Associate Director/Director, Information Security

About this role

Axsome Therapeutics is a biopharmaceutical company leading a new era in the treatment of central nervous system (CNS) conditions. We deliver scientific breakthroughs by identifying critical gaps in care and develop differentiated products with a focus on novel mechanisms of action that enable meaningful advancements in patient outcomes. Our industry-leading neuroscience portfolio includes FDA-approved treatments for major depressive disorder, excessive daytime sleepiness associated with narcolepsy and obstructive sleep apnea, and migraine, and multiple late-stage development programs addressing a broad range of serious neurological and psychiatric conditions that impact over 150 million people in the United States. Together, we are on a mission to solve some of the brain’s biggest problems so patients and their loved ones can flourish. For more information, please visit us at www.axsome.com and follow us on LinkedIn and X.

About This Role

Axsome Therapeutics is seeking an Associate Director/Director Information Security to take a leadership role in threat management, incident response, and vulnerability management functions. Operating as a hands-on leader, this role directs the cybersecurity team and service providers while remaining actively engaged in technical work. The role executes and advances the corporate Information Security Program and Management System owned by the Head of Information Security, and responsible for maintaining our security posture during non-standard hours, including active weekend and evening monitoring and rapid response to high-priority security incidents, and perform additional responsibilities as assigned by IT leadership. The Associate Director/Director Information Security will report to the Sr. Director, Information Security.

This role is based at Axsome’s HQ in New York City with an on-site requirement of at least three days per week. We are unable to consider candidates who are looking for fully remote roles.

Job Responsibilities and Duties include, but are not limited to, the following:

Security Operations & Threat Management

• Lead security monitoring and detection across MSP, SIEM, IDS/IPS, and the broader security toolset; personally triage, analyze, and escalate high-severity alerts

• Set alert prioritization and detection-engineering standards; directly tune detections, correlation rules, and use cases to improve signal quality

• Perform hands-on threat hunting with advanced techniques and tooling; operationalize hunting strategies and resulting mitigations

• Drive continuous improvement of security controls based on threat intelligence, hunt findings, and incident trends

Incident Response

• Act as incident lead for significant business-impact security events, leading identification, containment, eradication, and recovery — including direct investigation and forensic analysis

• Maintain and mature incident response plans, runbooks, and playbooks; alert optimization; design and lead tabletop exercises to validate readiness

• Lead post-incident reviews, author executive-facing reports, and drive remediation of process and control gaps

Vulnerability & Risk Management

• Lead the vulnerability management program; execute or validate scans, analyze results, and confirm remediation

• Apply risk-based prioritization and remediation SLAs aligned to business impact; report progress and residual risk

• Partner with IT Infrastructure & Operations and Application Development to drive timely patching and configuration hardening

Vendor, MSP & Third-Party Risk

• Manage the cybersecurity vendor and MSP relationships; ensure effective service delivery and enforce SLAs

• Define provider KPIs; lead service reviews and drive continuous improvement

• Manage the Third-Party Risk Management (TPRM) program — vendor assessments, risk ratings, contract security requirements, and remediation tracking

Program Support, Awareness & Team Leadership

• Oversee the cybersecurity awareness and training program; champion best practices, measure effectiveness, and drive improvements

• Support security audits and contribute to the continuous improvement of security policies, standards, and procedures within the corporate InfoSec Management System

• Manage the InfoSec project portfolio and directly contribute to technical workstreams as needed

• Manage, mentor, and develop cybersecurity team members while modeling hands-on technical excellence

Data Protection & Insider Risk

• Support data protection initiatives including data classification, DLP monitoring, SaaS security assessments, and insider risk investigations

• Investigate potential data leakage events and coordinate containment activities

Identity & Access Security

• Oversee security requirements related to identity governance, privileged access management (PAM), multifactor authentication (MFA), conditional access, and account lifecycle controls

• Review privileged-access risks and support periodic access recertifications

Cloud Security Governance

• Support cloud security monitoring, hardening, and governance across Microsoft 365, Azure, and AWS environments

• Assist in reviewing and remediating cloud security posture findings, misconfigurations, excessive permissions, and identity-related risks

• Partner with Infrastructure teams to implement Zero Trust security controls

Security Metrics & Executive Reporting

• Develop and maintain cybersecurity KPIs, KRIs, and executive dashboards

• Present operational security metrics, risk trends, and program maturity updates to leadership

Requirements / Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Information Security, or a related field

• 8–10 years of progressive information security experience, including 3+ years leading security operations, incident response, or security engineering functions

• Demonstrated hands-on proficiency with SIEM platforms, EDR/endpoint security, email security, and vulnerability management tooling

•…