Associate Director, Discovery Portfolio Management Strategic Planner, Discovery
About this opportunity
Company Description
About AbbVie
AbbVie's mission is to discover and deliver innovative medicines and solutions that solve serious health issues today and address the medical challenges of tomorrow. We strive to have a remarkable impact on people's lives across several key therapeutic areas including immunology, oncology and neuroscience - and products and services in our Allergan Aesthetics portfolio. For more information about AbbVie, please visit us at www.abbvie.com . Follow @abbvie on LinkedIn, Facebook , Instagram , X and YouTube.
Job Description
Purpose:
This role supports Discovery Portfolio Management by providing strategic oversight, portfolio analytics, and actionable insights across external studies and related initiatives. The position is responsible for evaluating portfolio composition, monitoring execution performance, and measuring key KPIs such as cycle time, success rates, throughput, and other indicators of portfolio health. The role partners across functions to support prioritization, governance, and continuous improvement through strong analysis, communication, and executive-level presentation skills.
Responsibilities:
Develop data-driven insights and recommendations to support Discovery Research operations and leadership decision-making, including portfolio prioritization, governance, and operational decision-making.
Serve as a strong communicator and writer, developing clear summaries, leadership updates, and executive-level slides and presentations.
Synthesize complex scientific, technical, analytical, and business issues into concise, actionable insights.
Anticipate challenges and recommend proactive strategies to address portfolio, operational, and business needs.
Balance quality, timing, budget, and strategic considerations to support high-impact decisions across the portfolio.
Analyze portfolio composition and performance to identify trends, gaps, risks, bottlenecks, and opportunities for improvement.
Track, interpret, and report key KPIs, including cycle time, success rates, throughput, budget performance, and other relevant portfolio metrics.
Investigate functional pain points and propose practical solutions, supporting or leading implementation efforts as needed.
Partner effectively across functions and with indirect authority to align stakeholders and drive execution.
Leverage external intelligence related to technologies, tools, and competitors to inform portfolio strategy and identify opportunities for innovation.
In addition to Cambridge, MA, this opportunity may also be based out of Lake County, IL or Worcester, MA.
Qualifications
BS & 10+ years, MS & 7+ years, PHD & 5+ years industry experience in Drug Discovery, ideally within a biotech or pharmaceutical company.
Strong background in portfolio analysis, project management, operations, or related scientific/business discipline.
Understanding of operational strategies for early-stage drug discovery programs’ evolution through the drug development lifecycle.
Demonstrated ability to analyze data, identify trends, and translate findings into actionable recommendations.
Experience measuring and reporting KPIs, with exposure to cycle time, success rate, and portfolio performance metrics preferred.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to create executive-level presentations and slides.
Ability to work effectively across functions and influence stakeholders without direct authority.
Strong organizational skills with the ability to manage multiple priorities and complex initiatives.
Demonstrated ability to resolve complex scientific, technical, analytical, and business issues.
Additional Information
Applicable only to applicants applying to a position in any location with pay disclosure requirements under state or local law:
The compensation range described below is the range of possible base pay compensation that the Company believes in good faith it will pay for this role at the time of this posting based on the job grade for this position. Individual compensation paid within this range will depend on many factors including geographic location, and we may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range. This range may be modified in the future.
We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including paid time off (vacation, holidays, sick), medical/dental/vision insurance and 401(k) to eligible employees.
This job is eligible to participate in our long-term incentive programs.
Note: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, incentive, benefits, or any other form of compensation and benefits that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole and absolute discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole and absolute discretion, consistent with applicable law.
AbbVie is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to operating with integrity, driving innovation, transforming lives and serving our community. Equal Opportunity Employer/Veterans/Disabled.
US & Puerto Rico only - to learn more, visit https://www.abbvie.com/join-us/equal-employment-opportunity-employer.html
US & Puerto Rico applicants seeking a reasonable accommodation, click here to learn more:
https://www.abbvie.com/join-us/reasonable-accommodations.html
Job details
How this role compares
Computed from every other active Drug Discovery & Preclinical Research role in our database, not just this employer's listings.
We currently track 136 comparable Associate Director Drug Discovery & Preclinical Research roles across 28 biopharma companies.
Salary context
42 of 136 peers report a salary range (USD, annualized)
Peers share this role's job function and a matching or adjacent seniority level -- not necessarily the same therapeutic area or country.
Where these roles are based
Top locations among the 136 comparable roles
+ 6 more countries
Seniority mix
136 of 136 peers have a known seniority level
Therapeutic area mix
16 of 136 peers have a known therapeutic area; the rest are genuinely unlabeled, not hidden
Similar opportunities
The closest matches from our peer group, ranked by how similar they are, not how well you'd qualify for them -- treat this as market context, not a guaranteed shortlist; a weak match is labeled as one below.
How we calculate "similar"
No black box, no LLM guesswork: a deterministic score built from four normalized attributes. Here's this role's own peer group at different match levels, so you can see the mechanism, not just the result.
Every comparison starts from the same 100-point budget: 25 for working in the same function, 40 for the same therapeutic area, 20 for the same or adjacent seniority, 15 for the same country. A dimension we can't confirm on both sides contributes nothing, never a guess, never a free pass.
0 points, never a partial guess. A role we know almost nothing about beyond its function bottoms out at 25%; it never inflates to 100% just because there's little to compare against. Seniority uses a defined ladder (Associate → Manager → Associate Director → Senior → Principal → Director → Senior Director → Executive/VP) so "Director" and "Senior Director" count as adjacent, but "Director" and "Executive/VP" do not.