Associate Director - SPE

At Lilly, we unite caring with discovery to make life better for people around the world. We are a global healthcare leader headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. Our employees around the world work to discover and bring life-changing medicines to those who need them, improve the understanding and management of disease, and give back to our communities through philanthropy and volunteerism. We give our best effort to our work, and we put people first. We’re looking for people who are determined to make life better for people around the world.

About The Technology Organisation

Technology at Lilly builds and maintains capabilities using cutting-edge technologies like most prominent tech companies. What differentiates Technology at Lilly is that we create new possibilities through tech to advance our purpose – creating medicines that make life better for people around the world, such as data-driven drug discovery and connected clinical trials. We hire the best technology professionals from a variety of backgrounds, so they can bring an assortment of knowledge, skills, and diverse thinking to deliver innovative solutions in every area of the enterprise.

About The Business Function

The Software Product Engineering (SPE) team is a specialised engineering group that delivers strategic solutions and differentiated capabilities. We take a forward-thinking approach, focusing on an enterprise platform and product mindset, ensuring that the solutions we build can be leveraged across Technology teams for broader impact and efficiency.

Role Summary

As an Associate Director in SPE, you will lead a high-performing engineering team to design, build, and optimise enterprise-grade platforms and applications that power Lilly’s mission-critical operations across Commercial, R&D, Clinical Trials, and Manufacturing. This role is pivotal in shaping technology strategy, driving innovation, and ensuring scalability and security of solutions.

What You’ll Be Doing

You will provide strategic leadership and technical direction to engineering teams, ensuring delivery of high-quality, scalable, and secure software solutions. You will champion best practices, foster innovation, and enable collaboration across teams to deliver impactful technology capabilities.

How You Will Succeed

• Provide deep leadership and coaching throughout the project delivery lifecycle, focusing on shared learning and continuous improvement.
• Drive adoption of best practices and modern engineering principles across teams.
• Mentor and develop team members through performance management, career planning, and talent discussions.
• Lead resourcing efforts, including recruitment and selection of top engineering talent.
• Organise work within Agile frameworks; ensure effective sprint planning, estimation, execution, and risk management.
• Identify synergies and reuse opportunities to improve efficiency and reduce duplication.
• Drive proof-of-concepts for emerging technologies and prepare teams for adoption.
• Represent SPE in cross-functional forums and influence technology strategy at an enterprise level.
  
  
  

What You Should Bring

• Technical proficiency in modern web development frameworks and languages (JavaScript, React, Node.js, Python).
• Hands-on experience with containerisation and orchestration technologies such as Docker, Kubernetes (K8s), and deployment automation tools like ArgoCD.
• Experience with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure) and DevOps practices (GitHub Actions, CI/CD).
• Excellent communication, leadership, and decision-making skills.
• Product mindset with a focus on scalability and user experience.
• Experience leading diverse engineering teams with specialised skills.
• Strong self-management and ability to thrive in ambiguity.
• Knowledge of ITSM and ITIL frameworks.
• Familiarity with Agile methodologies (Scrum, SAFe) and tools like Jira.
  
  
  

Basic Qualifications And Experience Requirement

• Bachelors degree in computer science or related field.
• 10–14 years of total IT experience, including at least 5 years in a management role leading teams of 12+ engineers.
• Proven track record in capacity planning, project estimation, and delivery in regulated industries.
• Strong background in software architecture and design principles.
• Experience with Microservices and Service-Oriented Architecture frameworks.
  
  
  

Additional Skills/Preferences

• Certifications such as PMP, PMI, PRINCE II, SAFe, CSM, or SEI.
• Experience in Pharma or Life Sciences domain is a plus.
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Familiarity with Terraform, Ansible, and Git for infrastructure automation.
  
  
  

Lilly is dedicated to helping individuals with disabilities to actively engage in the workforce, ensuring equal opportunities when vying for positions. If you require accommodation to submit a resume for a position at Lilly, please complete the accommodation request form (https://careers.lilly.com/us/en/workplace-accommodation) for further assistance. Please note this is for individuals to request an accommodation as part of the application process and any other correspondence will not receive a response.

Lilly does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, protected veteran status, disability or any other legally protected status.

#WeAreLilly

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