Director - Demand Forecasting

About the Department 

The Finance and Operations dept. brings insights and intelligence to inform decision making & drives digitalization and business solutions to attain NNI goals. Finance and Operations works closely across the organization to guide enterprise-wide resource allocations, investment choices, drive core operations and develop insights to drive growth and operational excellence across the value chain while innovating for future capabilities. Our focus on innovation ensures we're constantly building future capabilities. We're responsible for regulating accounting, upholding workplace safety, managing our supply chain and sampling, supporting technological and data innovation, insights and analytics, delivering patient support solutions, maintaining our facilities and assuring the integrity and completeness of all business transactions. At Novo Nordisk, you will have the opportunity to build a life-changing career in a global business environment. We encourage our employees to make the most of their talent, and we reward hard work and dedication with opportunities for continuous learning and personal development. Are you ready to maximize your potential with us?

The Position

This role is responsible for the volume forecasting of the total US business (diabetes, obesity and rare diseases), supporting evidence-based decision making based on solid financial planning and analysis driving business performance. This role is the center of excellence for forecasting as well as owner of the forecasting model and serves a central role in liaising between Finance & Supply Chain, Commercial Insights & Analytics, Pricing & Contracting as well as Strategy.

The role ensures an overall objective of developing and delivering a holistic, insight-driven volume forecast for current and pipeline products. Accountable for communicating insights on market trends of Novo Nordisk and competitor products that impact the volume outlook to senior leadership in a clear & consistent fashion. This position plays a critical role in minimizing complexity and optimizing clarity of the overall sales forecast process and lead the continuous development of the volume forecasting environment while leveraging internal and external resources as appropriate.

Relationships

Reports to the Executive Director of Forecasting & Strategic Finance.

Internal relationships include SVPs of Marketing, Sales, and Finance; Brand Marketing VP/Directors, Strategic Pricing team, Supply Chain team and various functions in Commercial Effectiveness. External relationships include management of vendors.

The position also has significant interaction with the Global Insights & Forecasting (I&F) and Operations Finance teams. Direct management responsibility for developing, leading and managing a team consisting of 4-6 employees.

Essential Functions

• Actively participates as a member of the Forecasting & Strategic Finance Leadership team in shaping strategy of the full team. Secures engaging culture and drives a clear vision for the team
• Owns the volume forecast for the short- and mid-term period across the company portfolio.
• Routinely communicates business unit and company consolidated financial and operational performance trends, historical and forecasted, using appropriate metrics. Bring recommendations, trends, resulting implications, key actions, and strategic implications to relevant stakeholders in the business unit at Novo Nordisk Inc. (NNI) level and HQ
• Accountable to maintain a strong working relationship with the Marketing team, PCOR & Strategy groups to ensure solid and aligned input to financial forecasting and reporting as well as input regarding ongoing issues or occurrences that could impact the overall sales forecast. Flag potential impacts from these issues on the financial forecast for management on a 'real-time' basis
• Support the Business Unit brand strategy and tactical process with financial analysis as well as liaise with business development and other strategic business cases
• Reviews and evaluates the quality of data and new data sources used in analyses, generating new insights and continuously improving the quality of all information.
• Serve as an internal consultant for Marketing, Sales, Finance, Supply Chain, Business Development, and Investor Relations on forecasting issues on a day-to-day basis
• Proposes recommendations for enhancements and/or improvements based on industry trends
• Engages in close collaboration with key internal stakeholders to ensure that forecast assumptions reflect latest insights and internal knowledge to achieve a high-quality volume forecast
• Facilitates collaboration among necessary stakeholders when making decisions and developing strategic plans
• Partner with senior leadership across the commercial organization in building and assessing marketing and sales driven scenarios and provide actionable insight to improve decision making
• Continually challenges forecast and reporting deliverables and processes
• Directs the improvement or standardization of processes and procedures
• Demonstrates an advanced understanding of the industry and Novo Nordisk dynamics and provides recommendations based on news flow
• Ensures that trends in the pharmaceutical and healthcare industries are understood by team and stakeholders and incorporated into financial strategies and resource allocations

Physical Requirements

0-10% overnight travel required.

Development of People

Supervisory, ensure that reporting personnel have individual development plans (IDP), with annual goals and measurements that are consistent with the priorities of the business, and that interim reviews are held so that their work is focused on those priorities, and they understand their level of accountability for results and the measurement process. Ensure that the IDP forms include completed learning and aspiration plans and are in place for all reporting personnel to enable the achievement of goals and capability to assume increased levels of responsibility. Manage the application and communication of all Novo Nordisk policies, procedures, and Novo Nordisk Way.

Qualifications

• Bachelors Degree within Finance, Management Accounting or similar required. Advanced degree preferred
• 8 years of relevant analytics, financial, forecasting related experience demonstrating a steady career progression with increasing roles of responsibility; at least six (6) years of pharmaceutical forecasting and/or strategic consulting experience preferred   
• Strong focus on process and structured workflows.    
• Proactive, high energy and driven to complete projects on time with high quality           
• Ambitious mindset with a continuous improvement approach and a desire to simplify the way we operate    
• Strong stakeholder management skills and ability to influence senior stakeholders. Manages multiple internal relationships at all levels of the business. Strong interface with senior level management concerning matters of importance to the Company.         
• Strong ability to understand and define stakeholder information needs and translate these needs into clear actions.     
• Ability and drive to lead a cross collaborative unit        
• Idea-generator and ability to secure timely execution of agreed actions
• Ability to utilize time effectively; sets priorities in order to manage multiple projects with time sensitive deadlines.          
• Good understanding of existing market and claim data sources preferred; strong ability to condense complicated data set to a key message required.
• High integrity

We commit to an inclusive recruitment process and equality of opportunity for all our job applicants.

At Novo Nordisk we recognize that it is no longer good enough to aspire to be the best company in the world. We need to aspire to be the best company for the world and we know that this is only possible with talented employees with diverse perspectives, backgrounds and cultures. We are therefore committed to creating an inclusive culture that celebrates the diversity of our employees, the patients we serve and communities we operate in. Together, we’re life changing.

Novo Nordisk is an equal opportunity employer. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, protected veteran status or any other characteristic protected by local, state or federal laws, rules or regulations.

If you are interested in applying to Novo Nordisk and need special assistance or an accommodation to apply, please call us at 1-855-411-5290. This contact is for accommodation requests only and cannot be used to inquire about the status of applications.