AI tooling Governance and Adoption Manager Job Basingstoke area,England UK,IT/Tech

OFA Group is scaling its use of AI tooling LLMs like Copilot, Claude, ChatGPT and the growing ecosystem of AI SaaS platforms across every function in the UK, France, and Spain. As adoption accelerates, so does the need for clear governance, cost discipline, standardised ways of working, and confident policy communication. We are creating a new role, AI Tooling Governance & Adoption Manager, to own this end‑to‑end.

Reporting to the Head of Operational AI, you will define how OFA governs, adopts, and scales its AI tooling from policy and vendor management through to training, adoption metrics, cost, compliance and security controls. This is a foundational role that will shape OFA’s IT and operational readiness for large‑scale AI transformation, working hand‑in‑hand with IT Security, Legal, Compliance, Finance, HR, and every business function across the group.

You will not be building AI products or features that sit with our Product and Engineering team. Your remit is the operating model that ensures the AI tools we license are used safely, cost‑effectively, consistently, and to their full potential.

Job Responsibilities

Own the end‑to‑end governance model for AI tooling policy, standards, tooling selection and the AI use case lifecycle from intake and pre‑approval through pilot, scale, review, and retire, with an auditable trail at each stage. Manage and maintain the approved AI tools catalogue, permitted‑use guidance, and prohibited‑use boundaries, with communications tailored to each function. Act as policy owner and liaison to Legal, Compliance, Data Protection, and IT Security, translating requirements into practical day‑to‑day guardrails.

Own the process to define and deliver AI system controls alongside Security, Compliance, Legal and IT to continually evaluate and improve controls and monitoring while balancing AI risk and business productivity. Keep the policy library current as UK/EU regulation (EU AI Act, GDPR) and the vendor landscape evolve.

Manage the AI tooling budget with the Group CISO and Finance forecasting, licence rationalisation, and entitlement management across LLMs and AI SaaS. Manage AI SaaS vendors and their account managers on roadmap, feature adoption, benchmarking, and renewals, not just invoices. Run a quarterly vendor review cadence and support build‑vs‑buy decisions with clear cost, risk, and adoption evidence. Perform RFPs and other supplier‑selection requirements to select and onboard new tooling as needed with business stakeholders and our project management office.

Partner with HR and external training vendors to co‑design AI tooling training pathways across the group tailored by function, seniority and region. Track adoption metrics (active users, coverage, feature usage, quality of use) by function and country, and drive targeted uplift where adoption lags. Build a champion/power‑user network and own the AI communications strategy – cadence, channels, tone so employees know what’s approved, what’s changing, and where to get help.

Lead identification of new training needs working with senior stakeholders in the business and external sources to identify risks and gaps.

Author and maintain the OFA "how we use AI" playbook standard workflows, prompt patterns, prompt libraries, and function‑specific guidance. Reduce fragmentation across teams and countries by driving common patterns without stifling function‑specific experimentation. Partner with the Head of Operational AI to product ionise successful pilots, and continuously refine intake and approval processes based on user feedback and volume.

Act as operational bridge to the Group CISO’s team on AI tooling data classification, cloud permissions, access reviews, and incident response. Coordinate DPIAs and risk assessments for higher‑risk use cases with the DPO and Legal, and provide governance input into third‑party risk and procurement for new AI vendors. Maintain a live AI risk register with clear ownership, mitigations, and review dates.

Own the monthly AI tooling governance dashboard spend, adoption, active use cases, risk posture for the Head of Operational AI & Group CISO. Prepare quarterly deep‑dives for…