For 75 years, Charles River employees have worked together to assist in the discovery, development and safe manufacture of new drug therapies. When you join our family, you will have a significant impact on the health and well-being of people across the globe. Whether your background is in life sciences, finance, IT, sales or another area, your skills will play an important role in the work we perform. In return, we’ll help you build a career that you can feel passionate about.

Job Summary

This role serves as the enterprise lead for skills-based talent management and career development, owning the strategy, design, and global execution of scalable skills and career solutions that enable workforce agility, internal mobility, and accelerated development of critical talent. The role partners closely with GTM&D leaders, HRBPs, P&C COEs, HR Ops and the business to embed skills into talent processes, platforms, and decision-making at scale. This role will also be implementing new AI based technology to bring skills management for scale. In addition to enterprise ownership of a global, enterprise process, the purpose of the Talent Strategy & Enablement Director role is to act as a GTM&LD senior leader for a global line of business to diagnose, consult and shape the talent strategy of the business in partnership with P&C CVPs, including:

Solicit and analyze VOC input, identify critical people and organization gaps and needs, prioritize and deliver solutions, and ensure the development and delivery of integrated solutions in alignment with the business and talent strategy to impact business results.
Operationalize key elements of the talent strategy by leveraging or building globally consistent and scalable processes or programs to deliver a portfolio of talent, learning and organization performance solutions to drive and measure intended business impact and metrics
The role collaborates closely with P&C Business Partners and Corporate teams to deliver and enable others to accelerate the delivery and impact of GTM&LD offerings

Essential Duties And Responsibilities

Duty% of Time Spent (no less than 10%)

Enterprise Skills Strategy

Lead the design and evolution of CRL’s enterprise skills framework, including skills taxonomy, proficiency definitions, and governance.
Embed skills into core talent processes including performance management, succession planning, workforce planning, and learning prioritization.
Partner with workforce planning and analytics teams to translate skills data into actionable insights for leaders.

Career Architecture & Career Enablement

Own CRL’s career architecture and career navigation strategy, ensuring clarity of career paths, skill requirements, and development options across roles and job families.
Design scalable career enablement solutions that empower employees to own their development while supporting business talent needs.
Ensure career frameworks align with job architecture, levels, and progression models globally.
Act as a senior internal consultant to GTM&D partners, HRBPs, and business leaders on skills-based talent strategies and career development approaches.
Build capability across HR and leaders to leverage skills and career data in talent decisions.

30%

Technology & Platform Leadership (Eightfold)

Serve as the GTM&D product owner for skills and career technology platforms (e.g., Eightfold), defining vision, roadmap, and success measures.
Partner with HR Technology, vendors, and analytics teams to optimize platform configuration, adoption, and continuous improvement.
Translate business and talent needs into scalable digital solutions that drive adoption, insight, and impact.

20%

Duties (Cont.)

Duty% of Time Spent (no less than 10%)

Business Line Talent Partner Responsibilities

Conducts organizational assessments & diagnostics, using defined methodologies to identify critical issues and root causes and implementing appropriate solutions to improve organization effectiveness.
Provide SME guidance, education and training as needed to P&C partners to enable quality execution of the processes within GTM&LD (OTR, GPS, Engagement, Careers, Talent Development programs)
Build strong working relationships with P&C BPs and teams, Business Leaders, HR specialists, and GTM team members
Lead the execution of the OTR process for the business and enable HRBPs to support their leaders in ensuring that key talent and critical talent segments have robust development plans and that their experiences create talent depth (individual, team-based, and organizational), ensuring consistency across the organization.
Administers and interprets 360 assessment and other globally adopted assessments for targeted senior and executive leadership populations
Partner with P&C BP leaders and teams and others to interpret organization survey results and make recommendations to improve items related to culture, talent and organization performance Consults on organization design/structures, architecture, and support systems.
Improve organizational effectiveness through the enablement of solutions to enhance leadership, improve productivity, and drive a performance and learning culture
Partner with HR leaders to create accelerated development plans for high potential leaders identified in talent reviews; monitor progress against plans and report progress
Support organization performance efforts that impact the business and partner with others to diagnose, design and deliver talent and OD/OE solutions unique to businesses or functions or new enterprise priorities
Assists in the design and deployment of proven organization change management principles and methodology to support large scale organizational change initiatives.
Lead global agile teams within GTM and across businesses as determined by strategies to build, enable, and implement key capabilities as defined by business strategy.
Leverage data and Talent Analytics to support tracking progress in the quality and depth of talent and to develop insights and make recommendations.
Conduct needs analyses (e.g., leadership, development, or training) across areas at periodic intervals to assess the current organizational capability levels and ascertain the capability levels for successful delivery of expected results – both short term and long term.
Collaborate in supporting HRBPs’ development of capability in talent management and organizational development

50%

Critical Skills / Core Competencies

Demonstrated experience building or leading skills-based talent or workforce models at enterprise scale.
Deep expertise in career architecture, internal mobility, and development frameworks.
Hands-on experience leading or implementing AI-enabled talent platforms (e.g., Eightfold or similar skills/career technologies).
Proven ability to operate as an enterprise owner and architect, influencing senior leaders and driving global adoption.
Customer Focus: Establishes and maintains effective relationships with clients, gaining their trust and respect. Proactively anticipates clients’ strategic needs while maintaining responsiveness to emergent requirements. Obtains and utilizes customer feedback to improve processes
Decision Quality: makes sound business decisions based upon a mixture of analysis, wisdom, experience, and judgment; most of his/her solutions and suggestions turn out to be accurate and effective when judged over time; sought out by others for advice and solutions.
Organizational Agility: Navigates effectively through complex organizations, finding the right people with whom to consult and solve problems. Recognizes which stakeholders can influence situations and initiates action to assess and obtain their support. Aware of cultural protocols/unwritten rules for getting things done. Initiative to identify and act on opportunities for improvement
Process Management: organizes the steps, resources and workflows necessary to get critical tasks accomplished. Looks for ways to simplify and bring order to complex, chaotic and unpredictable activities. Identifies opportunities to improve efficiency and develops plans, success measures and timelines for tasks. Anticipates activities required to help people accept and absorb change.
Managing and Measuring Work: Involves others in establishing objectives, measures and progress monitoring. Clarifies and assigns roles and accountabilities for tasks and key decisions. Delegates to and empowers direct and indirect staff members. Follows-up to recognize accomplishments and address deficiencies.
Conflict Management: effectively confronts and resolves disputes and resistance. Listens well to other parties. Sees conflicts and objections as opportunities to create better solutions. Reads situations well, recognizing competing interests, misunderstandings and systemic factors.
Dealing with Ambiguity: effectively copes with change, risks and uncertainty. Comfortably -- and far more often than not -- makes effective, timely decisions without either complete information or guiding precedents.
Problem Solving: Defines problems systematically, analyzing causes and effects. Seeks out others as sources of data, ideas and help. Asks penetrating questions to surface hidden problems and discern fact patterns. Recognizes the broader issues to simplify analyses and execute timely decisions or actions. Skill in critical and creative thinking to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions, or approaches to problems. Has an ability to simplify complex issues and take a pragmatic approach to organizational deliverables.
Business Acumen: Understands the priorities, agendas and concerns of clients; leverages external sources to gain business savvy and awareness of emerging trends; possesses general knowledge and understanding of business disciplines like Finance, Law, IT and Communications. Critical thinking to translate business needs into talent strategies
Program Management / project management. Includes engaging multiple stakeholders, keeping people informed, driving to closure and/or ensuring ongoing viability of initiatives

Job Qualifications

More than 15 years of HR experience, including in talent management, learning and development, organization development, process, strongly preferred; HR Generalist experience and managerial experience also preferred
Bachelor degree required. Master’s degree preferred.
Strong leadership skills required, including proven ability to facilitate cross-functional teams.
Success leading outsourced service relationships within environments using service level agreements and formal contract change order processes.
Ability to build strong working relationships with internal customers and positively influence key constituents
Strong aptitude for project management approaches, tools and phases of the project lifecycle.
Strong ability to apply the architectures, models, and frameworks used to execute multi-workforce, cross-generational, and multi-cultural, complex projects successfully

Compensation Data

The pay range for this position is $170,000/yr - $210,000/yr. Please note that salaries vary within the range based on factors including, but not limited to, experience, skills, education, certifications, and location.

About Corporate Functions

The Corporate Functions provide operational support across Charles River in areas such as Human Resources, Finance, IT, Legal, Sales, Quality Assurance, Marketing, and Corporate Development. They partner with their colleagues across the company to develop and drive strategies and to set global standards. The functions are essential to providing a bridge between strategic vision and operational readiness, to ensure ongoing functional innovation and capability improvement.

About Charles River

Charles River is an early-stage contract research organization (CRO). We have built upon our foundation of laboratory animal medicine and science to develop a diverse portfolio of discovery and safety assessment services, both Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) and non-GLP, to support clients from target identification through preclinical development. Charles River also provides a suite of products and services to support our clients’ clinical laboratory testing needs and manufacturing activities. Utilizing this broad portfolio of products and services enables our clients to create a more flexible drug development model, which reduces their costs, enhances their productivity and effectiveness to increase speed to market.

With over 20,000 employees within 110 facilities in over 20 countries around the globe, we are strategically positioned to coordinate worldwide resources and apply multidisciplinary perspectives in resolving our client’s unique challenges. Our client base includes global pharmaceutical companies, biotechnology companies, government agencies and hospitals and academic institutions around the world.

At Charles River, we are passionate about our role in improving the quality of people’s lives. Our mission, our excellent science and our strong sense of purpose guide us in all that we do, and we approach each day with the knowledge that our work helps to improve the health and well-being of many across the globe. We have proudly worked on 80% of the drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the past five years.

We’re committed to providing benefits that elevate your quality of life. Based on your position these may include: bonus/incentives based on performance, 401K, paid time off, stock purchase program, Health and wellness coverage, employee and family wellbeing support programs, and work life balance flexibility.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Charles River is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to providing equal employment opportunities for all qualified applicants and employees without regard to race, color, sex, religion, national origin, ancestry, age, mental or physical disability, family status, pregnancy, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local laws.

It is unlawful in some states (including Massachusetts) to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.

If you are interested in applying to Charles River Laboratories and need special assistance or an accommodation due to a disability to complete any forms or to otherwise participate in the resume submission process, please contact a member of our Human Resources team by sending an e-mail message to crrecruitment_US@crl.com. This contact is for accommodation requests for individuals with disabilities only and cannot be used to inquire about the status of applications.

For more information, please visit www.criver.com.

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