Job Description
About the Role
We are looking for an Delivery Lead to own end-to-end delivery for a portfolio of products within Digital Human Health. This is a senior people manager role, responsible for building and running a high-performing, largely outsourced delivery organization that partners closely with Product Management to turn roadmaps into shipped, working software — on time and on budget.
The specific platform scope for this role may shift based on business priorities, and could include areas such as identity management or digital content platforms (content creation, supply chain, and medical-legal review workflows).
Key Responsibilities
Delivery Leadership
- Own end-to-end delivery accountability for the assigned platform(s) — planning, execution, and risk management — with on-time and on-budget outcomes as the primary measure of success.
- Establish and maintain delivery governance, including roadmaps, release calendars, dependency mapping, and escalation paths, ensuring strong release planning and delivery predictability.
- Monitor and report delivery health (velocity, burn-down, budget vs. actuals, and milestone status) to senior leadership.
Stakeholder & Partner Management
- Serve as the primary delivery partner to Product Managers, translating product roadmaps into resourced, sequenced delivery plans — a core, high-visibility dimension of the role.
- Build strong working relationships with Security, Enterprise/Solution Architecture, and peer Delivery Leads to ensure delivery is aligned, de-risked, and consistent across the broader platform landscape.
- Communicate delivery status, risks, and trade-offs clearly to both technical and non-technical stakeholders, including senior leadership.
Vendor & Outsourced Delivery Management
- Build and scale the delivery organization over time, progressively improving the ratio of employees to contractors as the team matures.
- Own the relationship and performance management of external delivery partners/SIs, including SOW scoping, resource ramp-up/down, capacity planning, and quality of delivered work.
- Hold vendor teams accountable to delivery commitments, cost targets, and quality standards, managing escalations and remediation plans when performance slips.
- Partner with procurement/vendor management functions on contracts, renewals, and commercial terms as needed.
Budget Management
- Own the platform budget across licences, operations, and delivery teams.
- Continuously track spend across licences, run/operational costs, and both FTE and vendor delivery.
- Forecast burn and future needs, flagging variances early.
- Stay on budget, managing trade-offs to hit financial targets.
- Report budget vs. actuals to senior leadership.
Engineering & Technical Oversight
- Bring credible, hands-on-informed engineering leadership to guide technical decision-making and hold delivery teams (internal and vendor) to strong engineering standards.
- Partner with architecture on solution direction relevant to the platform in scope (e.g., identity management or digital content/DAM/MLR workflows).
Required Experience & Qualifications
- Significant experience leading software engineering and delivery teams at scale, including managing through line managers/leads (not just individual contributors).
- Proven experience managing outsourced/vendor delivery models — SOWs, offshore/blended teams, and vendor performance management.
- Hands-on or leadership-level experience with Adobe platforms (e.g., Adobe Experience Manager/Adobe Experience Cloud) and/or identity management platforms (e.g., Okta, SailPoint, ForgeRock, Ping) — candidates with strength in one and willingness to flex into the other are encouraged to apply.
- Strong track record of Agile/Scrum delivery in a complex, matrixed enterprise environment.
- Demonstrated ability to manage delivery against budget and schedule commitments, with clear ownership of outcomes.
- Excellent stakeholder management skills, particularly partnering with Product Management.
Preferred Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field, or equivalent practical experience.
- Experience in the pharmaceutical, life sciences, or other regulated commercial environment.
- Familiarity with digital content supply chain and medical-legal review (MLR) processes.
- Experience managing globally distributed teams across time zones.
What Success Looks Like
- Product Managers experience the role as a trusted, responsive delivery partner.
- Delivery consistently lands on time and on budget across the assigned platform portfolio, with issues surfaced and resolved proactively.
What we offer
- Exciting work in a great team, global projects, international environment
- Opportunity to learn and grow professionally within the company globally
- Hybrid working model, flexible role pattern
- Competitive salary & incentive pay
- Pension and health insurance contributions
- Internal reward system and referral scheme
- 5 weeks annual leave, 5 sick days, 15 days of certified sick leave paid above statutory requirements annually, 40 paid hours annually for volunteering activities, 12 weeks of parental contribution
- Cafeteria for tax free benefits according to your choice (meal vouchers, sport, culture, health, travel, etc.), Multisport Card
- Vodafone, Raiffeisen Bank, Foodora, and discount programmes
- Up-to-date laptop and iPhone
- Parking in the garage, showers, refreshments, massage chairs, library, music corner
Ready to take up the challenge? Apply now!
Know anybody who might be interested? Refer this job!
Required Skills:
Leadership, Planning, Product Management, Testing, Vendor Communications, Vendor Management
Preferred Skills:
Current Employees apply HERE
Current Contingent Workers apply HERE
Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully
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:
No relocation
VISA Sponsorship:
No
Travel Requirements:
10%
Flexible Work Arrangements:
Hybrid
Shift:
1st - Day
Valid Driving License:
No
Hazardous Material(s):
n/a
Job Posting End Date:
09/1/2026
*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.
