Director, Construction

About the role

AbbVie's mission is to discover and deliver innovative medicines and solutions that solve serious health issues today and address the medical challenges of tomorrow. The company strives to have a remarkable impact on people's lives across key therapeutic areas including immunology, oncology and neuroscience, and offers products and services in its Allergan Aesthetics portfolio. The Director of Construction provides senior leadership and owners oversight for all construction activities associated with a ~$500 million pharmaceutical capital project. The role ensures safe, compliant, and efficient construction execution while maintaining strict alignment with the company's capital governance, quality systems, and regulatory expectations. Functioning as the owners on‑site construction authority, the Director leads the construction management organization and oversees EPC/CM partners and trade contractors, ensuring that construction activities are executed safely, delivered on schedule and within approved capital budgets, and meet the quality and compliance standards required for pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities. This position integrates construction with engineering, procurement, commissioning, qualification, validation, and operational readiness to enable successful facility start‑up and reports to the Strategic Projects Director in the Operations Transformation organization.

Responsibilities

• Serve as the owners senior construction leader responsible for execution of all site construction activities.
• Lead the owners construction management organization including construction managers, field engineers, and site supervision.
• Provide governance and oversight of EPC/CM contractors and trade contractors to ensure alignment with project objectives.
• Take active part in constructability studies and provide inputs for the optimal construction strategy during design.
• Establish construction execution strategies, site procedures, and performance expectations.
• Ensure effective coordination between engineering, procurement, construction, CQV, and operations teams.
• Drive accountability across contractors to meet project commitments.
• Champion a Zero Incident safety culture consistent with corporate EHS standards and ensure full compliance with OSHA regulations and corporate safety management systems.
• Oversee contractor safety programs, audits, and incident investigations.
• Lead proactive hazard identification and mitigation initiatives across all construction activities.
• Monitor safety performance and implement corrective actions where necessary.
• Provide executive oversight of the integrated master project schedule with emphasis on construction milestones and critical path activities.
• Ensure contractors develop and maintain realistic and achievable schedules aligned with project objectives.
• Monitor progress, productivity, and performance metrics.
• Lead schedule risk assessments and mitigation strategies.
• Implement schedule recovery plans where necessary.
• Maintain oversight of construction budgets, commitments, and cost forecasts with accurate cost reporting and financial transparency across contractors.
• Monitor cost performance against approved capital authorization by identifying cost risks and implement mitigation strategies.
• Drive value engineering and cost optimization initiatives where available.
• Lead the construction change management process in accordance with corporate capital governance procedures.
• Review and evaluate contractor change requests and claims, negotiate commercial impacts and ensure proper documentation, maintain governance and control over construction costs throughout the