Alliance Management Lead, Business Development Unit

FairJourney Bio; Porto; On-site; EUR 80,000 - 110,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Employee benefits

International environment

Team integration

Job summary

FairJourney Bio seeks a seasoned Alliance Management Lead to steer and coach a team responsible for managing established client partnerships. You will drive growth through upsell and cross-sell while overseeing governance, stakeholder engagement, and delivery quality.

You will personally handle critical client interactions and governance discussions, shaping strategic directions for key accounts. You will lead the Alliance Management function, balancing people leadership with direct ownership of

Qualifications

• 8+ years of professional experience in account/alliance management and client relationships.
• Degree in life sciences, business or related field, or equivalent experience.
• Experience managing complex client relationships in biotech/pharma environments.
• Proven track record in client retention, renewals or expansion with commercial teams.
• People leadership and coaching skills; developing junior team members.
• Strong commercial awareness to identify upsell/cross-sell opportunities.
• Understand roles of Alliance Management and Business Development for growth.
• Judgement and problem solving in complex client situations.

Responsibilities

• Own strategic, complex or high-impact client partnerships with senior leadership involvement.
• Lead client relationship reviews, governance meetings and senior stakeholder interactions.
• Act as escalation point for sensitive client situations and coordinate internal responses.
• Oversee health of client portfolio; identify and track risks, commitments, actions.
• Turn client feedback into clear internal recommendations and actions.
• Coordinate senior and cross-functional stakeholders on significant client matters.
• Set expectations for account growth; coach team on upsell/cross-sell opportunities.
• Lead portfolio reviews highlighting expansion potential across services.
• Identify capability or process gaps; define improvement actions and recruitment needs.
• Promote collaboration and consistent relationship management practices across the team.

Skills

Relationship leadership

Strategic partnerships

Commercial acumen

Stakeholder management

People leadership

PowerPoint storytelling

CRM software

English fluency

Education

Life sciences degree

Business degree

Tools

CRM software

Office 365

Job description

FairJourney Bio is a globally recognized life sciences company specializing in antibody discovery, engineering, characterization, and production. We proudly serve leading pharmaceutical companies and top-tier biotech firms across the U.S., Europe, and Asia. Our cutting-edge facilities are based in Porto, Portugal, Cambridge, United Kingdom and San Diego, United States, where innovation and scientific excellence drive every project. For more information, please visit FairJourney Bio (fjbio.com).

The Role

As Alliance Management Lead, you will lead and coach the team that manages FairJourney Bio’s established client partnerships, and you will drive growth within those accounts through upsell and cross-sell. You will be accountable for the team’s people, performance, capacity, quality and delivery, and you will invest in developing our Junior Alliance, Alliance and Senior Alliance Managers.

You will set the direction for how FairJourney Bio manages and grows its existing client relationships, ensuring consistent governance, effective stakeholder engagement and proactive management of relationship risks and priorities. You will have broad autonomy and combine people leadership with direct ownership of selected strategic or complex partnerships, staying personally involved in critical client interactions, sensitive relationship matters and significant governance discussions.

Key Responsibilities

Strategic client partnerships

• Own selected strategic, complex or high-impact client partnerships that need senior relationship leadership.
• Lead significant client relationship reviews, governance meetings and senior stakeholder interactions for those partnerships.
• Act as a senior escalation point for sensitive client situations, relationship risks, service concerns or alignment challenges, and coordinate the internal response.
• Oversee relationship health across the client portfolio, ensuring material risks, concerns, commitments and actions are identified, tracked and managed.
• Review complex client feedback, recurring relationship themes and partnership context, and turn them into clear internal recommendations and coordinated actions.
• Coordinate senior and cross-functional stakeholders across internal teams on significant client matters.

Partnership growth and commercial alignment

• Set expectations and priorities for account growth across the portfolio, and coach the team to identify, qualify and progress upsell and cross-sell opportunities within existing client partnerships.
• Lead account planning and portfolio reviews that highlight expansion potential across FairJourney Bio’s services.
• Identify opportunities to strengthen or expand existing partnerships, and work with the relevant Business Developer to assess and progress them.
• Provide client relationship and portfolio insight to support renewals, proposals, commercial discussions and significant client decisions.
• Track and report on expansion opportunities and outcomes with Business Development leadership.

Continuous operational improvement

• Establish and continuously improve Alliance Management team operations, including relationship governance, stakeholder mapping, client reviews, escalation practices, documentation and relationship health monitoring.
• Identify capability, resource or process gaps within Alliance Management team, and define the improvement, recruitment, onboarding or development actions needed.
• Promote collaboration, accountability, knowledge sharing and consistent relationship management practices across the team.

Team leadership

• Lead the function and be accountable for its people, performance, capacity, quality and delivery.
• Translate Business Development and company priorities into Alliance Management plans, team objectives, portfolio priorities and expected outcomes.
• Allocate and rebalance client portfolios, workload and team capacity based on client complexity, strategic importance, relationship needs and team capability.
• Provide formal people management, including objective setting, performance management, and coaching of Junior and Senior Alliance Managers on commercial acumen, stakeholder management and governance.
• Develop Junior Alliance, Alliance and Senior Alliance team members, strengthening their relationship management, judgement, stakeholder management and governance capability.

Your Profile

• 8+ years of professional experience in account management, alliance management and client relationship expertise, including managing complex, strategic or sensitive partnerships.
• A degree in life sciences, business or a related field, or equivalent professional experience in alliance, account or client relationship management.
• Preference for experience managing complex client relationships or partnerships within biotechnology, pharmaceutical, CRO or a related environment.
• Experience contributing to client retention, renewals or expansion activities with commercial teams.
• People leadership and coaching skills, with a genuine commitment to developing junior team members.
• Commercial awareness, with the ability to identify and develop upsell and cross-sell opportunities within existing client relationships.
• Understanding of the respective roles of Alliance Management and Business Development, and how to work together on account growth.
• Judgement and problem solving in complex, ambiguous or high-consequence client situations.
• Stakeholder management and influencing skills across senior clients, Business Development, scientific teams and organisational leadership.
• Ability to lead significant client interactions and manage sensitive relationship matters with confidence and judgement.
• Ability to assess relationship health, identify material risks, and turn client context into appropriate actions and decisions.
• Ability to build clear, concise executive presentations in PowerPoint that turn complex commercial data into a compelling narrative for senior leadership.
• Planning and resource management across multiple client relationships and competing priorities.
• Understanding of relationship governance, stakeholder management and structured client engagement practices.
• Working knowledge of CRM systems and structured account management tools.
• Understanding of FairJourney Bio services and the biotechnology services environment.
• Excellent written and spoken English.

Travel Requirements

Travel may be required for client meetings, relationship reviews, governance interactions, stakeholder engagement, business development activities or company meetings.

We Offer

• Integration in a highly motivated team
• Working in an international environment
• Employee benefits package

If you’re ready to take the next step in your career path, we’d love to hear from you.