AI Operations Manager
Descartes Group
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Benefits offered by this job
Job summary
Descartes Group seeks an AI Operations Manager to lead a globally distributed AI Enablement team, translating priorities into structured execution and scalable service delivery. You will drive adoption, governance, and continuous improvement while coordinating with IT, Finance, and vendors.
The role emphasizes strong leadership, program management, and risk-aware operations within a remote Canada context, with a focus on secure, efficient AI services and measurable outcomes.
Qualifications
- 5+ years of experience in technology operations, service delivery, program or portfolio management, AI enablement, or a related Enterprise IT role.
- Hands-on experience implementing, operating, supporting, or driving adoption of enterprise AI technologies.
- Experience leading technology or AI-enabled services and managing geographically distributed teams across cultures and time zones.
- Proven ability to manage demand, priorities, delivery, risks, and dependencies across multiple initiatives.
- Working knowledge of IT service management, including incident, request, change, and continuous improvement processes.
- Experience applying AI governance, security, privacy, compliance, and technology risk requirements.
- Experience managing vendors, licensing, consumption, capacity, and budgets.
- Ability to use operational metrics, reporting, and analytics to drive performance and informed decisions.
- University degree, college diploma, or relevant industry certifications preferred. ITIL, project/program management, cloud, security, data, or AI certifications are assets.
Responsibilities
- Lead, develop, and coordinate a geographically distributed AI Enablement team across locations and cultures.
- Translate AI strategy into clear operational plans, ownership, and measurable deliverables.
- Manage AI intake, prioritization, backlogs, delivery tracking, risks, dependencies, and escalations.
- Oversee AI service operations, incident and request management, and reliable support coverage across regions.
- Manage AI licensing, consumption, capacity, budgets, and costs in collaboration with technical teams and Finance.
- Embed AI governance requirements into daily operations, ensuring security, privacy, compliance, and risk standards.
- Establish operational metrics and reporting across demand, delivery, adoption, service performance, capacity, risk, and cost.
- Promote AI adoption through collaboration with IT teams, business stakeholders, and vendors.
Skills
Education
Job description
The need for efficient, secure, and agile supply chains and logistics operations has become ever more critical and complex. By combining innovative technology, powerful trade intelligence and the reach of our network, Descartes helps get goods, information, transportation assets, and people where they’re needed, when they’re needed.
We’re one of the most broadly deployed logistics and supply chain technology companies in the world. More than 26,000 customers around the globe use our cloud-based solutions to transform the way they move inventory and information to enhance productivity, better serve customers, thrive competitively, keep pace with evolving regulations, and respond to rapidly changing market conditions. Descartes is publicly traded (Nasdaq:DSGX, TSX:DSG) with headquarters in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, and offices and partners around the world. With record financial performance for more than 16 years, we lead the industry in innovation investment. Every day, logistics service providers, manufacturers, retailers, distributors, and other logistics-intensive businesses of all sizes rely on our scale, stability, and comprehensive solution footprint to move what’s most important to them. Learn more at www.descartes.com.
As part of Descartes' Enterprise IT AI Enablement team, you will lead and coordinate the day-to-day operations of enterprise AI services across our global organization. You will translate AI priorities into structured execution, develop a distributed team, and ensure secure, efficient, and scalable service delivery while driving AI adoption and continuous improvement.
- Team Leadership & Operations: Lead, develop, and coordinate a geographically distributed AI Enablement team, aligning priorities, resources, and responsibilities across locations and cultures.
- Strategy Execution: Translate AI strategy and governance direction into clear operational plans, ownership, priorities, and measurable deliverables.
- Demand & Portfolio Management: Manage AI intake, prioritization, backlogs, delivery tracking, risks, dependencies, and escalations across concurrent initiatives.
- Service Delivery Excellence: Oversee AI service operations, incident and request management, and reliable support coverage across regions.
- Cost & Capacity Optimization: Manage AI licensing, consumption, capacity, budgets, and costs in collaboration with technical teams, vendors, Finance, and Procurement.
- Governance & Risk Management: Embed AI governance requirements into daily operations, ensuring alignment with security, privacy, compliance, risk, and audit standards.
- Performance & Continuous Improvement: Establish operational metrics and reporting across demand, delivery, adoption, service performance, capacity, risk, and cost. Drive process improvements, automation, and reduced operational dependencies.
- AI Adoption & Collaboration: Partner with IT teams, business stakeholders, and vendors to promote Enterprise IT AI initiatives, identify opportunities, and support effective AI adoption.
- 5+ years of experience in technology operations, service delivery, program or portfolio management, AI enablement, or a related Enterprise IT role.
- Hands-on experience implementing, operating, supporting, or driving adoption of enterprise AI technologies.
- Experience leading technology or AI-enabled services and managing geographically distributed teams across cultures and time zones.
- Proven ability to manage demand, priorities, delivery, risks, and dependencies across multiple initiatives.
- Working knowledge of IT service management, including incident, request, change, and continuous improvement processes.
- Experience applying AI governance, security, privacy, compliance, and technology risk requirements.
- Experience managing vendors, licensing, consumption, capacity, and budgets.
- Ability to use operational metrics, reporting, and analytics to drive performance and informed decisions.
- University degree, college diploma, or relevant industry certifications preferred. ITIL, project/program management, cloud, security, data, or AI certifications are assets.
- Strong communicator, organizer, facilitator, and people manager.
- Able to lead through influence and collaborate with technical teams, business stakeholders, vendors, and senior leadership.
- Skilled at establishing structure, accountability, and clear ownership in fast-paced, evolving environments.
- Strong analytical, problem-solving, prioritization, and decision-making abilities.
- Service-minded leader focused on operational excellence, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
We value team members who communicate with transparency, sharing information openly and building trust across functions. You bring excellence and expertise to your craft, holding a high bar for quality while continuously improving your skills. You demonstrate accountability by owning outcomes, following through on commitments, and taking responsibility for results. You are driven by metrics, using data and experimentation to inform decisions and deliver measurable impact.
- Smart: Able to quickly understand complex systems, connect ideas, and make sound judgments.
- Curious: Actively seeks to understand customer problems, emerging technologies, and better ways of working.
- Coachable: Open to feedback, willing to adapt, and continuously improving through learning.
- Strategic Impact: Help shape and scale enterprise AI operations across a global software organization.
- Leadership & Growth: Lead a distributed team and expand your influence as Descartes' AI capabilities evolve.
- Cross-Functional Visibility: Collaborate with IT, Finance, Procurement, vendors, business stakeholders, and senior leaders.
- Ownership & Autonomy: Drive operational priorities, improve service delivery, and establish scalable processes.
- Flexible Environment: Enjoy a remote opportunity in Canada within a collaborative, fast-moving technology organization.
Join Descartes and help build the operational foundation for secure, responsible, and scalable enterprise AI.
The salary range for this position is $100,000–$110,000 CAD. Compensation information provided is a good-faith estimate for this position only. Factors that may be used to determine actual salary include the candidate’s specific skills and years of experience. Similar positions located in different geographic regions will not necessarily receive the same compensation or currency.
As we scale, we’re looking for new doers, collaborators and innovators to join Descartes in uniting the people and technology that move the world as the Global Leader in Logistics and Supply Chain Technology. We’re entrepreneurial, hardworking, geeky-in-a-good way problem solvers. Guided by our values, we nurture a TEAM focused culture that invests in people and creates opportunities for advancement across a broad spectrum of career paths. We prioritize work-life balance and foster an environment with the space to take ownership, to be heard, and to carve a path for your individual accomplishments to help drive our success. At Descartes, everyone has a voice and the best idea wins, regardless of who makes it. We offer competitive compensation, great benefits, remote and flexible work hours, and the opportunity to join a company on an awesome mission with a great existing team and trajectory.
Descartes also has a deep sense of environmental responsibility. Learn more about how we helped our customers save over 552,000 metric tons of CO2 in 2020 by reducing fuel and paper consumption: https://www.descartes.com/who-we-are/social-responsibility-sustainability/environmental-impact. Join a team that’s committed to working with customers to conserve resources and enhance sustainability.
We conduct a mix of in-person and virtual interviews. Virtual interviews are held via Microsoft Teams and are recorded and transcribed. We may utilize AI tools to support our hiring team in notetaking, summarization, and internal training. AI tools are not used in our recruitment process for decision-making purposes. Recordings, transcripts, and notes are used for recruitment, including improvement of our process, and record-keeping purposes. Should you have any questions or concerns about our process, please connect with our hiring team in advance of scheduled interviews.
We are an Equal Employment employer. We do not discriminate in hiring on the basis of sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, color, religious creed, national origin, physical or mental disability, protected status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, provincial, or local law. For more information about our commitment to equal employment opportunity, please review our Code of Business Conduct and Ethics at Descartes.com. Descartes is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to job applicants with disabilities. Applicants in North America with a disability who require a reasonable accommodation for any part of the application or hiring process can email us at hrna@descartes.com. Provide your name and contact information along with the accommodation needed to assist you with the application process. Your request will be responded to as soon as possible. Reasonable accommodations will be determined on a case-by-case basis.
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