AI Product Lead

ROLE SUMMARY

The AI Product Lead is a product management role within the AI Capability function, responsible for defining, prioritizing and driving AI initiatives from strategy and roadmap through to delivery. Product management is the core of this role, bringing structure, strategic thinking and roadmap discipline, with technical ownership and AI innovation as secondary but integral capabilities that give the role genuine credibility in a fast-moving, technically complex environment. Reporting to the AI Capability Lead, the AI Product Lead works closely with Creative Builders, engineers and contractor PODs to shape what gets built and ensure it gets built well. You will own the product roadmap for AI initiatives, translating business priorities into clear, sequenced delivery plans, managing scope, dependencies and risks across concurrent workstreams. This role sits at the point where strategy meets execution, ensuring what is delivered is robust, commercially relevant and fit for enterprise adoption. The ideal candidate is a technically fluent product or programme manager, someone whose technical depth is what makes them effective in this role, not an optional extra. You will have worked closely with engineers, data teams and AI practitioners, and be confident evaluating technical approaches, identifying risks and making credible judgement calls on what gets built and how. You understand enough about how AI solutions are designed and built to genuinely shape them, own the roadmap with conviction, and hold contractors to account on quality and approach.

ROLE RESPONSIBILITIES

• Plan and manage AI initiatives from intake through to delivery, ensuring technical approach, tooling selection and solution design are clearly defined and agreed with engineering teams, and that decisions remain grounded in business requirements and technical best practice.

• Own the product roadmap for AI initiatives, defining and prioritizing what gets built, sequencing work against business value and strategic need, maintaining a clear backlog, and ensuring Creative Builders, contractor and vendor teams are working on the right things at the right time.

• Assess and challenge technical approaches across the portfolio, bringing sufficient technical fluency to evaluate AI architectures, LLM integrations and automation frameworks for feasibility, quality, compliance and scalability, and to push back confidently where approaches fall short or introduce unacceptable risk.

• Lead and coordinate multiple contractor teams and vendor pods, providing technical direction and delivery oversight across parallel workstreams, managing performance and ensuring output meets the required standard.

• Serve as the technical bridge between business stakeholders and engineering teams, translating ambiguous requirements into precise technical specifications, and maintaining alignment between stakeholder intent and engineering execution throughout delivery.

• Manage vendor relationships and contractor performance, including SoW delivery, milestone tracking and quality assurance, with sufficient technical depth to identify risks and challenge delivery approaches when needed.

• Define and embed standards for AI delivery at scale, covering development practices, quality gates, tooling norms and delivery frameworks, and actively support the rollout and adoption of these standards across vendor and contractor teams.

• Support the transition of completed AI initiatives into scaled delivery by managing knowledge transfer, technical documentation and acceptance criteria with Delivery, GSO and the wider C4 organisation.

• Define, track and report on project-level KPIs and OKRs, covering delivery velocity, technical quality and operational readiness, and using insights to improve approach and report progress to the AI Capability Lead.

 

BASIC QUALIFICATIONS

• Experience in product management or technical programme management, with a demonstrable track record of owning roadmaps and driving AI or digital initiatives in large-scale enterprise environments. Candidates must bring genuine technical fluency, not just familiarity with technical environments, the ability to engage with engineers, evaluate approaches and make credible technical judgements is a core requirement of this role.

• Hands-on technical fluency with AI and digital technologies, including GenAI platforms, LLMs, automation frameworks, agentic tools and integration patterns, sufficient to evaluate approaches, challenge engineers and make credible technical decisions.

• Proven experience managing and coordinating multi-vendor contractor teams and external delivery pods, with the ability to provide technical direction, manage performance and hold suppliers to account.

• Strong product ownership skills, including backlog management, acceptance criteria definition, prioritization and stakeholder alignment, across complex, cross-functional AI delivery programmes.

• Ability to translate ambiguous business requirements into precise technical specifications and delivery plans, maintaining alignment between stakeholder intent and engineering execution.

• Strong delivery instincts, comfortable managing scope, timelines, dependencies and change across multiple concurrent workstreams in fast-moving environments.

• Working knowledge of GenAI stacks (LLMs, vector stores, agents, orchestration, guardrails), data governance, security and compliance requirements in an enterprise context.

• Excellent communication skills with the ability to engage credibly at both technical and executive level, and to translate complex technical concepts for non-technical audiences.

• Formal qualification in project management (e.g. PMP, PRINCE2 Practitioner) and/or a technical discipline (computer science, engineering, AI/ML) preferred.
   

Work Location Assignment: Hybrid (some office presence is required)

Purpose 

Breakthroughs that change patients' lives... At Pfizer we are a patient centric company, guided by our four values: courage, joy, equity and excellence. Our breakthrough culture lends itself to our dedication to transforming millions of lives.  

Digital Transformation Strategy

One bold way we are achieving our purpose is through our company wide digital transformation strategy. We are leading the way in adopting new data, modelling and automated solutions to further digitize and accelerate drug discovery and development with the aim of enhancing health outcomes and the patient experience.

Flexibility  

We aim to create a trusting, flexible workplace culture which encourages employees to achieve work life harmony, attracts talent and enables everyone to be their best working self. Let’s start the conversation!  

Equal Employment Opportunity 

We believe that a diverse and inclusive workforce is crucial to building a successful business. As an employer, Pfizer is committed to celebrating this, in all its forms – allowing for us to be as diverse as the patients and communities we serve. Together, we continue to build a culture that encourages, supports and empowers our employees.

DisAbility Confident

We are proud to be a Disability Confident Employer and we encourage you to put your best self forward with the knowledge and trust that we will make any reasonable adjustments necessary to support your application and future career. Our mission is unleashing the power of our people, especially those with unique superpowers. Your journey with Pfizer starts here!

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