Associate Director, Sales Planning & Incentive Compensation

Role Summary

The Associate Director, Strategic Sales Planning & Incentive Compensation supports the US Specialty group by overseeing Field Planning and Incentives. The position allows for creativity and the opportunity to make a significant impact.

Responsibilities

• The primary objective of the Incentive Compensation team is to support Sales and Marketing in the design and ongoing implementation of sales incentive compensation (IC) programs.
• Applying operational, analytic, and communication skills to manage, harmonize, and optimize the sales crediting phase of IC calculations – i.e. the processes involved in aggregating raw customer-level sales data and applying AbbVie alignment and business rules to derive sales information at the territory level.
• The position reports into the Director, Field Planning & Analytics for US Specialty and will lead a team IC Managers to support the USS commercial sales teams in design, management and implementation incentive plans consistent with AbbVie philosophy and processes.
• Sales Operations Data Management: SME on system functionality, required inputs, and potential downstream impacts to consumers of the managed data. Leads a team tasked with ensuring the quality of inputs entered into the primary system used for sales force structure builds, personnel assignments, and franchise business rules. The candidate should have deep understanding of applications needed to implement the methodologies (e.g., Excel, SQL, IBM SPSS, VBA, SAS, Sprint, TAP).
• Call Planning Operations: Develops best practices for call plan design, modification, and maintenance across the enterprise. Ensures call plans designed by FPAT partners are handled correctly so targets are available to the field accurately and on time. Coordinates with internal and external partners and leads the field feedback process and central hub for US Specialty brands, including owning and enhancing the field feedback tool itself.
• Quality Control: Leads processes with Compliance, OEC, Human Resources, BTS and Franchise teams to onboard and review new products, indications, and details, driving what the salesforce can detail and to whom. Maintains data accuracy and integrity on a weekly/annual/as-needed basis and continually assesses SOPs to improve efficiency.
• Process Documentation & Continuous Improvement: Creates and maintains robust documentation for self-serve processes and facilitates process enhancements.
• Sales Crediting Operations – Execution, Optimization, Innovation: Be the subject matter expert on the sales crediting process and business rules across franchises; oversee Incentive Data Audit processes; design and implement optimization/innovation projects around audits and the Business Rules Repository; serve as the primary IC contact for the broader commercial organization; drive standardization across therapeutic areas; drive central operations and incentives; design and conduct analytics to guide decisions on high-level sales credit philosophies; lead strategic projects to harmonize sales crediting philosophy and processes across entities; lead complex multi-department projects (IC Team, Field Force Effectiveness, BTS, Commercial Data Operations, MABI, etc.).

Qualifications

• Required: BA/BS degree
• Preferred: Master’s degree in Business, Science, or Engineering
• Required: 8+ years analytical and/or commercial operations experience, preferably in the Pharma industry
• Required: Strong analytical skills and understanding of building systems/processes, with a proven track record of transforming data into actionable information for commercial analytics
• Required: Problem-solving orientation with the ability to solve problems across multiple departments and lead a team in formulating solutions and innovations
• Required: Experience working directly with pharmaceutical sales data sources including field reporting platforms/systems, especially for Incentive Compensation
• Required: Extensive understanding of pharmaceutical field sales activities, roles and behaviors
• Required: Experience developing and managing IT systems, quality control procedures, and comfort in directing low-level analytics

Skills

• Analytical thinking and data-driven decision making
• Process design and continuous improvement
• Project management and cross-functional collaboration
• Data systems familiarity (e.g., Excel, SQL, IBM SPSS, VBA, SAS) and ability to work with data sources used for incentive compensation
• Communication and documentation

Education

• BA/BS degree required; Master’s degree preferred.