Associate Director US Oncology Marketing HCP Strategy Advanced Renal Cell Carcinoma

Job Description

Our Oncology team is dedicated to delivering breakthrough innovations that extend and improve the lives of people with cancer worldwide. We achieve this through an unwavering commitment to scientific innovation, launch and execution excellence, and collaboration across stakeholders to help ensure that patients who need our medicines can access them.

The Associate Director, HCP Strategy for advanced renal cell carcinoma (AdvRCC) will lead the U.S. healthcare professional strategy for the AdvRCC business. This individual will define the strategic choices, customer priorities, and integrated engagement approach needed to drive sustained growth today while positioning the business for future success. The role will work closely with the alliance team and broader stakeholders to align portfolio strategy and execution in a way that optimizes the value across the AdvRCC treatment landscape.

The ideal candidate is an exceptional strategist and enterprise leader with strong planning, communication, digital marketing, collaboration, negotiation, marketing, and business acumen. They will translate deep customer, market, and competitive understanding into clear strategic direction, align stakeholders, and lead high-quality execution in a complex, highly matrixed environment.

Primary Responsibilities:

HCP and Brand Strategy Leadership

• Lead development and evolution of the U.S. HCP strategy for AdvRCC, ensuring alignment with brand, portfolio, and enterprise priorities.

• Define customer objectives, strategic imperatives, positioning, messaging priorities, and integrated engagement strategies that influence treatment decisions and support business growth.

• Translate clinical, customer, market, and performance insights into clear strategic choices, differentiated value propositions, and actionable commercial plans.

• Anticipate shifts in the treatment landscape and proactively evolve strategy to sustain competitiveness across current and future market scenarios.

• Provide strategic direction to cross-functional and agency partners, ensuring execution remains focused on the most important customer behaviors and business outcomes.

AdvRCC Portfolio and Alliance Collaboration

• Partner closely with the alliance team and stakeholders to align HCP strategy, customer engagement, and execution across the AdvRCC portfolio.

• Identify portfolio opportunities, strategic interdependencies, and potential trade-offs, and facilitate decisions that optimize enterprise value.

• Build durable partnerships through transparent communication, thoughtful negotiation, and a shared focus on customer and business outcomes.

• Ensure coherent portfolio narratives and coordinated execution across channels while maintaining clear brand roles and strategic priorities.

Market Research, Segmentation, and Competitive Strategy

• Lead market research to uncover HCP needs, prescribing drivers, barriers, patient-context considerations, and emerging opportunities across the AdvRCC treatment journey.

• Lead the development, refinement, and application of customer segmentation to identify priority audiences and inform differentiated engagement strategies.

• Assess market dynamics, treatment patterns, customer behavior, and competitive activity to strengthen strategic decision-making and forecast future business implications.

• Build and maintain a forward-looking view of the market landscape, including competitor strategies, clinical developments, potential new entrants, and evolving standards of care.

• Convert research and analytics into clear implications, strategic recommendations, and measurable actions for field, digital, and non-personal promotion.

Omnichannel and Digital Marketing Leadership

• Partner with digital, media, analytics, and customer experience teams to design connected journeys that deliver relevant content based on customer needs and behaviors.

• Champion test-and-learn approaches, using performance data and customer feedback to optimize content, channel mix, sequencing, and investment decisions.

• Ensure HCP experiences are customer-centered, strategically consistent, and executed with operational and compliance excellence.

Business Management, Measurement, and Optimization

• Define key performance indicators and measurement plans tied to strategic objectives, customer behavior, and business outcomes.

• Partner with analytics and finance to monitor performance, identify drivers and gaps, and recommend actions to improve impact.

• Lead annual and long-range planning inputs for the AdvRCC HCP business, including strategic assumptions, priorities, resource needs, and risk mitigation.

• Manage marketing investments by making disciplined trade-offs to maximize strategic and financial impact.

• Maintain strong operational oversight and ensure promotional activities meet applicable company, legal, regulatory, and compliance requirements.

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree required; MBA or advanced degree preferred.

• 5+ years of progressive experience in pharmaceutical, biotechnology, healthcare, or a related industry.

• Demonstrated experience in HCP marketing, brand strategy, market development, digital marketing, customer engagement, or related commercial roles.

• Proven ability to translate market research, customer insights, segmentation, competitive intelligence, and analytics into actionable strategies.

• Demonstrated success leading complex cross-functional work and influencing senior stakeholders in a matrixed environment.

• Exceptional strategic thinking, planning, communication, collaboration, negotiation, marketing, and business acumen.

• Strong executive communication and presentation skills, with the ability to simplify complexity and drive alignment and decisions.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Oncology experience; renal cell carcinoma or genitourinary oncology experience preferred.

• Experience supporting an in-market brand, indication expansion, launch preparation, or lifecycle strategy.

• Experience working within an alliance or co-commercialization model.

• Experience leading HCP segmentation, market research, competitive analysis, and omnichannel strategy.

• Understanding of oncology customer dynamics, treatment decision-making, and the evolving AdvRCC landscape.

Critical Success Factors:

The successful candidate will demonstrate:

• Strategic agility and a forward-looking, enterprise mindset.

• Ability to connect customer insight, clinical context, competitive dynamics, and business performance into a compelling strategy.

• Clear prioritization and sound decision-making amid ambiguity and competing demands.

• Exceptional collaboration, influence, negotiation, and alliance-management skills.

• Digital and omnichannel fluency, grounded in customer behavior and measurable outcomes.

• High learning agility, accountability, resilience, and commitment to execution excellence.

• A strong customer and patient orientation, with a passion for improving outcomes for people living with advanced RCC.

Required Skills:

Preferred Skills:

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Where required by law, the compensation range for this role is provided below.

The salary range for the primary location of this role is:

This range reflects the Company's reasonable expectation of the base salary applicable to this role at the time of posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs. The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits. Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.

Additional location(s): Please note the salary range above applies to the Primary Location of the position. Where a role has other listed locations, different compensation guidelines may apply. You may find the salary ranges for additional locations below. If the salary range is not listed for the location you are applying to, our Talent Acquisition team will provide further information to you relevant to your location.

Additional location(s) Compensation Information:

San Francisco Residents Only: We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

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