AI Program Lead

Exciting News – We’re Moving!  

As part of our continued growth and our commitment to fostering an exceptional, collaborative work environment, we’re thrilled to announce that our office will be relocating to a brand-new building at 2000 Innovation Drive, Wexford PA 15090 at the beginning of this year. In the meantime, hybrid employees will continue working from our current location at RIDC – O’Hara until the transition is complete.  

We’re excited about this next chapter and look forward to welcoming new team members to our growing organization!

The AI Lead is responsible for driving meaningful business value from AI at Armada. This role focuses on partnering with business leaders to identify high-value problems to solve with AI, shaping feasible approaches, and leading delivery in an environment where clarity emerges through iteration. The AI Lead is expected to bring strong opinions, technical judgment, and the credibility to push back on ideas that are unlikely to deliver value or succeed in practice. This role serves as the lead for Armada’s AI program, ensuring AI initiatives are intentionally prioritized, coordinated, and measured as part of a broader roadmap rather than executed as disconnected efforts.

This is a leadership role that blends technical understanding, stakeholder management, and delivery discipline. It is not a heavy programming role, but it does require deep understanding of how different AI approaches work and when they should (or should not) be used. AI solutions should be built pragmatically, leveraging the Microsoft ecosystem and off-the-shelf tools where appropriate, while avoiding unnecessary complexity or one-off implementations that won’t scale with a small team.

RESPONSIBILITIE

• Lead AI initiatives from idea to outcome
• Partner with stakeholders to clarify decisions, workflows, and constraints
• Shape ambiguous problems into solvable AI initiatives
• Maintain focus on measurable value, not experimentation for its own sake
• Define and evolve the Applied AI roadmap
• Establish near- and medium-term priorities aligned to business value
• Balance quick wins with longer-term capability building
• Adjust direction as business needs, data readiness, and technology evolve
• Apply sound judgment across AI approaches
• Evaluate and select between:
  • AI agents and copilots
  • LLM-driven automation and reasoning
  • Computer vision
  • Traditional ML and data-driven techniques
• Avoid forcing AI where simpler solutions are more effective

Supervisory Responsibilities

May have 1-5 direct reports, including AI developers, data engineers, or analysts.

QUALIFICATIONS

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in computer information systems or related field and/or proven knowledge & skill in AI, ML, and analytics.
• Minimum five years of experience, with at least 2 in project/program management, facilitation, or leadership role.
• Recent experience working with Azure, Fabric, and Power Platform. 
•  Ability to analyze complex technical and management problems and determine the most cost-effective solutions.
• Comprehensive knowledge of business practices and procedures, financial systems and controls, computer skills, and financial analysis techniques.
• Demonstrated ability to establish and maintain effective working relationships, to communicate clearly orally and in writing, and to influence when incumbent has no formal authority.
• Ability to communicate effectively with executive management and other senior level professionals.

Desired Qualifications:

• Strong business acumen, with the ability to understand business objectives, operational constraints, and decision-making contexts, and translate them into applied AI initiatives.

• Experience leading end-to-end AI or data-driven initiatives in a cloud-based environment, accounting for considerations such as:
  •  Value realization and ROI measurement
  •  Cost awareness and optimization
  • Security and access controls
  • Data privacy and responsible AI considerations
  • Monitoring solution health, adoption, and effectiveness
  • Governance around data usage, AI outputs, and decision support

• Strong understanding of applied AI approaches, including:
  • AI agents and copilot
  • LLM-based automation, classification, and reasoning
  • Traditional ML concepts (training, inference, evaluation, drift)
  • Computer vision fundamentals (where applicable)
• Experience shaping and prioritizing work across multiple initiatives, including:
• • Defining roadmaps and sequencing work
  • Establishing success metrics prior to delivery
  • Evaluating tradeoffs across value, feasibility, and risk
• Familiarity with the Microsoft analytics and AI ecosystem, such as:
• • Microsoft Fabric
  • Copilot Studio and Power Automate
  • Azure-based data and AI services (at a conceptual and architectural level)
  • Ability to work effectively with technical teams and partners
  • Leading and guiding developers without needing to write production code
  • Collaborating with internal teams or external partners for advanced modeling or analytics

Physical demands and work environment

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job.  Reasonable accommodation may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. 

• This is a hybrid position and work is sometimes performed in an office environment with normal noise levels.
• Involves prolonged sitting and computer usage.
• Position is headquartered in Wexford, Pennsylvania.           

Disclaimer

This job description is not intended, and should not be construed to be, an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, skills, efforts or working conditions associated with the job.  It is intended, however, to be an accurate reflection of those principal job elements essential for making decisions related to job performance, employee development and compensation.  As such, the incumbent may perform other duties and responsibilities as required.  Its contents imply no contractual obligation and may be changed by the company at any time.