Associate Director, Facility Operations
Category: Business Support & Administration
Location: Oxford, South East, GB
Research & Development
Oxford, United Kingdom
Are you an experienced operations leader who can bring structure, governance and strong stakeholder partnering to a fast-moving R&D environment—without slowing the science down? We are looking for an Associate Director to help strengthen UK R&D site operations across our UK sites based out Oxford, strengthening compliance, service delivery and supplier models while acting as a trusted partner to site leadership.
Your new role
As Associate Director, you will drive the next wave of operational professionalisation across our UK sites. You will help build robust governance, scalable support models and compliance-minded operations, while providing strong on-site leadership in a complex, evolving R&D environment.
Key responsibilities include:
* Leadership of a small team of highly skilled professionals and outsourced services, providing coherence, direction and support on day-to-day operations as well as strategic initiatives.
* Senior stakeholder partnering: Act as a trusted sparring partner to site leadership, navigating complexity and pushback with integrity, clarity and executive presence.
* Operational governance and professionalisation: Establish and strengthen structures, processes and governance so the UK organisation operates in a compliant, efficient and science-enabling way.
* Outsourcing and supplier management: Lead strategic supplier partnerships, to ensure resilient and integrated outcome-based delivery of comprehensive site operation.
* Cross-site operational accountability: Ensure consistent, high-quality operational support across sites in Oxford and London.
This role is Oxford-based and requires highly visible presence with regular on-site leadership.
Your new department
You will join UK R&D Operations, supporting a multi-site organisation across two sites in Oxford and one in London. The function brings together Health & Safety, site coordination, facility management activities and lab services, working closely with colleagues in the US and Denmark to ensure UK sites maintain operational readiness and compliance posture; governance, audit prep., corrective and preventative actions, and risk management (e.g. LTO: License to Operate). Moreover, the function leads operational change initiatives while maintaining business continuity and protecting R&D productivity. Accountable for Operations performance, responsible for influencing cross-functional outcomes.
Your skills and qualifications
We are looking for a mature, resilient operations leader who thrives in ambiguity and can create structure, trust and momentum in a fast-growing R&D environment.
To succeed, you will likely bring:
* A Bachelor’s degree in Facility Management, Engineering, Business Administration or a related field.
* Significant experience in site operations, facility or lab operations–adjacent roles within a professional industry setting, ideally pharma or life sciences.
* Proven leadership experience managing employees in complex, change-driven environments.
* Strong experience with outsourcing, vendor and contract management, including data-driven decision-making and KPI follow-up.
* Executive-level stakeholder management skills, with the ability to build trust and build "one team" collaboration.
* Comfortable operating within ambiguity, prioritising under pressure and driving progress despite organisational and capability constraints.
Benefits
As part of a global healthcare company, employees enjoy opportunities for learning and development, and benefits designed with career and life stage in mind.
Equal Opportunity & Accessibility
We are an equal opportunities employer, and we commit to an inclusive recruitment process and equality of opportunity for all our job applicants. If you are a person with a disability, if you are neurodivergent, and need any adjustments to be made during the application and selection process, please send an email to ebhn@novonordisk.com. Please include your name, the role you are interested in and the type of adjustment your need.
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