Senior Director, Tax

Company Description

Guardant Health is a leading precision oncology company focused on guarding wellness and giving every person more time free from cancer. Founded in 2012, Guardant® is transforming patient care and accelerating new cancer therapies by providing critical insights into what drives disease through its advanced blood and tissue tests, real-world data and AI analytics. Guardant tests help improve outcomes across all stages of care, including screening to find cancer early, monitoring for recurrence in early-stage cancer, and treatment selection for patients with advanced cancer. For more information, visit guardanthealth.com and follow the company on LinkedIn, X (Twitter) and Facebook.

Guardant Health is seeking a strategic and hands-on Senior Director, Tax to lead the Company's global tax function. As the most senior tax professional within the organization, this role will have overall responsibility for the Company's income tax accounting, compliance, reporting, planning, transfer pricing, indirect tax, tax controversy, and tax-related business initiatives.

Reporting to the Senior Vice President, Chief Accounting Officer, the Senior Director, Tax will serve as a trusted advisor to executive leadership and key business partners across Finance, Legal, Treasury, Human Resources, FP&A, Procurement, and Operations. This role will be responsible for developing and executing the Company's global tax strategy, ensuring compliance with applicable tax laws and regulations, managing relationships with external tax advisors and service providers, and supporting strategic growth initiatives, international expansion, and business transformation efforts. The Senior Director, Tax will serve as the primary owner of the Company's tax function, providing strategic leadership, technical guidance, and oversight of all tax-related activities.

The ideal candidate combines deep technical tax expertise with strong business acumen and leadership capabilities and thrives in a dynamic, high-growth public company environment with international operations.

Primary Responsibilities:

Tax Accounting & Reporting

• Lead quarterly and annual income tax accounting under ASC 740, including preparation and review of tax provisions, effective tax rate analysis, deferred tax calculations, uncertain tax positions, and related disclosures.
• Ensure accurate tax reporting for SEC filings, financial statements, and management reporting.
• Partner closely with Corporate Accounting and Financial Reporting teams during monthly, quarterly, and annual close cycles.
• Review and improve tax-related controls and SOX compliance activities.

Global Tax Compliance

• Oversee all federal, state, local, and international tax compliance activities.
• Manage external tax service providers responsible for preparation and filing of tax returns.
• Monitor legislative and regulatory developments and assess impacts to the Company.
• Ensure timely completion of tax filings, estimated payments, extensions, and reporting requirements.

Tax Planning & Strategy

• Develop and execute tax planning initiatives aligned with business objectives.
• Identify and implement opportunities to optimize the Company's effective tax rate, cash tax position, and utilization of tax attributes.
• Provide tax guidance and recommendations to executive leadership.
• Lead tax analysis and execution support for acquisitions, restructurings, financing arrangements, international expansion, and other strategic transactions.
• Support tax due diligence, integration planning, and structuring for acquisitions, investments, licensing arrangements, and other strategic transactions.
• Evaluate and develop strategies related to tax attributes, including net operating losses, tax credits, and ownership change considerations.
• Navigate optimal utilization of net operating losses.
• Periodic evaluation of valuation allowance on net deferred tax assets.

International Tax & Transfer Pricing

• Oversee global tax structures and international tax compliance requirements.
• Manage transfer pricing policies, documentation, and intercompany arrangements.
• Partner with international finance teams to ensure tax-efficient operational structures.
• Monitor emerging global tax legislation and regulatory developments, including international tax reform initiatives, and assess impacts to the Company.
• Optimize global tax planning to achieve a balance between tax efficient structures and our ability to repatriate cash as needed, including regular evaluations of whether the company is permanently reinvested as applicable in international jurisdictions.

Indirect Tax

• Oversee sales and use tax, VAT/GST, property tax, and other indirect tax obligations.
• Manage nexus assessments and compliance processes.
• Support implementation and enhancement of indirect tax automation solutions.
• Optimize utilization of available R&D tax credits.

Tax Risk Management

• Lead tax audits, inquiries, and examinations.
• Manage relationships with tax authorities and external advisors.
• Assess tax risks and develop mitigation strategies.
• Maintain strong internal controls over tax processes.
• Resolve tax audits, notices, examinations, and inquiries across domestic and international jurisdictions.

Business Partnership & Leadership

• Serve as the Company's primary tax subject matter expert.
• Provide guidance to Accounting, Treasury, Legal, HR, Procurement, and FP&A on tax matters.
• Support strategic initiatives, system implementations, process improvements, and finance transformation efforts.
• Manage external tax consultants and future internal tax team resources.
• Build scalable tax processes, documentation, and governance frameworks.
• Partner with FP&A on forecasting and modeling of effective tax rate, cash taxes, and tax-related business impacts.
• Identify and implement opportunities to improve tax processes, controls, automation, and use of technology.
• Evaluate staffing needs and build the tax organization as the company continues to scale.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Accounting, Finance, Taxation, or related field; CPA required.
• Master's in Taxation (MST) or other advanced tax credential preferred.
• 15+ years of progressive tax experience, including a combination of Big Four/public accounting and corporate tax leadership experience within a publicly traded multinational organization.
• Strong technical expertise in ASC 740, U.S. federal and state taxation, international taxation, transfer pricing, and tax planning.
• Experience serving in a leadership role responsible for tax accounting, reporting, and compliance within a publicly traded multinational company.
• Demonstrated experience managing global tax compliance, tax provision, audits, and tax controversy matters.
• Experience supporting multinational operations and navigating complex international tax regulations and emerging global tax reform initiatives, including transition to positive tax income and utilization of NOLs.
• Proven ability to develop and implement tax strategies that support business growth while minimizing tax risk.
• Demonstrated ability to communicate complex tax matters to executive leadership, auditors, and non-tax stakeholders.
• Experience managing external tax advisors, consultants, and service providers.
• Strong knowledge of internal controls, SOX compliance, and tax governance frameworks.
• Experience with ERP and tax technology platforms such as Oracle Fusion, Vertex, or similar systems.
• Strong business acumen with the ability to partner effectively across Finance, Legal, Treasury, HR, FP&A, Procurement, and executive leadership teams.
• Demonstrated leadership capabilities, including the ability to influence stakeholders, lead cross-functional initiatives, and build scalable processes in a growing organization.
• Experience in life sciences, healthcare, biotechnology, diagnostics, medical device, or other highly regulated industries is preferred.

AI & Digital Fluency

• Demonstrate curiosity, sound judgment, and the ability to critically evaluate and responsibly leverage AI-enabled tools in accordance with company policies, ethical standards, and regulatory requirements to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and quality of work.

Hybrid Work Model: This section is applicable to onsite employees who are eligible for hybrid work location as specified by management and related policies.  Guardant has defined days for in-person/onsite collaboration and work-from-home days for individual-focused time. All U.S. employees who live within 50 miles of a Guardant facility will be required to be onsite on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. We have found aligning our scheduled in-office days allows our teams to do the best work and creates the focused thinking time our innovative work requires. At Guardant, our work model has created flexibility for better work-life balance while keeping teams connected to advance our science for our patients.

The annualized base salary ranges for the primary location and any additional locations are listed below. This range does not include benefits or, if applicable, bonus, commission, or equity. Each candidate’s compensation offer will be based on multiple factors including, but not limited to, geography, experience, education, job-related skills, job duties, and business need.

Primary Location: Palo Alto, CA
Primary Location Base Pay Range: $273,200 - $375,650
Other US Location(s) Base Pay Range: $232,220 - $319,303
If the role is performed in Colorado, the pay range for this job is: $245,880 - $338,085