Associate Director, Country Medical Lead
About this opportunity
At Bristol Myers Squibb, our employees often ask, “Who are you working for?”, a question that fuels collaboration, accountability, and urgency in our work. Our purpose-driven culture inspires us to discover, develop, and deliver innovative medicines to prevail over serious diseases. We offer uniquely interesting and meaningful work, opportunities for growth, and a supportive environment that values inclusion, wellbeing, flexibility, and comprehensive benefits. This is work that transforms the lives of patients, and the careers of those who do it.
Position Summary
The Country Medical Lead (Associate Director) for Ireland is an instrumental leadership role within the Cardiovascular, Immunology, Haematology and Oncology franchise, responsible for leading the Medical Affairs team and all Medical Affairs activities in Ireland. Reporting into the Medical Director, UK and Ireland, the role also sits on the UK/IE Medical Leadership Team (MLT).
This role ensures that Irish medical strategy is developed and delivered to the highest scientific and compliance standards, while maintaining strong connectivity and alignment with UK/IE brand teams, European and Global colleagues. The successful candidate will build and lead a high-performing team of Scientific Advisors, act as a trusted scientific partner to healthcare professionals and key stakeholders, and represent the Republic of Ireland within cross-functional and international decision-making forums.
It is a high-impact leadership role with genuine influence over Irish medical strategy and resourcing, supported by the visibility of a broader UK/IE, European and Global network, and the opportunity to shape medical strategy at a critical time for the Cardiovascular, Immunology, Haematology and Oncology portfolio.
Key Responsibilities
Lead, coach and develop the Irish Medical Affairs team (Scientific Advisors), building strong Medical Affairs skills and behaviours across the group.
Own the development, execution and delivery of Irish medical strategies and non-promotional activities, coordinated through head office and the field medical team, with full budget and headcount accountability.
Partner with Commercial and Market Access (PAGA, Regulatory) to deliver on the strategy for Ireland including HTA submission, development of promotional materials and activities, and co-lead the local cross-functional team to ensure Ireland is well represented in company strategy.
Partner with the Clinical Operations team to secure the right clinical trials for Ireland, ensuring delivery against agreed expectations and timelines.
Build and maintain strong scientific relationships with healthcare professionals, key thought leaders and external stakeholders, delivering medically led activities such as ISRs and Medical Education programmes.
Maintain close connectivity with UK/IE brand, leadership, European and Global teams, sharing insights and best practice across the organisation.
Champion full compliance with the Irish Code of Practice and company policy, including medical signatory responsibilities, and drive continuous improvement initiatives across the Medical Affairs function.
Qualifications & Experience
Required qualifications:
An advanced scientific or clinical degree.
Demonstrated experience in a Medical Affairs, clinical or scientific leadership capacity within the pharmaceutical or healthcare industry.
Working knowledge of the Irish Code of Practice and relevant compliance frameworks, or the demonstrated ability to acquire this quickly.
Proven people leadership experience, with the ability to coach, develop and motivate a team.
Strong cross-functional collaboration skills, with experience partnering across Commercial, Market Access, Regulatory and other functions.
Preferred qualifications:
Registration as a physician, or as a pharmacist in Ireland.
Prior experience as a Medical Signatory, or readiness to take on signatory responsibilities.
Experience working across Cardiovascular, Immunology, Haematology or Oncology therapy areas.
Experience operating within a matrixed, multi-country organisation, with exposure to UK, European or Global Medical Affairs teams.
For exceptional candidates without a clinical or physician background: a strong scientific background, relevant industry experience and Code knowledge are welcomed.
Why you should apply
You will help patients in their fight against serious diseases
You will be part of a company that encourages excellence and innovation, respects diversity, develops leaders and values its employees.
You’ll get a competitive salary and a great benefits package including, but not only, an annual bonus, pension contribution, family health insurance, 27 days of annual leave , access to BMS Cruiserath on-site gym and life assurance
#LI-Hybrid
We hire for skills and capabilities, not just credentials – if this role excites you, but doesn’t perfectly match your resume, we encourage you to apply anyway.
How We Work
Where you work matters – because collaboration, innovation and patient impact happen in many settings. Our roles are structured across four work models: site-essential, site-by-design, field-based and remote-by-design. The model assigned to this role is based on its core responsibilities. Learn more at https://careers.bms.com/ways-of-working.
Supporting People with Disabilities
BMS is dedicated to ensuring that people with disabilities can excel through a transparent recruitment process, reasonable workplace accommodations/adjustments and ongoing support in their roles. Applicants can request a reasonable workplace accommodation/adjustment prior to accepting a job offer. If you require reasonable accommodations/adjustments in completing this application, or in any part of the recruitment process, direct your inquiries to adastaffingsupport@bms.com . Visit careers.bms.com/eeo-accessibility to access our complete Equal Employment Opportunity statement.
Candidate Rights
BMS will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records, pursuant to applicable laws in your area.
For roles based in Los Angeles County only: If you live in or expect to work from Los Angeles County if hired for this position, please visit this page for important additional information: https://careers.bms.com/california-residents/
Data Protection
We will never request payments, financial information, or social security numbers during our application or recruitment process. Learn more about protecting yourself at https://careers.bms.com/fraud-protection .
Any data processed in connection with role applications will be treated in accordance with applicable data privacy policies and regulations.
If this posting is missing required information required by local law or incorrect, contact BMS at TAEnablement@bms.com with the Job Title and Requisition number. Do not send application-related inquiries to this email. To check your application status, please login to your Candidate Home Account.
R1606361 : Associate Director, Country Medical Lead
Job details
How this role compares
Computed from every other active Medical Affairs role in our database, not just this employer's listings.
We currently track 343 comparable Associate Director Medical Affairs roles across 89 biopharma companies.
Salary context
105 of 343 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.
Where these roles are based
Top locations among the 343 comparable roles
+ 30 more countries
Seniority mix
343 of 343 peers have a known seniority level
Therapeutic area mix
113 of 343 peers have a known therapeutic area; the rest are genuinely unlabeled, not hidden
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.
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.
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.