Senior Director, Clinical Quality Assurance (CQA)
- Employer
- 4D Molecular Therapeutics
- Location
- Remote, United States
- Posted date
- Sep 28, 2026
View more categories
- Discipline
- Clinical, Quality, Clinical Research, Quality Assurance, Quality Control
- Required Education
- Bachelors Degree
- Position Type
- Consultant
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Job Details
Attention recruitment agencies: All agency inquiries are vetted through 4DMT’s internal Talent Acquisition team. No unsolicited resumes will be accepted. The 4DMT Talent Acquisition team must expressly engage agencies on any requisition. Agencies contacting hiring managers directly will not be tolerated, and doing so may impact your ability to work with 4DMT in the future.
4DMT is a leading late-stage biotechnology company advancing durable and disease-targeted therapeutics with potential to transform treatment paradigms and provide unprecedented benefits to patients. The Company’s lead product candidate 4D-150 is designed to be a backbone therapy forming the foundation of treatment of blinding retinal vascular diseases by providing multi-year sustained delivery of anti-VEGF (aflibercept and anti-VEGF-C) with a single, safe, intravitreal injection, which substantially reduces the treatment burden associated with current bolus injections. The Company’s lead indication for 4D-150 is wet age-related macular degeneration, which is currently in Phase 3 development, and second indication is diabetic macular edema. The Company’s second product candidate is 4D-710, which is the first known genetic medicine to demonstrate successful delivery and expression of the CFTR transgene in the lungs of people with cystic fibrosis after aerosol delivery
GENERAL SUMMARY
The Senior Director of Clinical Quality Assurance (CQA) will provide strategic and operational Quality Assurance leadership and oversight for multiple, registrational, global 4DMT-sponsored clinical trials, ensuring trials are executed in compliance with applicable international regulatory requirements for Good Clinical Practice (GCP).
This position reports to the Executive Director, Quality Assurance and is accountable for advancing the CQA mission, objectives, and strategic plan through proactive quality strategy, risk-based oversight, inspection readiness, and continuous improvement of clinical quality systems.
MAJOR DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES:
Provide strategic Quality leadership and oversight for multiple 4DMT Clinical Studies, including the followingstudy-specific activities:
Serve as a senior Quality partner to clinical study teams and leadership, providing guidance on GCP, ICH E6, and related regulations and guidance,, decision support, and escalation recommendations, including via attendance at Study team meetings, quality governance forums, and escalation discussions related to Clinical Study Quality Events.
Lead the development, implementation, and governance of Clinical Study Quality Plans for specific 4DMT clinical studies, with accountability for protecting subject safety/rights, data integrity, and GCP compliance across assigned studies and associated vendors.
Manage, mentor, and develop Clinical QA staff and consultants; establish clear goals, development plans, and succession depth.
Define, plan, perform, and/or oversee risk-based GCP Compliance audits of high-risk clinical vendors/sites, including clinical investigator sites
Ensure audit findings, quality risks, and CAPA commitments are communicated to senior stakeholders and collaborate with auditees and vendors to track, review, approve, assess the adequacy of CAPAs, and ensure timely escalation of unresolved or recurring issues
Provide senior Quality review and strategic input on Clinical documents, ensuring quality, accuracy, completeness, and inspection readiness of key clinical and regulatory documents, including as applicable Clinical Protocols, IBs, DSURs, Module 2.6 and 2.7 Tabulated and Written Summaries, and Integrated Summaries.
Lead and/or provide oversight for investigation and management of significant Clinical Study Quality Events:
Identify, communicate, and escalate significant incidents of GCP non-compliance, quality risks, and inspection-readiness concerns, and drive timely resolution, ensuring appropriate executive visibility, escalation, and risk-based decision-making.
Provide QA oversight for formal corrective and preventive actions (CAPAs), ensuring actions are risk-based, effective, timely, and appropriately escalated to address identified Clinical Study Quality Events, including potential serious breaches of GCP.
Partner with CMC Quality, Clinical Operations, and senior cross-functional stakeholders to facilitate the investigation, escalation, and resolution of clinical supply quality issues such as temperature excursions, product complaints, and deviations reported from clinical sites, ensuring appropriate risk assessment, stakeholder communication, and CAPA linkage when applicable.
Champion and advance a culture of quality that fosters learning, respect, open communication, collaboration, integration, and teamwork:
Oversee and provide strategic direction for development of GCP compliance training materials and delivery of training to strengthen clinical quality culture and inspection readiness.
Partner with Clinical Operations, Clinical Development, Biometrics, Data Management, Medical Affairs, and Regulatory Affairs to embed proactive quality and risk management into study design and conduct.
Lead the development and continuous improvement of the Clinical Quality Management system through the development / refinement of Clinical QA processes
Lead preparedness / readiness / management of BIMO / GCP inspections:
Define and lead GCP inspection readiness strategy, plans, and cross-functional readiness activities, including readiness governance, mock inspection support, inspection logistics, and issue escalation
Host, lead, and/or provide senior Quality support for GCP-related inspections
QUALIFICATIONS:
Education:
Bachelor's degree in a life science, nursing, pharmacy, or related field; advanced degree (MS, PharmD, PhD) preferred.
Experience in Ophthalmology is highly desired
Experience:
12+ years of experience or advanced degree with 10+ years of experience within a regulated environment such as Regulatory, Quality, Pharmacovigilance or Clinical Development / Operations within the Biotech or similar Industry
Proven experience leading Clinical quality strategy, quality governance, and senior-level quality oversight of global clinical trials and associated vendors
Minimum of 7 years of significant experience in clinical quality assurance, including experience leading, performing, and/or providing senior oversight of GCP audits and global clinical trials.
Experience hosting, leading, and supporting health authority inspections, including inspection readiness preparation, front-room/back-room support, response coordination, and follow-up commitment management
Extensive practical experience and understanding of clinical quality assurance applied throughout the clinical development life-cycle
Demonstrated ability to influence senior cross-functional stakeholders, lead complex clinical quality initiatives, and provide mentorship or functional leadership within Clinical QA
Other Qualifications/Skills:
Expert understanding of GCP requirements for investigational products and the ability to interpret and apply requirements strategically across clinical programs
Executive-level communication skills, both oral and written, with ability to present quality risks, recommendations, and inspection-readiness status to senior stakeholders
Strong leadership, influencing, and interpersonal skills, with a collaborative approach to driving alignment across Clinical, Quality, Regulatory, and external vendor stakeholders
Demonstrated ability to operate independently in a fast-paced small company environment, prioritize complex workstreams, make risk-based decisions with minimal direction, and adjust quickly to changing business priorities
Travel: %5
Physical Requirements and Working Conditions:
Physical Activity - Repetitive motions: Making substantial movements (motions) of the wrists, hands, and/or fingers. Fingering: Picking, pinching, typing or otherwise working, primarily with fingers rather than with whole hand or arm as in handling. Talking: Expressing or exchanging ideas by means of the spoken word.
Physical Requirements - Sedentary work: Exerting up to 10 pounds of force occasionally and/or a negligible amount of force frequently or constantly to lift, carry, push, pull or otherwise move objects, including the human body. Sedentary work involves sitting most of the time. Jobs are sedentary if walking and standing are required only occasionally, and all other sedentary criteria are met.
Working Conditions - The worker is not substantially exposed to adverse environmental conditions (as in typical office or administrative work).
Base salary compensation range: $245,000 - 286,000
Please note, the base salary compensation range and actual salary offered to the final candidate depends on various factors: candidate’s geographical location, relevant work experience, skills, and years of experience.
4DMT provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, marital status, status as a covered veteran, and any other category protected under applicable federal, state, provincial and local laws.
Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities
Company
4DMT is a gene therapy company with a transformative discovery platform --Therapeutic Vector Evolution --that enables our “disease first” approach to product discovery and development, thereby allowing us to customize our AAV vectors to target specific tissue types associated with the underlying disease.
At 4DMT we are creating and developing optimized “biopharmaceutical grade” AAV vectors that will allow us uniquely to unlock the full potential of gene therapy. Our customized and proprietary AAV vectors are each designed, according to a 4DMT Target Vector Profile, to deliver genes to specific cells and tissues in the body to eradicate both rare and large market diseases.
While AAV gene therapy pioneers are making great strides with the first wave of products, hurdles still exist with the use of conventional vectors. The most commonly used AAV capsids (e.g., AAV2, 5, 8 and 9) were identified either 1) as contaminants in lab stocks of adenovirus, or 2) through monkey tissue processing. Therefore, these conventional vectors are not targeted specifically to any tissue in the body. This can lead to inefficient and non-specific delivery, thus requiring extremely high doses and potentially resulting in toxicities (including inflammation), high manufacturing burdens and suboptimal efficacy. In addition, suboptimal routes of delivery can be required for delivery to the right tissues (e.g., subretinal delivery to the retina). Finally, pre-existing neutralizing antibodies in many patients can limit efficacy, clinical trial enrollment and market sizes. 4DMT Innovation empowers us to create new and improved next generation AAV capsids to allow targeted delivery of our products by the optimal clinical route of administration.
At 4DMT we use our robust discovery platform, termed “Therapeutic Vector Evolution,” to create customized and proprietary gene delivery vehicles (novel AAV vectors) to deliver genes to specific tissues and cells in the body by the optimal route of administration. We use the power of evolution to create and refine these optimized vectors through genetic diversification and then natural selection in vivo.
4D Purpose Statement: Boldly Innovating to Unlock the Full Potential of Gene Therapy for Countless Patients
GUIDING PRINCIPLES
Dare to Cure - Patients are waiting. Create big dreams for patients and take calculated risks to achieve them
Break Boundaries - Question the status quo and innovate beyond conventional approaches
Beyond Yourself - It's about patients, their families, our team, our families. We strengthen each other.
Prepare and Execute Relentlessly - Start with the end in mind, over-prepare and make contingency plans to your contingency plans
We invite all of you who share our passion and vision in creating the ultimate gene therapy products to cure genetic and rare diseases in children and adults. We seek the best people in the industry who identify with our mission and innovative results-driven approach. We offer an inspiring and collaborative environment that encourages individual contributions, recognizes performance in multiple ways, offers generous benefits and provides challenging opportunities for career development.
- Phone
- 510-505-2680
- Location
- 5858 Horton St. Suite 455
Emeryville
California
94608