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Associate Director, Data Semantic Governance

AbbVie · Mettawa, IL · Full time · Sales

Posted Sep 9, 2026 · We last checked this listing on Oct 6, 2026

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Likely interview questions for this role

Written from this job description, not a generic list. Each one notes what the interviewer is really checking.

About your past

What happens in practice when data isn't consistently defined? Give me an example you've seen.

What they are checking: Whether they have seen the real costs of inconsistent data firsthand, which makes their case for governance more convincing.

You'd partner with data strategy, analytics and the technology organization. Who resists governance most, and how do you handle it?

What they are checking: Whether they honestly recognize where resistance to governance comes from and have practical ways to work through it.

What would you do

How do you get two functions who define the same business term differently to agree on one definition?

What they are checking: Whether they can bring teams with different definitions to a shared one, which is the hardest practical part of this job.

How do you keep a semantic layer current when the business keeps changing?

What they are checking: Whether they treat the semantic layer as ongoing work, since definitions drift as the business changes over time.

How do you tell a standard that's worth enforcing from one that's just tidy?

What they are checking: Whether they apply governance in proportion to its value, so standards help people rather than burying them in rules.

How do you handle a team that has already built something outside the standard and doesn't want to change it?

What they are checking: Whether they can bring existing work into line with standards without alienating the teams who built it.

This is based at Mettawa. What would you want to know about the current data landscape before you took it?

What they are checking: Whether they ask sensible questions about the current data landscape before joining, showing realistic expectations about the work ahead.

About the work

This role owns governance standards for the semantic and logical data landscape. Explain what semantic governance means in plain terms.

What they are checking: Whether they can explain an abstract data concept in plain language, which they will need to do constantly with business partners.

Walk me through how you'd design a decision framework for approving a semantic standard.

What they are checking: The named deliverable, and whether they can structure a decision process

How would you measure whether governance is working?

What they are checking: Whether they can measure governance by its outcomes, not just its activity, which proves the function's worth to leadership.

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The full job description

As published by AbbVie.

The Associate Director, Data Semantic Governance will shape the strategic direction for how business data is governed and leveraged across the organization, ensuring a trusted, scalable, and AI-ready enterprise foundation. This individual serves as the bridge between business stakeholders, data operations teams (for Commercial and APS), data strategy and BI teams, as well as our BTS (IT) partners. The candidate will own the governance standards and decision framework for AbbVie’s semantic and logical data landscape that ensures data is consistent, interoperable, compliant, and aligned to enterprise priorities. The ideal candidate will bring deep expertise in data governance, semantic architecture, metadata, master data management, and data quality, along with executive presence and the ability to influence and drive alignment across the organization Responsibilities: Strategic Alignment & Semantic Governance Partner with Data Strategy, Analytics, and BTS (IT) teams to design a Semantic Governance process. Collaborate with BTS to define and approve semantic layer design, ontology mappings, standardize business glossary/terminology, canonical data models, metric definitions, dimensions and hierarchies, entity resolution and master data, data stewardship, metadata, data quality and lineage, search and discovery capabilities “Way of asking AI glossary”, access and governance rules, and consumption interfaces. Use usage patterns, feedback, and issue trends to improve semantic models. Develop and implement standardized templates for AI agents to promote consistency, scalability, and ease of use. Establish and evolve enterprise data governance frameworks. Serve as the governance liaison between APEX business teams and BTS to align execution with commercial strategy, enterprise transformation goals, privacy & compliance, and AI enablement. Execution, Data Quality & Optimization Define and operationalize business-driven data quality rules, anomaly detection, and monitoring protocols to strengthen trust in enterprise data. Partner with data stewards and IT teams to ensure data assets are cataloged, sensitivity-classified, and tagged with end-to-end lineage. Review data health score for completeness, consistency, accuracy, timeliness, and usability. Support quality scorecards, controls, and periodic governance reviews. Drive compliance-by-design across the enterprise data ecosystem and support proof-of-concepts for emerging semantic, metadata, and data governance technologies. Enterprise Influence & Strategic Enablement Influence senior stakeholders by clearly articulating how data governance and business architecture drive enterprise value. Represent the data governance function in executive forums, governance councils, and strategic working groups, while fostering cross-functional alignment around shared standards, stewardship expectations, and future-state data capabilities. Provide strategic oversight into initiatives, partners, and vendors supporting enterprise data governance priorities, and support investment decisions by connecting governance capabilities to enterprise outcomes and long-term value creation. • A bachelor’s degree or master’s degree in information systems, Business Analytics, Computer Science, or a related field is required. • 7+ years of progressive experience in data governance, business data architecture, or data management, acting as the bridge between business strategy and IT execution. • Deep expertise with data governance and cataloging platforms (e.g., Alation, Collibra) and Master Data Management (MDM) platforms (e.g., Reltio, Informatica). • Advanced knowledge of conceptual and logical data modeling, business glossaries, data lineage, and semantic layer design. • Strong proficiency in SQL for data profiling, querying, and quality assessment. • Solid understanding of cloud data ecosystems (Snowflake, AWS, Azure) to effectively partner with and guide BTS engineering teams. • Proven ability to author enterprise data standards and drive adherence across diverse business units and analytics users. • Prior experience in the Pharma/Life Sciences industry is highly preferred. • Excellent communication and technical translation skills; able to distill complex architectural concepts into clear business value for non-technical stakeholders. Applicable only to applicants applying to a position in any location with pay disclosure requirements under state or local law: ​ • The compensation range described below is the range of possible base pay compensation that the Company believes in good faith it will pay for this role at the time of this posting based on the job grade for this position. Individual compensation paid within this range will depend on many factors including geographic location, and we may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range. This range may be modified in the future. ​ • We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including paid time off (vacation, holidays, sick), medical/dental/vision insurance and 401(k) to eligible employees.​ • This job is eligible to participate in our long-term incentive programs. Note: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, incentive, benefits, or any other form of compensation and benefits that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole and absolute discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole and absolute discretion, consistent with applicable law.​ AbbVie is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to operating with integrity, driving innovation, transforming lives and serving our community.  Equal Opportunity Employer/Veterans/Disabled. US & Puerto Rico only - to learn more, visit https://www.abbvie.com/join-us/equal-employment-opportunity-employer.html US & Puerto Rico applicants seeking a reasonable accommodation, click here to learn more: https://www.abbvie.com/join-us/reasonable-accommodations.html

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