Workday Optimization Programme Leader

• Location: Barcelona, Spain

About the role

As Workday Optimization Programme Leader within our Digital People & Culture (P&C) and People Services team, you'll lead a multi-year, high-impact programme to optimise Sanofi's Workday platform — driving process excellence, data integrity, and AI-readiness across a global organisation. This is a fixed-term role of approximately 24 months, operating at the heart of Sanofi's Leap strategy. You'll work alongside senior stakeholders, a Lead Workday Architect, a PMO Lead, and a third-party implementation partner to deliver measurable, lasting transformation.

About Sanofi

Sanofi is a global biopharmaceutical company dedicated to supporting people through their health challenges, committed to chasing the miracles of science to improve people's lives. Our team across some 100 countries transforms the practice of medicine — providing life-changing treatments and life-saving vaccines to millions globally, with sustainability and social responsibility at the center of our ambitions. Our values — Aim Higher, Act for Patients, Be Bold, and Lead Together — guide everything we do. 

Main Responsibilities

• Lead the end-to-end functional Workday programme optimization, mobilizing cross-functional teams across People Services, Digital, Talent, Total Rewards, Workforce Planning, and HR Business Partners to deliver design, testing, and deployment waves on time and to plan.

• Own business outcomes and programme scope, ensuring deliverables, acceptance criteria, and milestones are clearly defined and met — managing change orders and preventing scope drift in close partnership with Procurement, Legal, and the PMO.

• Partner with the Lead Workday Architect, PMO, and a third-party implementation partner on configuration governance, integrated planning, risk management, and executive reporting — translating functional decisions into scalable platform design.

• Drive change management and adoption, leading impact assessments, readiness tracking, training, and communications to ensure sustained behaviour change and measurable user adoption across the organisation.

• Ensure delivery excellence, defining acceptance criteria for each deployment wave, leading user acceptance testing, orchestrating go-live and hypercare, and tracking key performance indicators such as time-to-hire, compensation cycle throughput, and self-service adoption.

• Monitor and prioritise platform enhancements, staying ahead of Workday release impacts and working with technical and HR Operations teams to continuously improve user experience and business value.

About You

• Experience: Proven background in global HR transformation and HRIS programme leadership, including hands-on experience with Workday (or a comparable platform) across multiple modules in complex, international organisations; end-to-end deployment and optimisation experience in matrixed environments.

• Soft and technical skills: Strong programme governance and vendor management capabilities; demonstrated ability to own Statements of Work and manage scope and change control with system integrators; solid change management credentials (e.g., Prosci or ACMP) with a track record of driving adoption at scale; ability to peer-coach technical teams while maintaining functional accountability; inclusive leadership style with the ability to energise global teams and navigate ambiguity.

• Education: Bachelor's degree in Business, HR, or a related field; advanced degree is a plus. Workday functional certifications and/or change management certifications are preferred but not essential.

• Languages: Fluency in English is required; additional European languages are a plus.

Why Choose Us?

• Chase the miracles of science alongside a supportive, forward-thinking team committed to making a real difference for patients.

• Grow without limits — whether through a promotion, a lateral move, or an international opportunity, your development is in your hands.

• Be rewarded for your impact with a thoughtful, competitive rewards package that recognises your contribution.

• Thrive personally and professionally with comprehensive health and wellbeing benefits, including high-quality healthcare, prevention and wellness programmes, etc.

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