Lilly Posted September 5, 2026

Associate Director – Central Automation Engineering

Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, United States of America FULL_TIME
Manufacturing & CMC Associate Director
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Lilly is the source of truth for this posting and owns the application process. We surface normalized context and market comparison you won't find on the original listing.

About this opportunity

At Lilly, the work is demanding because patients are waiting. We unite caring with discovery to help make life better for people around the world, knowing that every decision, every detail, and every day matters. Headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, our over 50,000 employees around the globe take on complex challenges to discover and deliver life-changing medicines, strengthen how health is understood and managed, and support the communities we serve. This is hard, urgent, selfless work, but it’s work worth doing. If you’re driven by purpose and ready to bring your best to work that truly matters for patients, we invite you to join us.

Position:

The Associate Director – Central Automation Engineering is responsible for the leadership of the Central Automation team supporting daily manufacturing operations at LKC (Lilly Kenosha County), spanning process automation systems, data historians, building management systems, and site infrastructure supporting parenteral filling and packaging lines. The Associate Director is responsible for the productivity and development of employees with the purpose of ensuring that reliable and compliant control applications and systems are used in the manufacturing of drug products at LKC. Additionally, the Associate Director partners to influence and implement within the process control organization and across functional disciplines to support the automation technical agenda, business plan priorities, and compliance objectives, while collaborating closely with Lilly's global automation and IT organizations.

Responsibilities:

Administrative Leadership

Supervise and lead the Central Automation team, including completing performance reviews and development plans

Staffing, including recruiting, resource planning, and succession planning

Manage the automation portfolio to deliver team milestones, projects, and lifecycle management commitments

Review and monitor financial performance; commit to meeting targets

Manage compliance for infrastructure supporting site automation needs, including data historians, PLCs, HMIs, DCS, and building management systems

Operational Excellence

Demonstrate a commitment to environmental, health, and safety

Identify, track, and report key indicators of functional performance

Ensure team is operating in a state of compliance

Collaborate with global automation teams and the parenteral network to ensure filling and packaging lines comply with the latest supported software from a cybersecurity and data integrity perspective

Own and ensure compliance for LKC automation cybersecurity and data integrity

Organizational Capability

In coordination with automation and compliance consultants, set and reinforce standards for appropriate rigor in automation work products

Assure focus by engineers and completion of critical assignments with appropriate monitoring and reporting

Influence the automation functional strategy across the LKC site

Support day-to-day engineering activities and plan for the 3–6 month horizon

Be a fully active member of site flow leadership, including participation on management sub-teams

Interact with regulatory agencies during site inspections as needed

Basic Requirements:

Minimum B.S. in Engineering or related technical field

Minimum 5 years of experience in automation/process control engineering, preferably in pharmaceutical or parenteral manufacturing

Previous supervisory experience or demonstrated technical leadership

Additional Preferences:

Experience with highly automated parenteral filling and packaging equipment (e.g., PFS platforms, vial/syringe/cartridge filling lines, device assembly and packaging lines)

Technical expertise in one or more automation platforms (e.g., Rockwell Automation, Emerson DeltaV, data historians)

Experience managing relationships with key vendors

CGMP regulatory knowledge in process or automation engineering

Established network across Lilly's global automation community

Strong problem-solving, analytical, and communication skills

Strong coaching and people development skills

Other Information:

Location: Lilly Kenosha County (LKC), Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin

Standard business hours (days, M-F) with after-hour and shutdown support as needed

Minimal travel required

Tasks require entering manufacturing areas which require wearing appropriate PPE

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 is proud to be an EEO Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, religion, gender identity, sex, gender expression, sexual orientation, genetic information, ancestry, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, or any other legally protected status.

Our employee resource groups (ERGs) offer strong support networks for their members and are open to all employees. Our current groups include: Africa, Middle East, Central Asia (AMECA), Black Employees at Lilly (BE@Lilly), Chinese Culture Network (CCN), EnAble, Evolve, Lilly Indian Network (LIN), Organization of Latinx at Lilly (OLA), Pride (LGBTQ+ Allies), Veterans Leadership Network (VLN) and Women’s Initiative for Leading at Lilly (WILL).

Actual compensation will depend on a candidate’s education, experience, skills, and geographic location.  The anticipated wage for this position is

$123,000 - $180,400

Full-time equivalent employees also will be eligible for a company bonus (depending, in part, on company and individual performance). In addition, Lilly offers a comprehensive benefit program to eligible employees, including eligibility to participate in a company-sponsored 401(k); pension; vacation benefits; eligibility for medical, dental, vision and prescription drug benefits; flexible benefits (e.g., healthcare and/or dependent day care flexible spending accounts); life insurance and death benefits; certain time off and leave of absence benefits; and well-being benefits (e.g., employee assistance program, fitness benefits, and employee clubs and activities).Lilly reserves the right to amend, modify, or terminate its compensation and benefit programs in its sole discretion and Lilly’s compensation practices and guidelines will apply regarding the details of any promotion or transfer of Lilly employees.

#WeAreLilly

Job details

Seniority
Associate Director
Function
Manufacturing & CMC
Therapeutic area
Not listed
Location
Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, United States of America
Employment type
FULL_TIME

How this role compares

Computed from every other active Manufacturing & CMC role in our database, not just this employer's listings.

We currently track 662 comparable Associate Director Manufacturing & CMC roles across 96 biopharma companies.

662Comparable roles tracked
612Currently active
96Companies hiring similar roles
36Countries represented

Salary context

189 of 662 peers report a salary range (USD, annualized)

Peers share this role's job function and a matching or adjacent seniority level -- not necessarily the same therapeutic area or country.

This roleSubject $123,000/yr – $180,400/yr
Lowest disclosed · Associate Director, Digital Scientific Workflows · Merck $0/hr – $0/hr (≈ $0–$0/yr)
Highest disclosed · Regional Manager - Megasys · Merck KGaA $220,000/yr – $250,000/yr
Peer group range $0 – $235,000 (median $151,700)

Where these roles are based

Top locations among the 662 comparable roles

United States354
India92
Ireland24
Netherlands24
United Kingdom21
Canada13

+ 30 more countries

Seniority mix

662 of 662 peers have a known seniority level

Senior323
Manager265
Associate Director74

Therapeutic area mix

5 of 662 peers have a known therapeutic area; the rest are genuinely unlabeled, not hidden

Rare Disease2
Dermatology & Aesthetics1
Vaccines & Infectious Disease1
Oncology1

Similar opportunities

The closest matches from our peer group, ranked by how similar they are, not how well you'd qualify for them -- treat this as market context, not a guaranteed shortlist; a weak match is labeled as one below.

60%similar
AbbVie North Chicago, IL Associate Director
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Gilead Sciences, Inc. Foster City, United States Associate Director
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Gilead Sciences, Inc. Foster City, United States Associate Director
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60%similar
Gilead Sciences, Inc. Foster City, United States Associate Director
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60%similar
Amgen Inc. Remote, United States Associate Director
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60%similar
Biogen Cambridge, United States Associate Director
Same function Same seniority Same country

Notify me about similar jobs

Get an email when we spot other openings like this one – same job function, comparable seniority, roles you'd actually want to see.

How we calculate "similar"

No black box, no LLM guesswork: a deterministic score built from four normalized attributes. Here's this role's own peer group at different match levels, so you can see the mechanism, not just the result.

Every comparison starts from the same 100-point budget: 25 for working in the same function, 40 for the same therapeutic area, 20 for the same or adjacent seniority, 15 for the same country. A dimension we can't confirm on both sides contributes nothing, never a guess, never a free pass.

60%
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AbbVie · North Chicago, IL · Associate Director
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Associate Director, Supply Chain
Gilead Sciences, Inc. · Foster City, United States · Associate Director
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Engineering Associate Director (AD) - Device Assembly
Lilly · Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, United States of America · Associate Director
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Associate Director – Biologics Process Engineering, Lilly Medicine Foundry
Lilly · Lebanon, Indiana, United States of America · Associate Director
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
Unmatched or unknown dimensions score exactly the same: 0 points, never a partial guess. A role we know almost nothing about beyond its function bottoms out at 25%; it never inflates to 100% just because there's little to compare against. Seniority uses a defined ladder (Associate → Manager → Associate Director → Senior → Principal → Director → Senior Director → Executive/VP) so "Director" and "Senior Director" count as adjacent, but "Director" and "Executive/VP" do not.