Senior Medical Director, Clinical Development

Who We Are:


Xenon Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:XENE) is a neuroscience-focused biopharmaceutical company dedicated to drug discovery, clinical development, and commercialization of life-changing therapeutics for patients in need. We are looking for great people who thrive in a respectful, collaborative, inclusive, and productive culture to join the Xenon team.


What We Do:


We are advancing an exciting product pipeline to address indications with high unmet medical need, including epilepsy and depression. Our flagship azetukalner program represents the most advanced, clinically validated potassium channel modulator in late-stage clinical development for multiple indications. Building upon the positive results and compelling data from our Phase 2b “X-TOLE” study in adult patients with focal epilepsy, our Phase 3 epilepsy program includes multiple clinical trials evaluating azetukalner in patients with focal onset seizures and primary generalized tonic-clonic seizures. In August 2025, we announced the completement of patient recruitment in our Phase 3 X-TOLE2 study and topline data are anticipated in early 2026. We also have multiple Phase 3 azetukalner clinical trials in major depressive disorder (MDD) and bipolar depression (BPD) underway, based on topline data from our Phase 2 “X-NOVA” clinical trial. In addition, we are proud of the leading-edge science coming out of our discovery labs, including early-stage research programs that leverage our extensive ion channel expertise and drug discovery capabilities to identify validated drug targets and develop new product candidates, and have recently initiated Phase 1 studies for our follow-on Kv7 channel opener, XEN1120, and our lead Nav1.7 development candidate, XEN1701, in pain. Backed by a strong balance sheet to support our growth plans, we continue to build a fully integrated, premier neuroscience company with strong discovery, clinical development, corporate, and commercial operations.


About the Role:


We are seeking a Senior Medical Director, Clinical Development to join our team. This incumbent is a key contributor to clinical development of the Company’s portfolio of products and product candidates from Discovery to Phase 3 and post-approval activities, focusing on leadership of clinical studies and programs as required, medical leadership, medical and safety monitoring (as Medical Monitor) for assigned company’s products. The Senior Medical Director, Clinical Development will have medical knowledge of psychiatry and preferably neurology, recent development advances in psychiatric therapeutics landscape, relevant drug development experience, be a collaborative, inspirational, resilient leader, have a broad strategic view of therapeutic area and be well-versed in high quality trial execution. Ability for highly collaborative approach to working with others across a range of Discovery, Clinical Development, and Commercial functions is an expectation. The Senior Medical Director, Clinical Development will interact with all levels of internal staff as well as external stakeholders, including, but not limited to Key Opinion Leaders, Advisory Boards and Committees, and Health Authorities.

This position reports to Vice President, Clinical Development, Psychiatry and will be located in the Boston, MA, USA location; we may consider other locations for an exceptional candidate.

RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Lead and manage clinical development studies in psychiatry, including design and medical oversight throughout clinical development stages in collaboration with internal colleagues.
• Ability to serves as medical monitor (MM) and interact collaboratively, collegially and competently with clinical research sites and investigators globally, to represent the Company, Product and protocol in the most optimal manner.
• Contribute to the preparation and on-going revisions and strategy of Clinical Development Plans for assigned products and product candidates, collaborating with other key internal functions including Translational Drug Development, Biostatistics, Clinical Operations, Regulatory, Medical Affairs and Commercial.
• Provide strategic and scientific leadership for trial designs, both standard and novel for both large and rare disease indications.
• Review scientific literature and develop product and indication knowledge to understand and effectively communicate information relating to products, product candidates and therapeutic areas.
• Serve as therapeutic area expert to provide scientific input into the development, execution, and communication of clinical trial(s).
• Maintain a high degree of awareness of the external research and regulatory environments and track emerging study data to ensure appropriateness of clinical development plans and trial endpoints.
• In collaboration with internal colleagues, identify and build rel