Director of Quality Assurance
Location: Craigavon, Northern Ireland
Hours: 35 hours per week, Monday Friday. Flexible working pattern.
Business Unit: Almac Pharma Services
Open To: Internal and external applicants welcome to apply.
Ref No.: HRJOB11627
The Opportunity
Within Pharma Services, Quality Assurance plays a critical role in ensuring that our global operations consistently meet the highest regulatory and compliance standards. From supporting manufacturing and packaging activities to maintaining robust quality systems, our teams are central to delivering safe and effective medicines to patients worldwide.
Due to continued growth, we are now offering an exciting opportunity for a Director of Quality Assurance to take on a senior leadership role with both global and site-wide impact. In this position, you will lead the Global Quality Assurance team alongside the Craigavon-based Quality Compliance and Validation teams, with overall accountability for the development, implementation and continuous improvement of the Global Pharmaceutical Quality System (PQS).
This is a highly visible leadership role where you will shape and influence quality strategy across multiple sites, ensuring that the Global PQS is designed and implemented to provide assurance that quality systems, facilities, equipment, utilities and computerised systems are aligned to the cGMP expectations of various global regulatory authorities. You will work closely with senior stakeholders across the business, providing expert guidance, monitoring performance, and driving proactive improvements to ensure continued compliance and operational excellence.
At a site level, you will also play a key role in leading the Craigavon Quality Compliance and Validation teams, ensuring the effective governance and operation of the PQS and supporting ongoing inspection readiness and continuous improvement initiatives.
This role is ideally suited to a strategic and forward-thinking quality leader who thrives in a global environment, enjoys influencing at senior level, and is passionate about building strong, compliant and efficient quality systems.
Key responsibilities include:
- Leading the Global Quality Assurance function and driving consistency across sites
- Developing and overseeing the global validation and qualification strategy
- Ensuring effective design and governance of the Global Pharmaceutical Quality System
- Monitoring compliance trends and advising senior leadership on risks and improvements
- Supporting regulatory inspections and audits at a global and site level
- Acting as a senior Quality representative on cross-functional teams involved in capital projects and the implementation of business improvements, which impact on the Global PQS
- Providing leadership to Craigavon Quality Compliance and Validation teams
Joining Almac means becoming part of a fastpaced, growing organisation within a highly regulated industry. We offer a supportive and collaborative working environment, with excellent opportunities for learning, development and longterm career progression across the Almac Group.
Our approach is simple we support, develop and reward our people, build fulfilling careers and together we advance human health. More information can be found here; Life at Almac.
What you need to be successful
To be successful in this role, you will bring significant experience in pharmaceutical quality management, along with a proven ability to lead teams and influence strategy at a senior level. You will combine strong technical expertise with a big-picture mindset, enabling you to shape and drive global quality systems in a complex, regulated environment.
We are particularly interested in hearing from candidates who have:
- A degree in a scientific discipline
- Significant experience in a senior quality management role involved in setting the strategy for development of the Pharmaceutical Quality System within the pharmaceutical industry
- Proven experience leading multi-functional and cross-site teams
- Experience in quality systems supporting manufacturing and packaging operations, particularly solid oral dosage forms
- Experience developing and implementing validation and qualification strategies
Desirable criteria include:
- A postgraduate qualification in a scientific or quality-related discipline
- Eligibility to act as a Qualified Person (QP)
- Experience in a Quality leadership position working in a global pharmaceutical environment
- Knowledge of lean/operational excellence principles within a pharmaceutical setting
This role reports to the VP of Quality Assurance and includes leadership responsibility for:
- Associate Director of Quality Compliance & Validation
- Associate Director of Global Quality Assurance
The role will involve global collaboration and may require participation in regulatory inspections, audits and key business projects. For more information please review our candidate spec - Pharma - Quality Assurance roles - 1
How to apply
Apply online and tailor your CV to outline how you meet the role criteria. Please upload your CV in PDF format where possible.
Closing Date
We will no longer be accepting applications after 5pm on Friday 31st July 2026
RECRUITMENT AGENCIES PLEASE NOTE:
Almac will only accept applications from agencies/business partners that have been invited to work on this role by our Talent Acquisition team. Speculative candidate CVs received or submitted directly to Hiring Managers will be considered unsolicited and no fee will be payable. Thank you for your cooperation.
