Director, Enterprise Team HR Leader, Brazil

Job Description

The Director, Enterprise Team HR (ETHR) Leader, Brazil reports to the AVP, Enterprise Team HR Americas. The role leads a flexible organization that translates enterprise priorities into coordinated human capital actions; provides local and site-based expertise across the market, and deploys HR capability against the highest-priority strategic, organizational, talent, culture, employee-relations and workforce needs.

The Brazil ETHR Leader serves as an integrator across the HR operating model. The role partners closely with Organization & Talent Partners (OTPs), COEs, HR Solutions & Operations and other ETHR leaders to deliver business priorities while maintaining the local insight and expert judgment required in the markets served. The leader connects across divisions and functions and helps move the organization toward more consistent, simplified and scalable solutions. The role is an integral member of the ETHR Americas Leadership Team.

Primary accountabilities

Lead the ETHR team and deploy capacity

• Lead ETHR support for Brazil, balancing resources across divisions, functions and sites.

• Provide strategic and operational direction and people leadership for the ETHR Brazil team, establishing clear accountability for team performance, development, and inclusive ways of working.

• Set clear priorities, allocate work, reallocate resources and expertise as business, site and enterprise needs evolve, and ensure delivery against agreed outcomes.

• Put into practice disciplined operating rhythms, decision rights, escalation paths and measures that create transparency, responsiveness and consistent delivery.

• Manage intake, prioritization, capacity management and workload balancing, ensuring the most critical enterprise, divisional and local priorities are supported with the right capabilities.

Execute the strategic agenda

• Partner with OTP to turn highest priority organization, talent, culture and change strategies into practical action; Lead the execution of highest priority enterprise and divisional initiatives within the assigned scope.

• Look across sites, business units and employee populations to identify recurring needs and drive use of consistent, standardized and simplified solutions.

• Monitor implementation, identify barriers and adjust delivery plans where necessary.

• Deliver COE-designed products and services and advocate with leaders for consistent, global processes.

• Identify systemic issues and translate them into broader organizational, product or process improvements in partnership with OTP, COE and HR Ops.

Coach through complexity

• Engage with and coach leaders in organization design, talent processes and transformation approaches.

• Coach and guide people managers on complex performance, talent, retention and organizational planning challenges that require human judgment beyond AskHR or AI-enabled coaching.

• Provide leadership and expert judgment to complex employee relations, labor and compliance matters and escalate appropriately when decisions may create broader risk or precedent.

• Bring divisional, site, culture and labor considerations into the design and delivery of people priorities.

• Support cyclical people activities and analytics where expert judgment is needed.

Deliver local expertise and insights

• Apply deep understanding of market/country environment and labor laws, directly and via coaching the team.

• Act as Senior HR leader for Brazil, sitting on country leadership team representing Enterprise HR across all divisions and partnering with OTPs as needed for strategic, above market input.

• Drive consistency in employee and manager experience and talent movement across the organization, with strong understanding of labor laws, regulatory requirements and compliance needs.

• Ensure we have on-the-ground coverage and relevant expertise for sites and employee populations; Ensure alignment to applicable labor law, compliance and market requirements.

• Engage appropriate specialty expertise for matters that require deeper employee relations, labor, site, functional or other knowledge.

• Deliver the local/divisional content needed to scale digital solutions while supporting a common HR experience.

Optimize the operating model and accelerate digital enablement

• Collaborate with OTP & COE teams to ensure clear context, coordinated priorities and effective handoffs.

• Challenge unnecessary customization and one-off solutions & coach the team to seek opportunities for simplification, standardization and scaling of solutions.

• Collaborate with ETHR leader peers to find cross divisional and enterprise solutions.

• Apply clear boundaries between strategic activation, expert consulting, local accountabilities and transactional delivery, redirecting work to the appropriate part of the model including to the Digital Front Door, shared services or other scalable channels.

• Use data, demand signals and service insights to improve resource allocation, identify capacity constraints and guide continuous improvement.

ETHR skills, capabilities and leadership expectations:

• Lead a team of Enterprise HR Partners as a player coach, managing prioritization and capacity.

• Build strong credibility with divisional leaders and HR peers.

• Translate strategy into disciplined execution, balancing divisional responsiveness with enterprise consistency.

• Build simplification, process improvement and experimentation into ways of working of the team.

• Work collaboratively with peer ETHR leaders to deliver beyond the boundaries of the assigned divisions.

The role requires the following capabilities and leadership characteristics:

• Execution Excellence: apply a broad enterprise view and deep local understanding to execute talent strategies and enterprise initiatives with leaders and OTPs.

• Consulting: diagnose the underlying problem or need, bring expert judgment to complex and high-risk matters and advise with confidence or redirect to the right place in the mode

• Change Catalyst: lead change directly — drive adoption, address resistance and ensure consistent, simplified ways of working.

• Influence: establish credibility with and work effectively across a broad set of enterprise leaders, partnering and navigating the HR operating model to deliver

• Business Savviness: quickly and efficiently read an unfamiliar business, site or market to assess the situation, credibly recommend action and support leaders and employees.

• Enterprise coordination & prioritization: work across businesses, regions, markets, sites, OTPs and COEs on strategic execution

• Agility: show curiosity and ability to learn new areas; assess shifting needs and requirements and devise plans to execute work and assign resources against those changing needs.

• Process optimization and simplification: embed a continuous improvement mindset, providing feedback to COEs and driving consistency and simplification locally.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in human resources, Business or a related discipline required.

• Minimum of ten (10) years of progressive HR or closely related business experience, including people-leadership responsibility in a complex environment.

• Demonstrated experience leading an HR team and building a strong, inclusive talent bench. (Preferably experience as HR leader in Brazil)

• Demonstrated experience across strategic initiative execution, manager coaching, organizational change, talent and performance, employee relations and local employment requirements.

• Proven ability to consult and influence leaders, manage high-risk and sensitive matters, and coordinate outcomes across organizational boundaries.

• Deep experience in leading in a labor regulated & unionized environment, bridging local employment needs with enterprise priorities.

• Experience strengthening positive employee relations and building manager and HR capability.

• Experience supporting transformational change, process simplification and continuous improvement.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, business judgment and analytical capability.

• Proficiency in English (written and speaking) and fluency in Portuguese (Spanish ideal)

• Travel 25%

Relocation within LATAM may be available for the successful candidate, subject to business needs and company mobility policies.

Required Skills:

Business Acumen, Business Acumen, Change Management, Compliance Monitoring, Confidential Data Handling, Consultative Selling, Digital HR, Diversity and Inclusion (D&I), Enterprise Solutions Sales, Functional Expertise, HR Policy Development, HR Reporting, Human Resource Information Systems (HRIS), Human Resource Management, Human Resources Analytics, Learning and Development (L&D), Liaison Work, Management Support, People Management, People Performance Management, Performance Management (PM), Pipeline Development, Pipeline Management, Presentation Delivery, Recruiting Processes {+ 10 more}

Preferred Skills:

Current Employees apply HERE

Current Contingent Workers apply HERE

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Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company. No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails.

Employee Status:

Regular

Relocation:

International

VISA Sponsorship:

No

Travel Requirements:

25%

Flexible Work Arrangements:

Hybrid

Shift:

Not Indicated

Valid Driving License:

No

Hazardous Material(s):

na

Job Posting End Date:

10/11/2026

*A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.

Requisition ID:R419658