Associate Director - Digital Transformation & Business Excellence

About the role

Novartis is looking for an Associate Director to lead strategic business initiatives for the Novartis Group and the Executive Committee, maximizing business value and long-term competitive advantage. The role covers planning and delivering high-impact projects around key products in major markets, building organization-wide leadership capabilities, and managing external consultants for capability development programs.

Key responsibilities

• Lead AI-enabled and process improvement initiatives, ensuring delivery, governance, risk management and value realization
• Lead process mining and intelligence engagements using Celonis to identify opportunities and generate insights
• Promote AI, GenAI and Agentic AI opportunities across the process excellence lifecycle
• Partner with Global Process Owners and business leaders to build transformation roadmaps aligned to performance objectives
• Define problem statements, value hypotheses, success measures and adoption considerations for AI-enabled initiatives
• Act as the bridge between process teams and DDIT/technology partners on scope, governance and outcomes
• Strengthen the BPE AI Community of Practice through knowledge sharing, workshops and reusable guidance materials
• Incorporate external best practices and contribute to enterprise governance and standards

Required profile

• Proven experience driving end-to-end process improvement and business transformation in complex, global organizations
• Bachelor's degree in a relevant discipline; Lean Six Sigma certification preferred
• Exposure to AI-related initiatives or change enablement

Required skills

• Strong project leadership, stakeholder management and influencing skills
• Process intelligence expertise, preferably Celonis, able to turn insights into business actions
• Solid understanding of AI, Generative AI and Agentic AI from a business process perspective
• Knowledge of Process Excellence, Continuous Improvement, Lean and Six Sigma
• Design thinking and workshop facilitation experience