstrated experience leading product and portfolio strategy across multiple programs in discovery and early clinical development, including influencing senior decisions on program advancement, investment, and resource allocation.
• Strong understanding of oncology biology and clinical development, with the ability to independently evaluate mechanistic, translational, and clinical evidence and connect it to treatment decisions.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in oncology, including familiarity with treatment pathways, clinical endpoints, patient segmentation, and the evolving competitive landscape.
• Strong analytical skills and the ability to build, challenge, and communicate assumptions.
• Demonstrated ability to use AI-supported evidence workflows to investigate program questions, test competing explanations, evaluate underlying sources, and identify when expert input or additional data is needed.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to present concise recommendations to senior leaders and defend them objectively.
• Ability to influence across functions without direct authority, lead teams through competing views, and establish productive working relationships with scientific, clinical, and commercial colleagues.

Responsibilities

• Develop a deep understanding of Moderna’s platform and its application to oncology.
• Assess how program mechanisms of action could affect disease, including tumor biology, patient heterogeneity, and biomarkers.
• Evaluate mechanistic, translational, and clinical evidence and its implications for program strategy, disease progression, and clinical endpoints.
• Engage with scientific evidence and external experts to assess competing hypotheses and identify unresolved biological questions that affect development choices.
• Understand patient journeys through diagnosis, staging, biomarker testing, treatment selection, assessment, and subsequent treatment, including decision-makers and factors shaping treatment choices.
• Integrate market and competitive expertise into early program decisions.
• Evaluate approved therapies, emerging mechanisms, and competitor programs, including clinical evidence, development timelines, strengths, and limitations.
• Develop scenarios for how standards of care and treatment pathways may evolve, including treatment sequencing and future differentiation requirements.
• Use discussions with KOLs, treating physicians, and internal and external experts, alongside scientific and market evidence, to test assumptions and resolve development questions.
• Lead disciplined strategy processes with program teams by framing choices, identifying needed information, structuring debate around alternatives and tradeoffs, and making decision logic explicit.
• Identify efficient development paths to reduce key risks and reach proof of concept; define evidence needed to support further investment and adapt recommendations as data emerge.
• Shape strategy and prioritization across the early oncology portfolio and present senior leaders with recommendations on opportunities, investment, and resource allocation, including alternatives, tradeoffs, and evidence gaps.
• Integrate scientific, disease, market, and competitive insights to define program opportunities and prioritize indications, patient populations, treatment settings, and lines of therapy.
• Develop and refine target product profiles that link mechanism of action and disease biology to a defined patient population, treatment setting, and clinical benefit.
• Define efficacy, safety, durability, dosing, and administration requirements and the supporting evidence needed to differentiate programs and influence treatment choices as standards of care evolve.
• Shape clinical and evidence-generation plans, including patient selection, biomarkers, endpoints, and evidence needed for regulatory approval, physician adoption, reimbursement, and access.

Benefits

• Competitive healthcare and voluntary benefit programs.
• Fitness, mindfulness, and mental health support.
• Family planning benefits, including fertility, adoption, and surrogacy support.
• Paid time off, including vacation, volunteer days, sabbatical, global recharge days, and a discretionary year-end shutdown.
• Savings and investment programs.
• Location-specific perks and extras.
• Potential eligibility for an annual discretionary bonus, other incentive compensation, or an equity award, subject to plan eligibility criteria and individual performance.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior