Functional Service Team Executive/Senior Director, Clinical Delivery Capabilities – Exploratory Medicine Pharmacology (EMP) in Bracknell

At Lilly, the work is demanding because patients are waiting. We unite caring with discovery to help make life better for people around the world, knowing that every decision, every detail, and every day matters. Headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, our over 50,000 employees around the globe take on complex challenges to discover and deliver life-changing medicines, strengthen how health is understood and managed, and support the communities we serve. This is hard, urgent, selfless work—but it’s work worth doing. If you’re driven by purpose and ready to bring your best to work that truly matters for patients, we invite you to join us.

The purpose of the Functional Service Team Executive/Senior Director role is to establish, lead, and sustain a functional service team that operates as a scalable extension of the EMP workforce, enabling the exploratory and biopharmaceutics clinical development portfolio to respond effectively to shifts in portfolio volume, timing, and priorities. This role works in close partnership with the Strategic Sourcing and Governance Executive/Senior Director, who sets sourcing strategy and governance across EMP vendors and oversees contracts and budgets for study related work, to translate that direction into a fully operational service.

The role is accountable for clinical vendor management and performance optimization across the service team, including how it is governed, set up for success, trained, measured, and supported, and for the strength of the relationships that underpin it with functional service providers (FSPs) and EMP stakeholders. This role plays a critical part in driving EMP towards its strategic objectives by delivering consistent quality, productivity, and value through the external service team.

Service Team Establishment, Governance and Operating Model:

• Translate the sourcing strategy, commercial framework, and enterprise governance set by the Strategic Sourcing and Governance Executive/Senior Director into a fully operational functional service team, ensuring alignment on scope, service model, and expectations with the FSP partner(s) and third-party organizations (TPOs).
• Own the FSP delivery strategy for EMP and oversee its execution and budget to ensure the FSP model, resourcing plans, and study-level delivery align with EMP development priorities, portfolio demand, and clinical study milestones, and so that the FSP model can scale as the level of investment grows.
• Partner with the Strategic Sourcing and Governance Executive/Senior Director to formalize how EMP studies are allocated between FSP, other external delivery models, and internal execution, including an explicit decision owner, defined selection criteria, and a recurring governance cadence.
• Partner with EMP leadership and the Therapeutic Areas (TAs) to forecast portfolio demand and plan capacity, enabling the service team to mobilize, scale, and release resources in step with the dynamics of the portfolio.
• Establish and lead a functional service team as an extension of the EMP workforce, defining a flexible resourcing model that responds effectively to fluctuations in portfolio volume, timing, and priorities.
• Design and implement a governance framework for the service team, including clearly defined scope, roles and responsibilities, decision rights, a tiered escalation model, and oversight forums with EMP leadership and TPO partners.
• Define the operating model and implementation approach required for the service team to succeed, including capacity planning, onboarding and transition plans, ways of working, and alignment with EMP processes and quality standards.
• Ensure that the infrastructure required to support the service team is in place, including systems access, tools, data and reporting capabilities, contracting and budgeting mechanisms, and collaboration platforms.
• Actively contribute to the successful implementation of key EMP initiatives, including acceleration plans and portfolio delivery models.
• Provide leadership for the development and implementation of EMP portfolio delivery strategies and actively engage functional leaders across the organizations.
• Ensure that the team is aware of both the future demands of the portfolio and external possibilities for breakthrough advances in solutions delivery.
• Proactively identify potential issues and develop contingency plans with a focus on quality and risk mitigation.
• Lead or sponsor cross functional, enterprise-wide projects to increase productivity and accelerate portfolio delivery.
• Collaborate with EMP Leadership to ensure the right structure for developing talent and critical capabilities.

Clinical Vendor Management and Performance Optimization:

• Serve as the point of accountability for delivery of service team outputs to agreed scope, quality, timeline, and budget in support of the exploratory and biopharmaceutics clinical development portfolio.
• Lead clinical vendor management for the FSP partner(s) and TPO partners, including portfolio-level relationship management and structured business reviews.
• Serve as the single accountable point of contact for each FSP partner across EMP, providing clear accountability, and holding providers accountable for execution.
• Lead the FSP service team leadership and vendor management community supporting EMP.
• Drive performance optimization by establishing a standardized performance measurement framework and supporting data streams comprising KPIs, metrics, and quality indicators.
• Provide regular performance reporting and insight to EMP leadership and the Strategic Sourcing and Governance Executive/Senior Director.
• Own the technology and data agenda for FSP oversight, including integration of provider data into EMP systems.
• Assess the health of FSP-supported work across the EMP portfolio on a regular basis.
• Build and sustain strong working relationships with EMP leadership, the TAs, and functional partners.
• Serve as the primary partner to EMP leadership on FSP matters.
• Partner with peer FSP, sourcing, and vendor management leaders across LRL and the broader enterprise.
• Represent EMP in LRL-wide forums and governance bodies.
• Serve as a connector between EMP and the broader LRL organization.
• Establish and sustain a strong network with other LRL functions.
• Maintain awareness of regulatory issues and trends relevant to assigned portfolio.
• Apply innovation and lessons learned in real time.

Training, Capability Development and Continuous Improvement:

• Define and oversee the training required for service team readiness.
• Foster a culture of accountability, inclusion, and high performance across a blended workforce.
• Model behaviors and establish an environment where performance and results are valued.
• Lead the service team and its stakeholders through change and complexity.
• Capture lessons learned and best practices from service team delivery.
• Coach/mentor department personnel, as needed.
• Demonstrate high learning agility by identifying and maintaining external awareness.

Basic Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in a scientific or related field; Minimum of 10+ years of experience in clinical development or related fields within the pharmaceutical industry, with significant experience in a leadership role.
• Experience in Enterprise Project Management, Project Risk Management, and Project Document Management.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Proven ability in Cross‑Functional Leadership, Operational Leadership, and Relationship Building.
• Strong analytical thinking skills and experience utilizing analytics software for decision‑making.
• Proficiency in Change Control Management and Integration Management within complex organizations.
• Exceptional Self‑Discipline and Stakeholder Engagement capabilities.
• In‑depth understanding of clinical trial processes, regulatory requirements, and industry best practices.
• Ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast‑paced environment and drive results through effective Project Leadership.