Marvin H. Johnson Jr.
Penn State Class of 1984
Mr. Johnson will share personal and professional lessons from his distinguished career leading large-scale global pharmaceutical sales and marketing initiatives worth more than $3 billion in revenue.
Marvin Johnson’s career at Merck & Co. (MRK), a research-intensive worldwide biopharmaceutical company, spanned nearly 35 years of diverse and increasing responsibilities in sales, marketing, and operational support leadership positions before he retired in 2018.
His experience extended across regional, national, and global books of business and therapeutic categories including diabetes, acute care, neurology, respiratory, cardiovascular, pain management, and sleep disorders.
Although the majority of his work was within commercial operations, in his last role at Merck he served as the chief learning officer (CLO) for Global Learning and Development reporting to the executive vice president of human resources and serving on the enterprise’s senior human resources leadership team. Mr. Johnson led a transformational initiative to modernize Global Learning and Development and strengthen Merck’s position as a high-performance learning organization by building people capabilities through relevant, continuous learning experiences that are personalized, adaptive, and easy to find, consume, and apply. His team was nationally recognized by the training industry for its success in evolving its operating model to deliver impactful learning solutions resulting in improved business outcomes and enhanced learner experiences.
Previously, Mr. Johnson was the vice president of the U.S. Human Health Commercial Operations Group for the Primary Care Sales division and, prior to that, global brand leader for Merck’s migraine franchise where he successfully led worldwide product launches.
He began his career as a professional sales representative at Merck after graduating with a bachelor’s degree in marketing from Penn State.
Mr. Johnson is a member of the board of directors of Trevena, a biopharmaceutical company, and Marinus Pharmaceuticals. He is the chair of the board of trustees for Tabor Children’s Services, a nonprofit child welfare agency. Mr. Johnson serves on the board of Woods Services, which supports children, adolescents, and adults with complex medical and behavioral health care needs, as well as the Penn State Abington Advisory Board.