Head of Global Congress Center of Excellence in Zürich

Job Description

About the Role

The Senior Director, Congress Center of Excellence (COE) is the enterprise leader responsible for establishing and leading the global congress strategy, governance, and operating model across the organization.

This role will transform congress engagement from a series of individual event activities into a strategic, integrated, and insight-driven enterprise capability that advances scientific exchange, evidence dissemination, and stakeholder engagement.

The role serves as the architect of the Medical Congress Operating Model, partnering across Global Medical, including Scientific Communications, Publications, Medical Information, and HEOR/RWE, as well as Clinical Development, International Business Unit (IBU) Regional and Local Medical, Commercial, Legal, Ethics & Compliance, Regulatory, and external agencies to ensure coordinated planning and execution of congress activities.

This role will leverage AI, analytics, automation, and digital technologies to improve planning, content development, insight capture, and measurement.

This role will also develop scalable capabilities, processes, and technologies that maximize both the scientific impact and operational efficiency of congress participation while ensuring compliance and organizational alignment.

How You Will Contribute

• Enterprise Congress Strategy
• Shape and own the enterprise-wide congress vision for Medical, working in collaboration with key stakeholders in regional Medical and Commercial organizations.
• Develop and maintain a global congress tiering and strategic prioritization framework that drives objective and consistent decision-making across the portfolio.
• Establish congresses as an integrated component of asset-level and enterprise Integrated Scientific Communication Plans (ISCPs).
• Establish and govern a consistent scientific narrative framework across congresses, assets, geographies, and stakeholder channels, in collaboration with Global Medical and Commercial counterparts.
• Create a portfolio-level view of congress engagement to drive enterprise prioritization, coordination, and investment decisions.
• Align congress strategies with Medical objectives, evidence generation plans, publication strategies, scientific communication priorities, and asset lifecycle needs.
• Ensure congress participation supports broader organizational goals related to scientific leadership, data dissemination, stakeholder engagement, and evidence communication.
• Congress COE & Medical Operating Model Development
• Design, implement, and continuously evolve the Congress COE operating model serving the entire Medical organization.
• Establish governance structures, decision rights, planning processes, accountability models, and operating principles across global, regional, and local teams.
• Define how congress-related capabilities are centralized, standardized, coordinated, and locally executed, leveraging the Global Capability Model (GCM) and Content Factory organization.
• Develop enterprise congress playbooks, SOPs, planning templates, governance forums, and best practices.
• Create scalable and repeatable processes that support flagship congresses and broader portfolio participation.
• Drive the transformation of congress engagement to a coordinated enterprise capability, partnering closely with internal stakeholders, leveraging the GCM.
• Ensure congress outputs continuously inform broader scientific communication strategies, building mechanisms to translate congress learnings into scientific communication planning and evidence generation priorities.
• Drive standardization of tools, templates, technologies, and planning processes.
• Establish the enterprise framework for congress measurement, analytics, and performance management.
• Define KPIs that assess scientific impact, stakeholder management, content utilization, scientific exchange, insights generation, operational effectiveness, investment efficiency, and narrative progression.
• Create dashboards and executive reporting mechanisms that provide visibility into congress performance across the portfolio.
• Leverage AI, analytics, automation, and digital technologies to improve planning, content development, insight capture, and measurement.
• Lead budget planning, forecasting, vendor oversight, contract management, and financial optimization.

Qualifications

• Required
• Master's degree
• 13+ years of pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and/or healthcare industry experience.
• Significant leadership experience within Medical Affairs, Scientific Communications, Medical Communications, Publications, Congress Strategy, and/or related disciplines.
• Proven experience developing and executing global congress strategies across multiple assets and geographies.
• Demonstrated success leading enterprise-wide initiatives, operating models, governance frameworks, and/or Centers of Excellence (COEs).
• Strong understanding of integrated scientific communications, evidence dissemination, scientific engagement, and congress ecosystems.
• Experience utilizing AI, analytics, and emerging technologies to drive impact within Scientific Communications or Medical Affairs.
• Experience driving alignment across global, regional, and local organizations.
• Demonstrated ability to influence senior stakeholders without direct authority.
• Deep understanding of congress compliance requirements, review processes, and industry standards.
• Preferred
• Doctorate degree (Pharm D, Ph D, MD, or equivalent).
• Experience establishing or transforming a Congress COE.
• Experience integrating congress strategy into ISCPs.
• Experience with modular content, content factories, omnichannel scientific engagement, and digital Medical Affairs.
• Experience leading organizational transformation within a large global pharmaceutical organization.
• Locations
• Zurich, Switzerland

Base Salary Range

The estimated salary range reflects an anticipated range for this position.

The actual base salary offered may depend on a variety of factors, including the qualifications of the individual applicant for the position, years of relevant experience, specific and unique skills, level of education attained, certifications or other professional licenses held, and the location in which the applicant lives and/or from which they will be performing the job.

• Worker Type
• Employee
• Worker Sub-Type
• Regular
• Time Type
• Full time
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