Location: Bethesda, MD
Schedule: Hybrid - 2 days onsite / 3 days remote
Duration: 6-month contract with potential to extend or convert
We are working with a well-established organization seeking an experienced Contracts Manager to join their team on a contract basis. This is an excellent opportunity for a seasoned federal contracts professional with experience supporting government-funded research, healthcare, public health, or other highly regulated programs.
The Contracts Manager will provide leadership across the full contract lifecycle, including contract administration, negotiation, compliance, risk management, and business development support. This individual will partner closely with internal leadership, program teams, legal, finance, and other stakeholders to ensure contracts are effectively managed and aligned with organizational and regulatory requirements.
Responsibilities
- Manage and provide oversight for a diverse portfolio of federally funded contracts, with a focus on healthcare, research, public health, or related programs.
- Administer complex contract types, including cost-reimbursement, time-and-materials, fixed-price, IDIQ, BPA, and GSA Schedule contracts.
- Review, draft, negotiate, and administer a variety of agreements, including NDAs, teaming agreements, subcontracts, subawards, consulting agreements, data use agreements, data transfer agreements, and other strategic partnership agreements.
- Serve as a trusted contracts advisor to program managers, business development teams, senior leadership, and other internal stakeholders.
- Conduct pre-award reviews of solicitations, RFPs, task orders, and other contractual documents.
- Ensure compliance with applicable federal contracting regulations, agency requirements, and organizational policies.
- Support business development, capture, proposal development, partner arrangements, and contractual risk assessments.
- Identify and mitigate contractual and compliance risks throughout the contract lifecycle.
- Partner with legal, finance, research/program operations, and compliance teams to support successful project execution.
- Provide guidance and mentorship to contracts staff.
- Identify opportunities to improve contracts processes, procedures, and best practices.
Qualifications
- 10+ years of experience in federal government contracting and contract management, with significant experience managing complex contracts and/or teams.
- Bachelor's degree required; Master's degree or equivalent combination of education and experience preferred.
- Experience supporting federal healthcare, clinical research, public health, biomedical research, or related government programs strongly preferred.
- Experience working with federal health agencies such as NIH, HHS, CDC, FDA, or similar organizations.
- Strong experience developing, negotiating, and administering federal contracts, subcontracts, and research-related agreements.
- Knowledge of federal contracting regulations, compliance requirements, cost principles, audits, and contract administration practices.
- Experience providing contractual guidance to senior leadership and cross-functional teams.
- Strong negotiation, communication, analytical, and problem-solving skills.
- Experience with contracts management or enterprise project management systems; experience with Deltek Costpoint or similar systems is a plus.
- Must be authorized to work in the United States as a U.S. Citizen or Green Card Holder.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience supporting government-funded clinical research, biomedical research, public health, health informatics, or research services programs.
- Strong understanding of federal healthcare and research contracting environments.
- Experience with real-world data (RWD), real-world evidence (RWE), healthcare claims, EHR, registry, or other research datasets.
- Experience negotiating data-related agreements, including data use agreements, data transfer agreements, licensing agreements, and research collaboration agreements.
- Knowledge of privacy, security, data governance, HIPAA, human subjects research, and other regulatory considerations related to healthcare or federally funded research.
- Experience with GSA Schedules, Multiple Award Schedule (MAS), or other federal contracting vehicles.
- Previous experience leading or mentoring contracts professionals.