Head of Digital Workplace

About the Position

Werfen is a family-owned, innovative company founded in Barcelona, Spain. With its headquarters in Barcelona, it operates directly in 30 countries, more than 30 territories through distributors, and with a workforce of over 10,000 employees. Werfen is a specialized diagnostics company committed to providing innovative solutions to hospitals and laboratories, powering patient care around the world.

The Head of Digital Workplace and Collaboration is a role reporting to the Director of Global IT Infrastructure and Support in the IT division. This individual will lead the strategic vision and execution of our digital workplace and collaboration environment. They will play a pivotal role in leveraging technology to enhance employee experience & agility, drive operational efficiencies, and facilitate effective communication and collaboration across the organization.

Key Responsibilities

• Responsible for the global effectiveness and efficiency of all digital workplace solutions including collaboration technologies, device deployment & management, end user storage, desktop virtualization, printing, telephony.
• Collaborate with key stakeholders to understand business needs, identify opportunities, and prioritize initiatives that enhance employee experience, productivity, and satisfaction.
• Develop and drive the strategic roadmap for the digital workplace and collaboration initiatives aligned with the organization's goals and objectives.
• Ensure the scalability, security, and reliability of digital workplace infrastructure to support the evolving needs of the organization.
• Foster a customer-oriented culture, security by design capability, and mindset driven by continual service improvement techniques.
• Define and promote user-centric design principles to enhance the overall digital workplace experience and dexterity for employees.
• Establish governance frameworks, policies, and standards to ensure compliance with regulatory requirements, data security protocols, and industry best practices.
• Monitor and enforce adherence to governance policies, addressing any compliance issues or security vulnerabilities proactively.
• Champion best practices for virtual collaboration, including video conferencing, instant messaging, document collaboration, and project management.
• Analyze data and feedback to identify opportunities for optimization and continuous improvement in digital workplace capabilities.
• Assess and describe capabilities needs, select, recruit, and retain talents based on Digital Workplace & Collaboration and IT division's strategy and objectives.
• Lead the development of training programs, resources, and support mechanisms to promote adoption and proficiency.
• Set yearly performance objectives, conduct performance and salary reviews.
• Develop and control the annual Opex and Capex budgets for Digital Workplace and Collaboration to achieve the annual set targets.
• Define key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics to measure the effectiveness and impact of digital workplace initiatives.
• Oversee the purchasing process together with stakeholders ensuring the selection through RFP (if required), contract negotiation, and signature of technology and services.
• Evaluate, select, and deploy tools and platforms that enable seamless communication, knowledge sharing, and teamwork among employees, regardless of their location or device.
• Manage relationships with technology vendors, service providers, consultants, and associated contracts to ensure the successful delivery of digital workplace solutions and services.

Networking/Key relationships

• End Users
• Infrastructure and Support organization
• IT Leadership Team
• Enterprise Architect
• Information Security
• PMO
• Enterprise Application & Development
• Business stakeholders
• Vendors / Service providers

Requirements

• Master degree or equivalent in Computer Science or in a related field.
• Minimum five years of IT workplace management, leadership responsibilities, managing teams.
• Strategic planning, organization design, and development experience.
• Vendor management and service externalization experience.
• IT transformational initiatives in complex and dynamic environments experience.
• Experience in merger, acquisition, or divestiture, including due diligence, day 1 readiness, and integration/carve-out execution.
• Knowledge of collaboration technologies, device deployment & management, cloud storage, Workplace AI, Desktop virtualization.
• Knowledge of the Enterprise Service Management (ITSM/ITIL).

Skills & Capabilities

• Value-driven mindset embedding security, standardization, user experience, and continuous improvement disciplines.
• Track record of budget and cost management.
• Organized, ability to plan for short-, mid-, and long-term objectives.
• Ability to work independently and take decisions in alignment with management.
• Excellent analytical, problem-solving, and decision-making skills.
• People-, customer-, and service-oriented mindset.
• Communication and persuasion skills.
• Excellent English communication skills (written and oral), at ease interacting with management.

Travel requirements

Travel to main Werfen locations is expected for this position (one visit per quarter, on demand as required).

People Manager Core Competencies

• Building Talent Planning and supporting the development of individuals' knowledge, skills, and abilities so that they can fulfill current or future job responsibilities more effectively.
• Customer Focus Ensuring that the internal or external customer's perspective is a driving force behind strategic priorities, business decisions, organizational processes, and individual activities; crafting and implementing service practices that meet customers' and own organization's needs; promoting and operationalizing customer service as a value.
• Decision Making Identifying and understanding problems and opportunities by gathering, analyzing, and interpreting quantitative and qualitative information; choosing the best course of action by establishing clear decision criteria, generating and evaluating alternatives, and making timely decisions; taking action that is consistent with available facts and constraints and optimizes probable consequences.
• Driving for Results Setting high goals for personal and group accomplishment; using measurement methods to monitor progress toward goals; tenaciously working to meet or exceed goals while deriving satisfaction from that achievement and continuous improvement.
• Driving Innovation Creating an environment (culture) that inspires people to generate novel solutions with measurable value for existing and potential customers (internal or external); encouraging experimentation with new ways to solve work problems and seize opportunities that result in unique and differentiated solutions.
• Emotional Intelligence Essentials Establishing and sustaining trusting relationships by accurately perceiving and interpreting own and others' emotions and behavior; leveraging insights to effectively manage own responses so that one's behavior matches one's values and delivers intended results.

People Manager Accountabilities

Effectively carries out the expectations of Werfen People Managers as defined in Werfen's Role of the Manager program. Among others, this includes maintaining regular, at minimum once a month, and transparent communication with the team through effective use of formal one-on-one meetings with direct reports and team meets. Managing performance issues and conflict proactively; uses judgment in consulting with department leadership and Human Resources. Responsibility for the team's compliance in terms of training, and fulfillment of their tasks and objectives as well as onboarding of new employees and development of the existing team.