Job Description
About the Role
Our US Immunology team is committed to transforming the lives of patients living with Inflammatory Bowl Disease (IBD). We aspire to achieve this through relentless commitment to patients, innovation, ensuring access to life-changing therapies, and collaborating with healthcare systems, governments, and payers to make treatments available to those who need them most. Our focus is on the patients, scientific rigor and flawless execution—bringing breakthrough therapies to patients who need them.
Thought Leader Liaison Team Leader (TLMD) (Director) is a key member of the Immunology brand marketing organization reporting directly to the Associate Vice President of Marketing. This position is critical to ensuring advocacy development for our platform and product positioning, speaker program preparation and management, and congress engagement are seamlessly aligned with brand objectives and executed compliantly. This will help create a strong and sustained our company's presence across local, regional, and national IBD communities. Additionally, this role is critical to ensure that key scientific leader insights directly inform brand and go-to-market strategies.
Primary Responsibilities
- Advocacy Development:
- Lead identification and mapping of national and regional scientific leaders (SLs), clinical leaders, and emerging experts in across the US IBD landscape.
- Develop and assess advocacy of key opinion leaders around the scientific messages, product positioning, and medical education content.
- Engagement Planning & Execution:
- Structure and implement engagement plans for SLs, including congress participation, site visits, and HQ-approved activities (e.g., advisory boards, customer strategy sessions).
- Gather actionable insights from SLs to inform marketing strategies and brand planning.
- Provide real time insights from KOL on approved key business questions / topics.
- Congress Participation and Engagement:
- Collaborate with marketing team to determine participation and level of support in key IBD conferences.
- Ensure key engagement meetings and congress execution between HQ employees and KOLs
- Speaker Bureau Development & Readiness:
- Help identify and manage a US IBD Speaker Bureau, including faculty identification, onboarding, and training as appropriate to approved content.
- Ensure speaker advocacy to our scientific platform key messages and support speaker readiness for educational speaker engagements including congress product theatres.
- Team leaderships:
- Design and build out the regional TLML marketing team to prepare for launch
- Lead the team to execute engagement plans with key thought leaders throughout the US and support development of approved educational content based on KOL and faculty input.
- Cross-Functional Collaboration:
- Partner with field Sales, Marketing, Market Access, and Global Medical Affairs to ensure alignment on SL needs and account dynamics.
- Compliance & Governance:
- Ensure strict adherence to compliance regulations, internal policies, and industry standards in all engagement activities.
Qualifications
Required:
- Bachelor’s degree required; advanced degree (MBA, MS, PharmD, or equivalent) preferred.
- Minimum 5-8 years in pharmaceutical sales, marketing, or field medical engagement or KOL management roles.
- At least 2 years of IBD experience strongly preferred with existing Key KOL networks in IBD
- Demonstrated success in building and maintaining scientific relationships with KOLs, speakers, or professional societies in a highly regulated environment.
- Excellent communication, interpersonal, and organizational skills
- Proven ability to synthesize insights into strategic recommendations.
- Ability to influence and collaborate across a matrixed environment without direct authority.
- Travel up to 60% (including weekends and evenings for congresses and advisory meetings).
Required Skills
Communication, Engagement Management, Inflammatory Bowel Diseases, Marketing, Marketing Strategies, Product Launches, Strategic Thinking, Team Leadership, Thought Leadership Marketing
Preferred Skills
Current Employees apply HERE
Current Contingent Workers apply HERE
US And Puerto Rico Residents Only
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Requirements
As an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer, we provide equal opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. As a federal contractor, we comply with all affirmative action requirements for protected veterans and individuals with disabilities. For more information about personal rights under the U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment laws, visit:
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We are proud to be a company that embraces the value of bringing together, talented, and committed people with diverse experiences, perspectives, skills and backgrounds. The fastest way to breakthrough innovation is when people with diverse ideas, broad experiences, backgrounds, and skills come together in an inclusive environment. We encourage our colleagues to respectfully challenge one another’s thinking and approach problems collectively.
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U.S. Hybrid Work Model
Effective September 5, 2023, employees in office-based positions in the U.S. will be working a Hybrid work consisting of three total days on-site per week, Monday - Thursday, although the specific days may vary by site or organization, with Friday designated as a remote-working day, unless business critical tasks require an on-site presence.This Hybrid work model does not apply to, and daily in-person attendance is required for, field-based positions; facility-based, manufacturing-based, or research-based positions where the work to be performed is located at a Company site; positions covered by a collective-bargaining agreement (unless the agreement provides for hybrid work); or any other position for which the Company has determined the job requirements cannot be reasonably met working remotely. Please note, this Hybrid work model guidance also does not apply to roles that have been designated as “remote”.
The salary range for this role is
$190,800.00 - $300,300.00
This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs.
The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.
We offer a comprehensive package of benefits. Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.
You can apply for this role through https://jobs.merck.com/us/en (or via the Workday Jobs Hub if you are a current employee). The application deadline for this position is stated on this posting.
San Francisco Residents Only: We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance
Los Angeles Residents Only: We will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local laws, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance
Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully
Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company. No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails.
Employee Status
Regular
Relocation:
No relocation
VISA Sponsorship
No
Travel Requirements
50%
Flexible Work Arrangements
Hybrid
Shift
1st - Day
Valid Driving License
No
Hazardous Material(s)
NA
Job Posting End Date
02/21/2026
- A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.
Requisition ID:R384153
