Employee Benefits Manager

Benefits Manager

Job Description Summary

#LI-Hybrid

Location: Hyderabad, India

About The Role

As a Benefits Manager, you will be accountable for developing and managing a multi‑country benefits strategy, including benefit design and end‑to‑end operations. This role involves leading negotiations with benefits vendors and service providers, and making informed decisions on the implementation of new or renewed benefit programs aligned with local market benchmarks and the Novartis global benefits strategy.

You will lead and develop a team of Benefits Experts to ensure seamless execution of day‑to‑day benefits operations, adherence to device governance metrics, and compliance with established standards. Driving process excellence through benefits automation, efficiency improvements, AI‑enabled standardization, and data‑driven dashboards will be key performance expectations and critical to career progression in the role.

From a people leadership perspective, you will have managerial responsibility for maintaining strong partnerships with internal stakeholders across Finance, Procurement, and HR, as well as managing relationships with external benefits vendors and brokers.

Job Description

Key Responsibilities

• Review and analyze the local benefit programs as necessary to ensure they are efficient, market competitive, attractive to employees, compliant with local regulatory requirements, and aligned with global benefit principles.
• Responsible for participating in local benefits survey and data submission. Analyze survey results, benchmark local benefits against the market data, and share findings with local stakeholders.
• Manage benefit policy/program renewals, vendor changes, and new program expansions with the support of the cluster benefits lead, local brokers, and procurement to leverage Novartis' global/regional purchasing power.
• Manage the global benefits database for the respective country's benefits plans.
• Support local & global stakeholders in local benefit projects, i.e. new benefits implementation, global rollouts, M&A, etc.
• Support local P&O in ERG discussions to gather feedback on employee benefits programs.
• Submit changes or new benefit proposals for review/information to cluster benefits lead according to the benefits governance framework.
• Prepare periodical reports required for legislative bodies, external vendors, unions, payroll, etc.
• Develop and deliver training and consulting to the country organization on any benefits-related programs & processes.
• Manage the benefits admin experts on day-to-day operational activities and their performance.
• Act as a 1st-level escalation point to employees, country P&O head, and PS&S teams.
• Work closely with P&O PP and external benefits vendors to ensure that the day-to-day administration of the programs is operating efficiently.
• Train the admin experts on benefits SOPs, processes, benefits technology, etc.
• Prepares or reviews process maps with the help of Benefits experts.
• Thrive for process improvements and initiate related projects.
• Acts as a deputy and 2nd line of control to the cluster benefits lead.

Essential Requirements:

• University degree, preferable in economics, mathematics, accounting or equivalent experience
• Minimum 5 years of experience in managing employee benefits processes for large and mid-sized organizations
• Should have managed a team
• Should have handled and worked on Benefits technology platforms (Darwin, Benify etc.)
• Should demonstrate good knowledge of benefits ecosystem and prevalence, understanding of regulatory norms around insurance, pensions etc. for countries managed  
• Good understanding of logical, rules-based software systems

Desirable Requirements:

• Experience in Global/ MNC organizations
• Should have managed stakeholders across different functions

Skills Desired

Compensation & Benefits, Compensations Management (Employees), Employee Relationship Management (Erm), Equity incentive management, Hr Administration, HRIS (Human Resource Management System), Hr Operations (Hr Ops), Hr Policies, HR Service Delivery, HR Strategy, Human Resource Management System, Human Resources (HR), Job Evaluation, Labor Law, Management Skills, Organizational Development (OD), Service Delivery Management

Experience Level

Mid Level