Alliance Manager

About the role

The Alliance Manager serves as Argenta's primary commercial and relationship interface for an assigned portfolio of commercial customers and those transitioning into commercial supply at the Shawnee site. The role owns end-to-end accountability for the overall customer health, including governance forums, escalations, contract interpretation and ownership, change orders, pricing alignment, and supporting customer-facing business reviews.

Responsibilities

• Own the cadence and content of Monthly Business Reviews (MBRs), QBRs, and other governance forums for assigned accounts — including agenda development, pre-reads, action capture, and follow-through.
• Lead site-specific customer governance and ensure consistent representation of Argenta commitments across all customer-facing forums.
• Host customer site visits; coordinate internal stakeholders, prepare materials, and own follow-up actions.
• Build trusted-partner relationships with customer Alliance / Account Manager and External Manufacturing leadership counterparts.
• Own interpretation of and adherence to Master Supply Agreements (MSAs), Quality Agreements, and associated commercial terms for assigned customers.
• Care for contract amendments and renewals with Legal, Finance, and customer counterparts; ensure executed documents are filed to Shawnee Contracts and Trackers.
• Maintain the customer contracts library for the assigned portfolio and ensure operational teams (CSP, Scheduling, QA, MSAT, PMO) understand the contractual constraints they operate within.
• Originate, negotiate, and shepherd customer change orders from request through execution.
• Align change order scope, pricing, terms, and delivery commitments across PMO, MSAT, Supply Chain, Quality, and Finance.
• Own customer pricing adjustments for the assigned portfolio, including annual reviews, indexation, pass-throughs, and ad-hoc commercial adjustments.
• Serve as the named escalation point for assigned customers; triage and own the customer-facing response.
• Partner with assigned Customer Supply Planners to ensure daily execution matches commercial commitments and that the customer receives a single, consistent message.
• Identify expansion opportunities within assigned accounts and partner with the Head of Alliance to advance them.
• Maintain account dashboards and pre-reads for governance forums and internal leadership reviews.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent combination of education and progressive experience in customer-facing commercial or operations roles.
• Advanced degree (MBA, MS, or equivalent) preferred but not required.
• Project management, commercial, or operations certifications (PMP, APICS / CPIM, Lean Six Sigma) considered an asset.
• Minimum 5 years of progressive experience in CDMO, biopharma, animal health, or pharmaceutical manufacturing, with at least 2-3 years in customer-facing commercial, alliance, account management, or program management roles.
• Strong working knowledge of CDMO commercial frameworks: Master Supply Agreements, Quality Agreements, change orders, pricing structures, and supply commitments.
• Demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional teams without direct authority in a regulated GMP manufacturing environment.
• Proven ability to navigate executive-level customer relationships (Procurement Heads, External Manufacturing Heads, Alliance leadership) and to de-escalate commercially sensitive situations.
• Working knowledge of supply chain planning, production scheduling, quality systems (Zen QMS or equivalent), and regulatory frameworks applicable to pharmaceutical manufacturing.
• Comfort reading and interpreting commercial contracts with sound judgement about when to escalate to Legal.
• Strong financial acumen — able to interpret price files, P&L impacts, and the commercial implications of operational decisions.
• Experience with ERP, QMS, Microsoft, AI, and Salesforce preferred.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills; comfortable partnering with customer counterparts at varied levels of seniority.

Qualifications

• Occasional travel may be required for customer site visits, governance forums, or Argenta network engagement; routine travel is not anticipated.