Christina Seckar (Past Speaker)

Christina “Chris” Seckar is the Executive Director of Human Resources for the Discovery, Pre-clinical and Early Development (DPED) organization within Merck Research Laboratories.  In this role, Chris has responsibility for all Human Resources needs for the team developing the organization’s early pipeline, which is key to Merck’s strategy.  With over 23 years of experience in HR, Chris provides coaching and executive leadership support to the DPED team on talent strategy, workforce and team effectiveness and career development. 

Chris joined Merck (formerly Schering-Plough Corporation) in 2007 and has progressed through roles of increasing responsibility providing strategic HR support to leaders in a number of Merck’s major divisions and corporate functions including, Research and Development, Human Health, Animal Health, Consumer Health and Corporate Finance.  Prior to joining Merck, Chris held a variety of human resource roles at Schlumberger, the world’s leading supplier of technology, project management and information solutions to the oil and gas industry and Genex Services, a leader in medical cost containment and disability services.  Chris has lived and worked in Australia, the United Kingdom and Switzerland in addition to her home country of the United States.

Chris holds a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Lafayette College in Easton Pennsylvania, and a Master of Arts in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from West Chester University in West Chester, Pennsylvania. Chris lives in Morristown, New Jersey.