Executive Director and Head of Cancer Vaccines

Role Summary

Are you ready to lead the charge in transforming cancer treatment? As the Executive Director and Head of Cancer Vaccines in Early Vaccines and Immune Therapies, you'll spearhead efforts to program the immune system to recognize and eliminate malignant cells. With AstraZeneca's diverse modalities at your disposal, you'll deploy polyclonal immunity against a range of tumor targets. Leading a team of scientists and cross-functional experts, you'll explore strategies to amplify immunity, driving early clearance and long-term durable surveillance. Your role will involve influencing senior stakeholders and managing collaborations to deliver effective solutions. You'll also recruit, develop, and retain a cutting-edge team, fostering a high-performance culture and accelerating decision-making and delivery.

Responsibilities

• Develop a portfolio of cancer vaccine projects
• Develop a strategy to support target discovery and product development, ensuring cross-functional strategic alignment
• Lead the team to deploy immunity to a range of cancers, leveraging diverse platforms
• Oversee the development of a portfolio of cancer vaccines across early discovery and research pipeline
• Establish strategic relationships across the organization and functions
• Oversight and accountability of partnerships with academic or outsourced partners
• Develop internal and external partnerships to explore combinatorial strategies
• Create and foster effective relationships with senior and executive stakeholders in Research, Bioprocess Development, Clinical and Translational Medicine, and Global Project Teams to ensure alignment across functions
• Responsible for ensuring all projects within their area and their teams clearly and objectively communicate results, as well as their associated risks, uncertainties, and limitations
• Define the training standards for junior colleagues in line with best practices and principles

Qualifications

• Required: PhD or equivalent in immunology, oncology, molecular biology, biochemistry or a related discipline with 20+ years industry experience
• Required: Proven experience developing novel immunological approaches to deploy immunity to fight tumors
• Required: Proven experience with immune profiling, tumor modeling, systems biology, and/or immune oncology
• Required: Experience working in a cross-functional team to maximize expertise and accelerate success
• Required: Experience developing and implementing novel methods to support vaccine development
• Required: Experience supporting or leading interdisciplinary vaccine discovery or development programs
• Required: Proven experience leading and managing junior colleagues
• Required: Proven experience developing and controlling budgets
• Required: Excellent written and verbal communication, business analysis, and consultancy skills

• Preferred: PhD or MD degree in immune-oncology
• Preferred: Comfortable working with and leading lab and computational scientists across disciplines
• Preferred: Familiarity with animal tumor models
• Preferred: Proven track record of publishing relevant results and tools in peer-reviewed journals, conferences, and other scientific proceedings
• Preferred: Experience in life sciences and healthcare
• Preferred: Experience in novel methods development and application
• Preferred: Experience in a complex global organization

Skills

• Cross-functional leadership
• Strategic program management
• Communication and consultancy skills
• Team building and stakeholder management

Education

• PhD or equivalent in immunology, oncology, molecular biology, biochemistry or related field
• MD or PhD in immune-oncology (preferred)