About Avantor
Avantor is a leading global provider of mission-critical products and services to the life sciences and advanced technology industries, working side-by-side with customers at every step of the scientific journey to enable breakthroughs in medicine, healthcare, and technology — serving more than 300,000 customer locations across the Globe. As a company undergoing significant business transformation, Avantor is investing in the data capabilities and operational discipline needed to drive sustainable growth. This UK/Ireland-based role offers the opportunity to shape global workforce strategy.
About the Role
As Senior Manager, Workforce Planning & Data Analytics, you will build and lead the enterprise workforce planning capability, ensuring Avantor's global talent strategy is anchored in rigorous data and aligned to its business transformation agenda. You will translate complex workforce dynamics across our business segments into actionable insight for senior leaders worldwide.
Operating from the UK or Ireland, you will work across time zones and business units, acting as a strategic partner to global HR, Finance, and segment leadership — bringing the analytical rigour and commercial acumen needed to support a company of Avantor's scale and ambition.
Key Responsibilities
Workforce Planning & Strategy
- Lead Avantor's global workforce planning cycle, building supply/demand models across business segments, functions, and geographies
- Partner with segment Presidents, HRBPs, and Finance to translate business transformation and growth goals into structured headcount and capability plans
- Develop scenario models to support restructuring, transformation, and strategic redeployment decisions — providing analytical rigour to senior business cases
- Build the workforce planning methodology, including frameworks, cadence, and governance aligned to the Avantor operating model
- Monitor the global life sciences labour market trends to inform talent strategy and competitive positioning
People Analytics & Reporting
- Own Avantor's people analytics function — including dashboards, predictive models, and self-service reporting for HR and business leaders
- Deliver high-quality, executive-ready workforce insight covering attrition risk, DEI progress, productivity, skills gaps, and organisational effectiveness
- Partner with HR Technology and IT to build scalable data pipelines from Avantor's HRIS (Workday) and adjacent systems
Leadership & Stakeholder Management
- Act as a trusted advisor to Finance on FTE budgeting, headcount governance, and cost transformation tracking
- Present workforce analytics findings in compelling, business-focused narratives to C-suite and segment leadership across multiple time zones
- Champion a culture of data-led decision-making across the global HR function
Process & Governance
- Establish and maintain data governance standards for all people data, ensuring accuracy and full compliance within legislation and multi-jurisdictional requirements across Avantor's global footprint
- Continuously improve planning methodologies, tooling, and ways of working in line with the Avantor Business System continuous improvement approach
- Support headcount transparency and governance during periods of organisational restructuring and transformation
Skills & Experience
Essential
- Proven experience in workforce planning, people analytics, or HR data roles, with 3–5+ years at manager level within a large, complex, global organisation
- Advanced analytical skills — proficiency in Power BI/Tableau, Excel, and workforce planning tools
- Experience in using Workday and Workday Adaptive
- Experience supporting business transformation, restructuring, or cost optimisation programmes through workforce data
- Strong commercial acumen with the ability to connect people data to P&L outcomes and strategic priorities
- Outstanding stakeholder management skills, including confident engagement with C-suite audiences across multiple geographies
- Solid understanding of UK and/or Irish employment law, data privacy legislation (UK GDPR / EU GDPR), and workforce reporting obligations
Desirable
- Life sciences, biopharma, or advanced technology sector experience
- Experience working with Workday or a comparable enterprise HRIS
- Familiarity with external labour market data providers (e.g. Mercer, LinkedIn Talent Insights)
- Experience working across US-headquartered matrix organisation with European centres of excellence
- Relevant data or analytics certification
What Success Looks Like (First 12 Months)
- A credible, embedded global workforce planning cycle aligned to Avantor's annual operating plan and multi-year transformation roadmap
- Executive dashboards driving monthly people strategy conversations at segment and enterprise level
- Headcount forecasting accuracy materially improved, supporting Finance reconciliation and cost transformation tracking
#LI-REMOTE
Disclaimer:
The above statements are intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by employees assigned to this classification. They are not intended to be construed as an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, duties and skills required of employees assigned to this position. Avantor is proud to be an equal opportunity employer.
Why Avantor?
Dare to go further in your career. Join our global team of 14,000+ associates whose passion for discovery and determination to overcome challenges relentlessly advances life-changing science.
The work we do changes people's lives for the better. It brings new patient treatments and therapies to market, giving a cancer survivor the chance to walk his daughter down the aisle. It enables medical devices that help a little boy hear his mom's voice for the first time. Outcomes such as these create unlimited opportunities for you to contribute your talents, learn new skills and grow your career at Avantor.
We are committed to helping you on this journey through our diverse, equitable and inclusive culture which includes learning experiences to support your career growth and success. At Avantor, dare to go further and see how the impact of your contributions set science in motion to create a better world. Apply today!
EEO Statement:
We are an Equal Employment/Affirmative Action employer and VEVRAA Federal Contractor. We do not discriminate in hiring on the basis of sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, color, religious creed, national origin, physical or mental disability, protected Veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state/province, or local law.
If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please contact us by email at [email protected] and let us know the nature of your request and your contact information. Requests for accommodation will be considered on a case-by-case basis. Please note that only inquiries concerning a request for reasonable accommodation will be responded to from this email address.
Privacy Policy:
We will use the personal information that you have submitted to us in order to consider your application for the relevant role.
Your privacy is important to us. Please click here for our Privacy Policy which explains the purposes for which we will use your personal information and the ways in which we will handle and retain your information. It also explains the rights you have in relation to your information, and how to contact us with any queries or requests.
3rd Party Non-Solicitation Policy:
By submitting candidates without having been formally assigned on and contracted for a specific job requisition by Avantor, or by failing to comply with the Avantor recruitment process, you forfeit any fee on the submitted candidates, regardless of your usual terms and conditions. Avantor works with a preferred supplier list and will take the initiative to engage with recruitment agencies based on its needs and will not be accepting any form of solicitation.
