Feature
A growing number of enterprises across industries are looking to compete in the AI era by posting newly created senior executive roles to oversee their AI strategy, adoption and product development.
The need for enterprises to build AI teams to develop, implement and use AI technologies is requiring them to create and fill senior executive positions in AI. In the third quarter, there were 31,610 vacancies in the U.S. for AI jobs, a 6.6% increase from the second quarter — and a 37.5% year-over-year increase, according to Veritone, an enterprise AI software company.
The number of senior executive positions to help lead the growing AI teams is considerably lower. There are currently 45 jobs posted at LinkedIn with the title of chief AI officer, VP of AI or head of AI.
Here, we present a complete view of what a sampling of 10 enterprises are looking for in a senior AI executive, including the responsibilities and qualifications.
Table of Contents
- Enterprises Want Guidance From an AI Executive
- 1. Chief AI Officer
- 2. Chief AI Officer
- 3. Head of AI Technology
- 4. Head of AI
- 5. Head of AI
- 6. Vice President, Head of Artificial Intelligence
- 7. VP of AI/ML Platforms & Operations
- 8. Generative AI Vice President
- 9. VP of AI Risk and Governance
- 10. Staff VP of AI Technology
Enterprises Want Guidance From an AI Executive
Throughout the 10 job posts, the overriding need is clear: Enterprises are looking for someone to show them and their teams exactly how to capitalize on artificial intelligence. While the salary, responsibilities and qualifications vary, here's what we found in the group of job postings:
Salary Range
In terms of salary, the low range for most of the senior AI executive salaries starts above the median AI salary of $158,298 reported by Veritone, which includes hands-on veteran software engineers.
The lowest-range salary in the group is $146,400 for the role of VP of AI risk and governance at LPL Financial.
The highest-range salary in the group is $488,000 for the chief AI officer role at LinkedIn.
Key Responsibilities: Build the AI Team and Function
Many of the enterprises looking for senior AI executives are posting somewhat general job responsibilities. This might be because the company’s higher-profile AI function, team and budget are relatively new and works in progress. There might not be precedent for the AI senior roles. Several posts, then, call for the AI executive to build the team as well as take on highly undefined domains, such as ethics and compliance. Most of the positions call for cross-functional and interdepartmental collaboration by the AI executive to embed AI as a core technology enterprise-wide.
Key Qualifications: A Tech Visionary
The enterprises are more specific in the qualifications they’re seeking for senior AI roles. They’re split on the years of experience. Some require many years of experience in tech or AI, and some require five years — or don’t stipulate years at all. What many of the companies do stress is a deep understanding of AI and a leader who has technical skills in coding, cloud computing or data. Notably, many of them want a communicator who can champion AI internally to push buy-in of the technology. Most of the enterprises say they require a visionary high-tech leader who can integrate emerging technology in an organization.
Now, let's explore exactly what the enterprises want in a senior AI leader:
1. Chief AI Officer
Organization
- LinkedIn
Salary
- $298,000 to $488,000
Location
- Mountain View, California
- Remote or hybrid
Job Description: Develop AI Strategy to Improve Company
The chief AI officer at LinkedIn creates and executes the company’s AI strategy, including overseeing AI research and ensuring the alignment of AI initiatives with overall business objectives. The CAIO collaborates with senior leaders to identify opportunities where AI can provide competitive advantages, enhance customer experiences and optimize operations. They report to the SVP of engineering.
Key responsibilities: Develop and implement a comprehensive AI strategy that aligns with the company's goals and vision. Lead AI R&D efforts to create innovative products. Collaborate with cross-functional teams to identify opportunities for AI applications and ensure their implementation. Ensure compliance with regulations. Stay up-to-date on advancements in AI and related technologies and provide strategic recommendations to executive team. Build and manage an AI team, including data scientists, machine learning (ML) engineers and AI researchers. Sustain a culture of innovation and craftsmanship. And be a thought leader in the data and AI fields internally and externally.
Job Qualifications: Experience in Both Software Management and AI
Basic qualifications: B.A. or B.S. or higher or equivalent experience. Over 10 years of software engineering management. And over 10 years of experience in AI, data science or machine learning
Preferred qualifications: Ph.D. in computer science, AI/ML, statistics or a related field. Track record of leading AI initiatives. Experience leading high-impact, cross-company initiatives. Track record of excellence in relevant research areas. Experience attracting, retaining and developing top AI engineers and data scientists. And excellent communication and presentation skills
2. Chief AI Officer
Organization
- UCLA Health
Salary
- $157,400 to $380,600
Location
- Los Angeles, California
- On-site
Job Description: Create AI Vision to Change Health Care
The chief AI officer at UCLA Health shapes and drives the AI vision and strategy. The CAIO works closely with the senior executive team and health system faculty, staff and trainees to use AI to transform health care delivery. They report to the CIO and the chief data and analytics officer.
Key responsibilities: Lead the development and execution of a comprehensive AI strategy that aligns with organizational priorities and goals. Recommend tools and strategies to be a leader in the use of AI to transform health care by improving patient safety, quality, customer service, efficiency and value-based care. Collaborate with stakeholders to define and develop a build vs. buy AI road map for different business units, such as for patient progression, promoting access, finance, HR, and ancillary departments. Cultivate relationships with community partners, technology companies, academic institutions and funding agencies to support AI. Explore and promote joint venture opportunities to co-develop AI tools with industry partners. Ensure compliance with ethical, state, federal and regulatory requirements. Champion the ethical and just use of AI in clinical trials, research studies, education, clinical operations, and emerging application areas. Partner with school of medicine AI efforts to ensure the overall AI road map and implementation are done in a collaborative and cohesive manner. Represent organization in health care and AI forums. Build strategic partnerships with relevant organizations and shape the organization’s image regarding AI innovation and thought leadership. Facilitate employee training programs and awareness initiatives to educate staff about AI, including ethical guidelines and data privacy regulations relevant to AI.
Job Qualifications: Experience With AI in Clinical Settings
Key qualifications: A master’s degree or above is required. Understanding of clinical and business operations in a complex academic medical center. Experience driving AI innovation and translation of AI into the clinical domain. Understanding of AI technologies, including machine learning, natural language processing (NLP), large language models (LLMs) and retrieval-augmented generation (RAG). Proficiency in data science, including statistical analysis, predictive modeling and data visualization. Leadership skills in a complex and highly matrixed organization. Ability to build relationships with a range of stakeholders, including senior executives, clinicians, research faculty, trainees and staff.
3. Head of AI Technology
Organization
- IHG Hotels & Resorts
Salary
- $183,751 to $229,688
Location
- Atlanta, Georgia
- Hybrid
Job Description: Scale AI Across Global Enterprise
The head of AI technology at IHG Hotels & Resorts engages stakeholders throughout the enterprise. The executive works with other leaders to use internal and external partners to conceive, design, develop, launch, scale and evolve AI capabilities in a secure, responsible manner. They also shape AI products, ensuring they’re scalable and responsible.
Key responsibilities: Develop and execute AI strategies that align with the organization’s mission and goals, focusing on enhancing customer experience and employee experience, driving measurable positive impact and enabling efficiencies. Serve as a consultative influencer throughout the business, engaging with colleagues at all levels, helping build individual and enterprise skills to understand how to safely use AI and evolve skills for future imperatives. Lead a team of internal and partner experts, including leading matrix teams via influence and collaboration, to oversee the development and deployment of AI models to solve complex business problems. Foster a culture of learning and innovation within the team. Develop and integrate training and change management capabilities. Drive governance, security and responsible use, ensuring protection for company and customer data, and help manage a vast and dynamic range of threats.
Job Qualifications: Experience With Multiple Technologies
Key qualifications: A bachelor’s or master’s degree with experience in computer science, MIS, IT, business administration, engineering or a related field or an equivalent combination of education and experience. Experience within a range of technical architectures, products, security, analytics and systems. Experience leading direct, matrix and vendor and contractor teams. Leadership within a global organization driving the adoption of transformational technologies. Broad-based technical experience. Knowledge of AI, ML, automation, deep learning, NLP, tools and techniques. Ability to learn and understand the company’s technical infrastructure, organization and road maps at a detailed level. Experience leading complex technical products and programs in a product-centric organization, using modern product management practices to drive quality results at pace. Verbal and written communication skills. Ability to communicate with technical and non-technical audiences. Stay up-to-date on AI technologies and trends. Ability to interpret and use data and monitor and adjust the performance of systems.
Related Article: A 4-Step Plan to Becoming an AI-First Organization
4. Head of AI
Organization
- Remitly
Salary
- $232,000 to $290,000
Location
- Seattle, Washington
- Hybrid
Job Description: Establish the AI Vision
The head of AI at Remitly sets the long-term vision and direction for AI across the company. The executive leads teams building ML applications and platform offerings to solve challenges in the financial services industry. Their work impacts ML and data science teams, customer experience and the profitability of the business. They take on strategic leadership across multiple domains, transform AI usage and accelerate growth across the business. They report to the VP of engineering.
Key responsibilities: Lead, grow and coach multiple teams of platform engineers and machine learning engineers. Evolve the company’s vision for AI. Partner with domain leaders to identify and scale new ML opportunities. Collaborate with teams to drive value from high-quality platform offerings. Develop, advocate for and drive adoption of ML best practices. Build relationships with partner teams in data and analytics engineering.
Job Qualifications: Experience in Machine Learning
Key qualifications: Over seven years in leadership roles across ML and engineering. Over 15 years of experience across ML and engineering. Experience with managing, growing and coaching multiple teams of engineers and engineering leaders across career levels. Experience leading platform/infrastructure teams in the AI/ML space. Building relationships with customer teams and partner teams across disciplines, including non-ML engineering and product management. Defining and improving processes across teams. Keeping teams directed at the most important customer and business challenges. A track record of leading large-scale, long-term ML and engineering initiatives across several teams, including driving adoption of ML in new domains.
5. Head of AI
Organization
- CLEAResult
Salary
- $179,200 to $268,900
Location
- Remote
Job Description: Lead AI Center of Excellence
The head of AI at CLEAResult is a visionary leader of the AI Center of Excellence. The executive oversees and drives the strategic development and implementation of AI initiatives. The executive innovates and leads, shaping the direction of AI integration, and collaborates with business units to identify transformative AI opportunities. They partner with stakeholders to drive strategic initiatives that enhance customer satisfaction, operational efficiency and energy program measures. They also lead the AI Center of Excellence’s operations, including building the team to work cross functionally and identifying opportunities for AI adoption and application.
Key responsibilities: Develop and implement a comprehensive AI technology strategy aligned with company objectives to guide technical advancements and innovations. Build, lead and manage a team of AI experts, providing guidance, mentorship and fostering a culture of innovation and improvement. Collaborate with cross-functional teams to design, prototype and deploy AI models, algorithms, tools and solutions across business units, driving development and implementation. Be the AI thought leader and provide education, events and workshops to promote a culture of learning and innovation. Lead and oversee the implementation of AI solutions at scale, including developing strategic road maps, establishing governance frameworks, managing cross-functional teams and ensuring alignment with business objectives to drive transformative outcomes. Monitor and evaluate the performance of AI solutions, making adjustments and improvements. Define and lead the development of the organization’s AI architecture and ensure scalability, efficiency, security and alignment with business goals. Ensure compliance with ethical and legal standards in AI development and deployment, including data governance and security practices in AI implementations. Engage with stakeholders to understand their AI needs and provide strategic recommendations. Demonstrate thought leadership in AI. Pioneer new approaches and guide the team toward innovative solutions by exploring new AI technologies and applications relevant to the energy-efficiency sector. Stay up-to-date with the latest advancements in AI technologies and assess their impact on the company's operations and offerings. Manage relationships with AI technology vendors and partners.
Job Qualifications: Experience With Large-Scale AI
Key qualifications: A degree or equivalent experience in a quantitative field and demonstrated leadership ability. Over 15 years of technology experience. Delivering large-scale data and AI projects on time and budget, managing teams that vary in size both on shore and off shore. Leading a growing function and scaling a team. Communication skills and the ability to work with senior executives. Analytical and problem-solving abilities with attention to detail.
6. Vice President, Head of Artificial Intelligence
Organization
- Tokio Marine HCC
Salary
- $270,000 to $310,000
Location
- New York, New York
- Hybrid
Job Description: Champion AI Enterprise-Wide
The VP and head of AI at Tokio Marine HCC spearheads AI initiatives, championing the development and execution of AI strategies throughout the organization. The executive is a strategic visionary with a background in AI and ML and skills in collaboration. They play an instrumental role in guiding the company’s AI trajectory.
Key responsibilities: Formulate and execute a comprehensive AI strategic plan that’s in alignment with the organization's overarching objectives. Lead AI project implementations to ensure timely and budget-compliant delivery. Act as a key member of the governance committee, overseeing policy development, vendor selection processes, use case evaluation and project approvals, ensuring adherence to regulatory and ethical standards. Establish a scalable and secure technological and digital infrastructure capable of accelerating AI adoption. Cultivate an organizational culture that embraces learning, innovation and the integration of AI technologies. Initiate and oversee educational and training programs to enhance AI literacy across all departments. Offer expertise and guidance to departments keen on launching AI initiatives, aiding in the identification of AI opportunities and the formulation of project proposals and implementation strategies. Supervise AI program management, ensuring strategic alignment and efficient execution of AI projects. Partner with leaders to drive education and adoption of AI tools. Implement changes to process and workflows, introducing tools to create efficiency and productivity gains. Stay up-to-date on industry trends, emerging technologies and best practices in AI, evaluating and recommending new strategies to maintain a competitive edge. Develop KPIs/OKRs for generative AI and measure and iterate.
Job Qualifications: Experience With AI Models
Key qualifications: A master’s degree or Ph.D. in computer science, AI, ML or related discipline. At least five years of experience with AI/ML-specific model life cycle management, including understanding of AI/ML architecture, model risk data management and responsible AI practices. Experience leading AI initiatives. Familiarity with AI/ML frameworks. Experience with security best practices for generative AI development and deployments. Experience identifying and communicating key risks to AI implementations and architectures. Experience with risk analysis and reports that describe risk implications to executives. Knowledge of AI and ML technologies. Leadership capabilities and the ability to inspire innovation and drive progress within cross-functional teams. Proficiency in strategic planning, project management and collaborative problem solving. Experience within the insurance sector is advantageous but not mandatory. Experience in financial services or other highly regulated sectors.
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7. VP of AI/ML Platforms & Operations
Organization
- Visa
Salary
- $231,700 to $426,150
Location
- Foster City, California
- On-site
Job Description: Oversee AI Products and Road Map
The VP of AI/ML platforms and operations at Visa is a strategic thought leader, technical expert and influencer who drives transformation. The VP creates the vision and provides the technical execution for AI/ML platforms and operations. They oversee product teams and drive scale and create a step function in the value delivered by AI and ML. They also partner with business unit teams and the technology team to create the vision and road map for AI/ML platforms and operations.
Key responsibilities: Drive the creation of a commercial-grade software framework that can be updated and improved. Direct and manage the data platforms that support value-added services business and products in service of security and customers. Create an AI/ML development life cycle and framework and drive adoption across the organization. Collaborate with leaders, from C-level executives to individual contributors, charting the path for AI/ML. Be an organizational leader, influencing and enabling multiple partners. Standardize AI model development, training, monitoring and deployment. Become the bridge between all AI/ML stakeholders. Establish relationships that facilitate influencing and road map alignment. Use an understanding of AI/ML models and systems, data engineering and software to guide a team of product managers and engineers.
Job Qualifications: Experience in AI Development and Innovation
Basic qualifications: At least 12 years of experience with a bachelor’s degree or at least 10 years of experience with an advanced degree or at least eight years of experience with a Ph.D.
Preferred qualifications: At least 18 years of experience with an advanced degree. Expertise in creating strategic road maps and delivering scalable AI/ML/data science innovations and products. Over 10 years of experience in AI and ML development and platforms, with a focus on guiding business strategy through technological innovation. Research background in AI and ML, including publications in top-tier conferences or journals. Expertise in coding languages, such as Python, R and Java. Experience creating and evolving cloud-based and hybrid AI and ML platforms, tools and libraries. Advocating for and adopting new technologies as they emerge. Knowledge of data governance and privacy regulations. People leader with experience building and managing a global and diverse team. Communication skills and ability to translate complex technical jargon into understandable language. Business acumen, including financial management and strategic planning, to align product development with organizational goals. Experience in collaboration. Manage operational disruptions and handle product operations crisis management situations. Analytic discipline with focus on delivering against quantitative goals.
8. Generative AI Vice President
Organization
- JPMorganChase
Salary
- $164,350 to $260,000
Location
- New York, New York
- On-site
Job Description: Innovate With LLMs
The generative AI VP at JPMorganChase plays a crucial role in ensuring the smooth operation and optimization of LLM-aided AI products. The VP collaborates with cross-functional teams — including the ML center of excellence, AI research, cloud engineering — to foster innovation and deliver solutions that yield a high ROI. They ensure APIs are built with scalability, allowing them to handle a large number of requests without compromising performance.
Key responsibilities: Combine data assets with AI, including LLMs and multimodal LLMs. Bridge scientific research and software engineering. Collaborate with cloud and site reliability engineering (SRE) teams and lead the design and delivery of production architectures.
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Job Qualifications: Experience Building Machine Learning Teams
Basic qualifications: A Ph.D. in a quantitative discipline, such as computer science, mathematics and statistics. Over five years of experience in a contributor role in ML engineering. A track record in building and leading teams of ML engineers and scientists. An understanding of the fundamentals of statistics, optimization and ML theory, focusing on NLP/computer vision algorithms. Experience in implementing distributed/multi-threaded/scalable applications. Understanding and aligning with business expectations and writing clear and concise OKRs. Experience as a responsible owner for ML services in enterprise environments. Grasp of computer science fundamentals and software development life cycle (SDLC) best practices. Communication skills to convey technical information and ideas at all levels, building trust with stakeholders.
Preferred qualifications: Experience in designing and implementing pipelines using directed acyclic graphs (DAGs). Constructing batch and streaming microservices exposed as gRPC/GraphQL endpoints. Experience in parameter-efficient fine-tuning, model quantization and quantization-aware fine-tuning of LLM models. Knowledge of chain-of-thoughts, tree-of-thoughts, graph-of-thoughts prompting strategies.
9. VP of AI Risk and Governance
Organization
- LPL Financial
Salary
- $146,400 to $244,000
Location
- Washington, D.C.
- On-site
Job Description: Develop AI Governance
The VP of AI risk and governance at LPL Financial establishes and oversees risk governance, including AI and other programs, to support a strong risk culture that prioritizes risk identification and collaboration. The VP develops and oversees AI governance for internal and external stakeholders. The executive manages a risk-based decision framework, overseeing the policy and committee governance for AI and models. They also design and oversee an ongoing monitoring program.
Key responsibilities: Establish and oversee risk training, communication and partnership programs. Develop and implement AI-related communications and trainings for internal and external stakeholders. Perform risk assessments and partner with subject matter experts to assess risks associated with AI solutions. Perform testing on AI solutions and design and implement an ongoing monitoring program. Monitor the regulatory landscape for evolving expectations for AI and models in alignment with the company’s business model and design and implement enhancements. Lead a team to support AI governance and strategy. Produce and support the production of materials for executive-level risk and governance committees. Draft newsletters, program announcements and other communications and materials. Coordinate across risk leads and stakeholders for ongoing framework consistency. Adapt to the evolving needs of business partners and changes to the risk and compliance organization to assist in progressing the department strategy.
Job Qualifications: Experience in Finance and Analytics
Key qualifications: Over seven years of financial services experience. A B.A. or B.S. in finance, accounting, business, economics or a related discipline. Prior leadership experience. Over seven years of experience in compliance or risk-related roles within financial services, preferably wealth management. Strong analytical skills, both quantitative and qualitative, with high attention to detail and accuracy. Excels in fast-paced environments and has an entrepreneurial mindset. Experience preparing executive-level presentations. Experience with strategic planning preferred. Strong analytical skills to evaluate business opportunities and results against established objectives. Consensus builder to drive change within and outside direct accountability. Critical thinking to create solutions for the most complex business challenges.
10. Staff VP of AI Technology
Organization
- Elevance Health
Salary
- $192,960 to $385,920
Location
- Atlanta, Georgia
- On-site
Job Description: Drive AI Across the Organization
The staff VP of AI technology at Elevance Health oversees the strategic AI initiatives that optimize the value of AI across the enterprise. They enable multiple business needs, including improving service, and drive adoption of AI and analytics.
Key responsibilities: Ideation and execution of responsible AI product strategy, collaborating with core systems, including commercial claims, membership, provider and product systems. Accountable for data acquisition and infrastructure setup for exploratory data analysis to determine experiments for modeling. Ensuring AI experiments and models align with enterprise value priorities and are deployable. Engage with business and technical executives and subject-matter experts to socialize AI and for model integrations and deployments. Have fiscal responsibility for IT budgets. Motivate teams to accomplish AI goals and objectives. Direct interdisciplinary AI teams to develop value-aligned models and ensure alignment with organizational metrics. Implement the policies, practices and procedures of the company and IT. Coordinate project management across department and divisional lines. Hire, train, coach, counsel and evaluate performance of direct reports. Create, manage, prioritize and drive execution of product road map pipeline with AI solutions. Work with large and complex data sets to solve problems using analytical and statistical approaches. Apply quantitative analysis, experimentation, data mining and data presentation to develop opportunities for health care products. Identify and measure product success through goal setting, forecasting and monitoring to understand trends to guide strategies. Partner with cross-functional, matrixed structure to inform, influence, support and execute product strategy and investment decisions. Ideate, influence and generate buy-in to develop product strategy and vision and drive consensus. Drive decision making through user insights, quantitative analysis and A/B testing.
Job Qualifications: Experience in IT
Basic qualifications: A B.A. or B.S. degree in IT, computer science or a related field. At least 15 years of IT leadership experience, with eight years of experience in large enterprises leading multiple delivery teams, large code bases, high transactional-based systems and large program experience, over $100 million, including business case development through implementation. Or a combination of education and experience, which would provide an equivalent background. Stakeholder, leadership, organizational and execution management skills. Data analysis and understanding of statistical models. User experience and design. Communication, reporting and presentations. Understanding of data science principles. Research, market analysis and analytical skills.
Preferred qualifications: Commercial product experience/solutions experience in claims, product, provider or membership. Experience with AI and utilization management. Large base coding experience. Experience with ML models and deep learning algorithms, such as convolutional neutral networks. Familiar with cloud-based AI services. Experience with tools for containerization, configuration management and orchestrating deployments. Experience with Python, Java, R, C++ or JavaScript.
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