Associate Director, Manufacturing Systems...

We're seeking an experienced technical leader to join our team in an Associate Director level role, responsible for building, configuring, and ongoing sustainment of system integrations between downstream capabilities and shop floor manufacturing systems, including MES, OT data historians (e.g., AVEVA PI), and process control systems (e.g., DeltaV).

Reporting to the Operations Orchestration Product Manager, this role also serves as the technical authority for integration delivery and operations, ensuring reliable performance of integrations and supporting infrastructure across global sites.

In this role, you will operate at the intersection of manufacturing operations, automation, and product engineering, partnering closely with site teams, IT and OT RunOps, data engineering, product vendors, and product management to ensure our platforms are powered by accurate, timely, and well contextualized data.

Why This Role Matters

Manufacturing downstream capabilities, including scheduling, productivity, and operational reporting, are only as effective as the data that supports them. Your leadership will ensure that critical production data is consistently and reliably connected to these platforms, enabling trusted insights that improve throughput, quality, visibility, and decision making across our global manufacturing network, ultimately supporting the delivery of life changing therapies to patients.

Key Responsibilities

• Build, configure, and sustain system integrations connecting operational systems to digital shopfloor systems and downstream operational capabilities.

• Partner with site operations and process engineers to define and execute detailed data mapping, translating shop floor data into parameters required for scheduling, productivity, and operational reporting use cases such as activity timing, equipment status, and production events.

• Establish and maintain integration standards, templates, and reusable patterns to enable consistent onboarding of new sites, lines, and capabilities.

• Oversee execution and scale up of integration solutions across global sites, ensuring alignment with site readiness, minimal disruption to operations, and consistent configurations.

• Provide senior level troubleshooting and incident leadership for integration related issues, working across manufacturing, automation, IT, and vendor teams to diagnose root causes, restore data flows, and prevent recurrence.

• Drive data quality and validation practices to ensure accuracy, completeness, and consistency of data supporting scheduling, productivity, and reporting capabilities.

• Maintain strong working familiarity with manufacturing data ecosystems , including MES, data historians, and process control environments, to understand how data is generated and structured at the source.

• Stay current with evolving technologies such as Ignition, OPC UA, edge platforms, and broader Industry 4.0 solutions, incorporating relevant advancements into integration approaches.

• Manage vendor and integrator relationships related to integration delivery, ensuring clear expectations, technical quality, and alignment to standards.

• Coordinate execution across a distributed global team model , ensuring alignment, timely decision making, and effective escalation management.

• Partner closely with the Operations Orchestration Product Manager to inform roadmap priorities based on integration complexity, site readiness, and technical insights.

• Mentor engineers and site teams on integration best practices, troubleshooting approaches, and data interpretation.

• Support governance and change control processes for integration configurations, ensuring traceability, compliance, and proper lifecycle management.

• 12+ years of experience in manufacturing technology or industrial systems environments; pharmaceutical manufacturing experience strongly preferred.

• A minimum of 5 years in system integration, automation, or manufacturing IT/OT roles.

• Strong experience integrating upstream systems such as MES, PI, and DeltaV with downstream platforms including scheduling, productivity, analytics, and reporting.

• Solid understanding of manufacturing execution processes and shop floor data generation.

• Demonstrated experience in data mapping and contextualization across manufacturing systems.

• Proficiency in SQL and relational database concepts, with experience querying and transforming manufacturing and operational data for downstream applications.

• Working familiarity with manufacturing data ecosystems including MES, data historians, and process control environments.

• Familiarity with modern integration technologies including APIs, OPC UA, streaming, and edge to cloud data flows.

• Awareness of emerging manufacturing technologies including Ignition and Industry 4.0 approaches.

• Understanding of IT infrastructure considerations affecting industrial data systems.

• Experience with SDLC practices and computer system validation concepts.

• Strong leadership, communication, and stakeholder management capabilities across global teams.

• Bachelor's degree in engineering, Computer Science, or a related field preferred.

Required Skills

• Manufacturing System Integration, MES, Data Historians, Data Mapping and Contextualization, Integration Strategy and Execution, Integration Troubleshooting, Manufacturing Data Flows, SQL, Incident Management, Change Controls, SDLC, Technical Leadership

Preferred Skills

• Global manufacturing environments, pharmaceutical operations, distributed delivery models, modern integration protocols, Ignition platform familiarity, OPC UA, edge computing concepts, OEE and productivity systems, real time scheduling systems, Automation, Business Process Improvements, Change Controls, Data Management, Edge Computing, Escalation Management, Incident Management, Information Technology (IT) Infrastructure, Manufacturing Engineering, Manufacturing Environments, Operations Management, Pharmaceutical Manufacturing, Problem Management, Product Management, Real-Time Programming, Relational Database, Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC), Stakeholder Management

We are proud to be a company that embraces the value of bringing together, talented, and committed people with diverse experiences, perspectives, skills and backgrounds. The fastest way to breakthrough innovation is when people with diverse ideas, broad experiences, backgrounds, and skills come together in an inclusive environment. We encourage our colleagues to respectfully challenge one another's thinking and approach problems collectively.

Learn more about your rights, including under California, Colorado and other US State Acts (https://www.msdprivacy.com/us/en/CCPA-notice/)

The salary range for this role is

$142,400.00 - $224,100.00

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.