Senior Lead, Business Performance & Continuous Improvement

As part of the Thermo Fisher Scientific team, you'll discover meaningful work that makes a positive impact on a global scale. Join our colleagues in bringing our Mission to life every single day to enable our customers to make the world healthier, cleaner and safer. We provide our global teams with the resources needed to achieve individual career goals while helping to take science a step beyond by developing solutions for some of the world's toughest challenges, like protecting the environment, making sure our food is safe or helping find cures for cancer.

DESCRIPTION

Position Summary

The Senior Lead, Business Performance & Continuous Improvement partners with business and functional leaders to drive strategic initiatives, improve organizational effectiveness, and accelerate business results through the application of Practical Process Improvement (PPI) methodologies.

This role serves as a key partner to Commercial, Marketing, Product Management, R&D, and other SG&A functions to identify improvement opportunities, address complex business challenges, and lead cross-functional initiatives that support growth, customer experience, and operational excellence objectives.

The successful candidate will combine strong business acumen, structured problem-solving capabilities, and influential leadership skills to drive sustainable improvements across a highly matrixed organization.

Key Responsibilities

Business Partnership & Opportunity Identification

• Partner closely with business and functional leaders to understand strategic priorities, operational challenges, and emerging opportunities.
• Develop strong relationships across Commercial, Marketing, Product Management, R&D, and SG&A functions to proactively identify areas for improvement and organizational effectiveness opportunities.
• Support leaders in prioritizing improvement initiatives aligned with business objectives, customer needs, and growth strategies.
• Serve as a trusted partner in translating business challenges into actionable improvement plans.

Practical Process Improvement Leadership

• Lead and facilitate PPI initiatives utilizing structured problem-solving methodologies, including 8-Step Problem Solving, Kaizen, A3 Thinking, and other continuous improvement tools.
• Guide teams through root cause analysis to identify underlying drivers of business and process performance challenges.
• Facilitate cross-functional workshops to define problems, align stakeholders, develop countermeasures, and implement sustainable solutions.
• Coach leaders and teams on the effective application of PPI principles and methodologies.

Strategic Initiative & Transformation Support

• Lead cross-functional projects and strategic initiatives that support divisional growth, commercial effectiveness, customer experience, and organizational performance objectives.
• Support deployment and execution of enterprise and divisional strategies through structured improvement initiatives and change management approaches.
• Partner with stakeholders to identify risks, barriers, and dependencies that may impact successful implementation.
• Drive accountability and alignment across multiple functions to ensure achievement of intended business outcomes.

Organizational Effectiveness & Change Leadership

• Facilitate collaboration among diverse stakeholder groups to improve alignment, communication, and execution.
• Support organizational change initiatives by engaging stakeholders, addressing resistance, and fostering adoption of new processes and ways of working.
• Promote a culture of continuous improvement through capability building, coaching, and sharing of best practices.
• Help teams simplify processes, clarify roles and responsibilities, and improve cross-functional interactions.

Business Impact & Results

• Contribute to initiatives that support revenue growth, customer retention, productivity improvements, and operational effectiveness.
• Identify opportunities to improve commercial processes, customer-facing workflows, and cross-functional business operations.
• Ensure improvement efforts are aligned with measurable business outcomes and strategic priorities.

REQUIREMENTS

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Engineering, Life Sciences, or related discipline.
• 8+ years of experience in continuous improvement, business transformation, commercial excellence, operations, program management, consulting, or related fields.
• Demonstrated experience leading cross-functional improvement initiatives in complex matrix organizations.
• Strong facilitation, stakeholder management, and change leadership skills.
• Experience applying structured problem-solving methodologies to address business challenges.
• Excellent communication, presentation, and influencing skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Practical Process Improvement (PPI), Lean, Six Sigma, or equivalent continuous improvement certification.
• Experience supporting Commercial, Marketing, Product Management, and/or R&D organizations.
• Experience leading Kaizen events, process improvement workshops, and strategic problem-solving efforts.
• Experience supporting growth initiatives, commercial transformation, or organizational effectiveness programs.
• Advanced degree (MBA or related field) preferred.

Critical Success Factors

• Ability to build trusted partnerships across all levels of the organization.
• Strong business acumen and ability to understand complex business challenges.
• Effective facilitator capable of driving alignment among diverse stakeholder groups.
• Skilled in navigating ambiguity and translating challenges into structured action plans.
• Ability to influence outcomes without direct authority.
• Strong balance of strategic thinking and execution focus.
• Commitment to continuous improvement and delivering measurable business results.