Manager, AI & Automation Design

Manager, AI & Automation

Location: Rochester, NY, Madison, WI, Des Moines, IA

This is a full-time, direct hire role requiring onsite work in any of the above mentioned cities 3 days per week (2 days WFH). No sponsorships available for this role.

Laine Recruiting is partnering with a well-established manufacturing organization to identify a Manager, AI Strategy & Solutions Design. This is a high-impact leadership role focused on the front end of building enterprise AI capability: identifying meaningful opportunities, shaping strategy and roadmap, designing practical solutions, and building alignment across the business.

This role is especially well suited for someone who enjoys working in an investigatory environment, partnering with business and technical leaders to identify where AI can create measurable value before determining how solutions should be designed, prioritized, governed, and delivered. Early focus areas are expected to include finance, engineering, procurement, and logistics, with an emphasis on opportunities tied to hard-dollar impact.

This is an opportunity to join a company that is investing meaningfully in innovation and looking for a leader who can help define where AI and automation should go, why it matters, and how to build a thoughtful path forward.

Why this opportunity

Greenfield, 0-to-1 opportunity to build the machine. This role is focused on shaping the function from the front end by identifying opportunities, building the roadmap, and defining the architecture and operating model, rather than inheriting a mature program or owning every aspect of downstream delivery.
Real business impact. Early opportunity areas will center around finance, procurement, engineering, and logistics, giving this person the ability to tie AI strategy directly to measurable operational and financial outcomes.
Leadership investment and resource support. They are committed to this capability planning to pair this role with the resources needed to execute, whether through internal support, external partners, or purchased capabilities.
Executive visibility and enterprise-wide influence. The role offers direct exposure to senior leadership and the opportunity to influence priorities across multiple functions and sites.
Real operational complexity. With multiple sites, manufacturing operations, supply chain considerations, and a broad set of active business initiatives, practical AI opportunities should be real and varied rather than theoretical.
High trust / family-owned environment. They emphasizes being family-owned, values-driven, and people-oriented, which may resonate with candidates who want visibility and influence without the politics of a massive public company.

What you’ll do

Investigate and assess business problems, workflows, and opportunities where AI, generative AI, and automation can create measurable value
Partner with business and technical stakeholders to identify, prioritize, and shape high-value use cases across functions such as finance, engineering, procurement, logistics, operations, and commercial teams
Build and help lead the organization’s AI and generative AI strategy, roadmap, and operating model
Translate business needs into practical solution designs, reference architectures, and phased implementation approaches
Evaluate emerging technologies and recommend where they can create real business value
Help define standards around governance, responsible AI, risk management, and safe enterprise adoption
Develop business cases, ROI frameworks, and prioritization models that help leadership make informed investment decisions
Communicate opportunities, tradeoffs, and recommendations clearly to senior leadership and non-technical stakeholders
Guide vendor, partner, and internal team alignment around how solutions should be delivered, even when downstream build and deployment may be handled by others
Support AI platform and capability planning across key tools and environments, including cloud and enterprise productivity ecosystems
Drive internal understanding and adoption through stakeholder engagement, education, and change leadership

What We’re Looking For

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Data Science, AI/ML, or a related field
5+ years of experience in AI/ML engineering, advanced analytics, data-driven software development, or related technical environments
3+ years of experience leading technical teams, architecting enterprise solutions, or driving complex cross-functional technology initiatives
Strong understanding of machine learning, large language models, natural language processing, deep learning, automation technologies, and modern AI solution patterns
Hands-on experience with modern AI and cloud platforms such as Azure ML, Databricks, Azure OpenAI, OpenAI API, AWS AI services, or similar tools
Proven ability to translate business needs into scalable technical solutions and move initiatives from concept through design and implementation planning
Experience identifying and prioritizing AI or GenAI use cases tied to measurable business value
Strong communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to explain technical concepts clearly to business leaders, operators, and non-technical teams
Ability to balance strategy, architecture, prioritization, governance, and executive alignment
Experience working across complex business environments where change management, cross-functional alignment, and practical execution are critical to success

Preferred Qualifications

Experience in manufacturing, industrial, supply chain, logistics, or other operationally complex environments
Experience with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), vector databases, embeddings, prompt engineering, and model evaluation frameworks
Familiarity with Responsible AI practices, including governance, privacy, risk controls, and safe enterprise adoption
Experience shaping solution strategy and architecture while coordinating delivery