Senior Director – Quality Assurance, Manufacturing
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.
About the Katwijk Site
Eli Lilly is investing €2.6 billion in a new state‑of‑the‑art manufacturing facility in Katwijk, Netherlands. This facility will produce oral medicines for cardiometabolic health, neuroscience, oncology, and immunology, incorporating next‑generation manufacturing technologies including dock‑to‑dock automation, paperless manufacturing, and process analytical technology while achieving carbon neutrality and zero waste to landfills.
Position Overview
The Senior Director – Quality Assurance, Manufacturing is accountable for setting and executing the site Quality Assurance strategy, ensuring sustained cGMP compliance, regulatory readiness, and a strong quality culture across manufacturing operations. This role serves as a senior member of the site leadership team, providing decisive quality leadership, independent oversight, and enterprise‑level influence to protect patient safety and product integrity.
Key Responsibilities
Executive Quality Leadership
Define and own the site Quality Assurance strategy aligned with Lilly Global Quality Standards and business objectives.
Serve as the senior quality authority for manufacturing operations, with final decision‑making accountability on quality matters.
Act as a visible role model for quality culture, integrity, and patient focus across the site.
Governance, Compliance & Regulatory Readiness
Ensure sustained compliance with cGMPs, regulatory requirements, and internal quality systems.
Maintain continuous inspection readiness and act as the primary Quality Assurance representative during regulatory inspections.
Establish and oversee robust governance for deviations, change management, validation, data integrity, and CAPA effectiveness.
Engage constructively with the site Works Council (ondernemingsraad) on quality-related matters affecting working conditions.
Manufacturing & Operational Oversight
Provide strategic quality oversight for manufacturing processes, facilities, utilities, equipment, and computerized systems.
Ensure quality risks are proactively identified, assessed, and mitigated.
Drive integration of quality into operational excellence, digital manufacturing, and continuous improvement initiatives.
Leadership, Talent & Organization Development
Build, lead, and develop a high‑performing Quality Assurance organization with clear accountability and succession planning.
Ensure quality independence while enabling effective cross‑functional collaboration.
Attract, develop, and retain senior quality talent to support long‑term site and enterprise needs.
Strategic Planning & Business Partnership
Serve as a core member of the Site Leadership Team, contributing to site strategy, investment decisions, and long‑term operating model.
Influence enterprise quality strategy through collaboration with global and affiliate stakeholders.
Ensure quality considerations are embedded in capital projects, technology implementation, and site expansion activities.
Environmental Health & Safety
Demonstrate executive accountability for environmental, health, and safety standards within the Quality organization.
Ensure safe, compliant operations and strong EHS performance across manufacturing quality activities.
Qualifications and Requirements
Education
Master's degree or PhD in Pharmacy, Chemistry, Engineering, or a related life sciences discipline preferred; Bachelor's degree minimum.
Experience
Extensive leadership experience within pharmaceutical manufacturing or other highly regulated industries.
Proven senior‑level accountability for Quality Assurance, regulatory compliance, and inspection management.
Experience with EMA, FDA, or other major regulatory inspections (given the new facility context). Familiarity with Dutch regulatory environment and EMA expectations is preferred.
Experience in a greenfield or site start-up environment.
Experience with oral solid dosage and/or Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (API) manufacturing.
Technical & Leadership Expertise
Deep expertise in cGMPs, quality systems, and regulatory expectations.
Strong strategic leadership, decision‑making, and executive communication skills.
Ability to influence at site, regional, and enterprise levels
Fluency in English required; Dutch language proficiency strongly preferred.
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 does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, protected veteran status, disability or any other legally protected status.
Actual compensation will depend on a candidate’s education, experience, skills, and geographic location. The anticipated wage for this position is
€123,750 - €181,500
Full-time equivalent employees may also 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 pension plan; vacation benefits; eligibility for healthcare benefits; flexible benefits (if applicable) 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
How this role compares
Computed from every other active Quality role in our database, not just this employer's listings.
We currently track 61 comparable Senior Director Quality roles across 27 biopharma companies.
Salary context
32 of 61 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 61 comparable roles
+ 10 more countries
Seniority mix
61 of 61 peers have a known seniority level
Therapeutic area mix
0 of 61 peers have a known therapeutic area; the rest are genuinely unlabeled, not hidden
No peers with a known therapeutic area yet.
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.
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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.