Lead AI Strategist

🎯 Why This Role Matters

As a Lead AI Strategist you will be the end‑to‑end owner for our most impactful customer engagements. Partnering with a senior technical lead, you’ll guide a multidisciplinary team of engineers and researchers to scope, deliver, and scale AI‑native workflows that materially improve how our customers operate. You’ll work directly with executive stakeholders, translate ambiguous problems into clear roadmaps, drive adoption change‑management, and hold the team accountable for business outcomes—not just artifacts.

Location:

Remote first. Cincinnati, OH;
Atlanta, GA, or Miami/Fort Lauderdale, FL areas preferred. Remote (U.S.) considered with periodic client travel.

• Own outcomes:
  Lead complex, high-impact client engagements end-to-end—from discovery and value targeting through launch and scale-up—anchored to business KPIs.
• Shape strategy:
  Facilitate executive workshops; identify high-leverage use cases; craft AI adoption roadmaps that deliver value in a quarter and compound thereafter.
• Partner with engineering:
  Work in lockstep with a senior technical lead to define scope, cut clean iterations, and de‑risk delivery across data, integration, and security constraints.
• Drive adoption:
  Orchestrate change‑management, training, and communications; design workflows that stick; establish governance, playbooks, and measurement.
• Measure impact:
  Define success metrics, baselines, and experiment designs; build dashboards and run regular business reviews with client sponsors.
• Communicate crisply:
  Synthesize complex ideas into clear narratives for C‑suite executives and frontline operators; create decision‑ready briefs and visuals.
• Uplevel the team:
  Mentor peers, standardize repeatable approaches (AI Sprints), and contribute to internal methods and reusable components.

• 8+ years (or equivalent skill level) in consulting, product, strategy, or program leadership roles delivering technology‑enabled change (client‑facing required).
• Fluency in generative‑AI concepts (LLMs, RAG, agents, prompt engineering).
• Proven ability to lead executive‑level stakeholder management, align incentives, and de‑risk complex initiatives.
• Strong analytical and product mindset: able to turn messy problems into testable plans, write tight PRDs/briefs, and make pragmatic trade‑offs.
• Excellent written, verbal, visual communication, and facilitation skills.
• Bias for action: builder mentality, caring more about outcomes than optics.
• Nice to have: domain experience in retail, hospitality, logistics, healthcare/pharma, or financial services; familiarity with data governance, security, and compliance practices.

• Competitive compensation with performance upside.
• Comprehensive benefits
• PTO
• Final package depends on experience and location.

Very Big Things is a generative‑AI consulting and implementation partner. We combine forward‑deployed engineers, product strategists, and researchers to ship bespoke AI systems that deliver measurable ROI for mid‑market and enterprise clients. We’re AI‑native: we build, use, and continuously improve our own workflow tooling (e.g., AI Sprints across R&D → Production) to move from idea to business impact fast.

• We are remote‑friendly with an East‑coast heartbeat; client‑onsite time varies by engagement.
• We optimize for skill, signal, and values over pedigree. Expect a fast process: intro → working session (realistic client scenario) → panel → references.
• We focus on mid‑market and enterprise clients.
• We value curiosity, proactive learning, and ownership. If you’re a thoughtful builder who likes turning ambiguity into impact, you’ll fit right in.

VBT is an equal‑opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all teammates.