Head of AI Implementation & Enablement

Cancer Research UK (CRUK); Stratford-upon-Avon; Hybrid; GBP 95,000 - 105,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Generous benefits package

Flexible working culture

Job summary

Cancer Research UK seeks a Head of AI Implementation & Enablement to lead the AI CoE, establish governance, and accelerate scaled, responsible AI adoption across CRUK. You will partner with the Data & Technology SLT to embed AI priorities in roadmaps while ensuring governance, risk, and outcomes align with the organisation’s mission to beat cancer.

Based in Stratford with flexible working (typical 2 days in the office), the role requires strong leadership, stakeholder influence and a track

Qualifications

• Practical understanding of generative AI, large language models and AI agents.
• Experience leading large-scale organisational change and embedding new technologies.
• Experience scaling pilots into business-owned services and measuring ROI.
• Excellent senior stakeholder management and influencing skills.
• Comfortable making decisions in fast-moving, ambiguous environments with evolving tech/regulatory expectations.
• Experience leading and developing a team with inclusive practices.

Responsibilities

• Understand business outcomes and prioritise AI opportunities within domain roadmaps.
• Shape and prioritise AI opportunities by value and define adoption patterns.
• Run a portfolio of AI experiments and pilots, tracking value and scaling successes.
• Create and own CRUK’s AI governance framework with risk tiers and approvals.
• Maintain the AI inventory and report progress to the AI Steering Group.
• Drive AI adoption and literacy across CRUK and build cross-team communities of practice.
• Build consensus among stakeholders with differing priorities and risk appetites.
• Lead and develop the AI CoE team.

Skills

Generative AI

Large language models

AI governance

Stakeholder management

Team leadership

Change management

Risk management

Decision making

Job description

Department: Data & Technology

Salary: £95,000 - £105,000 per annum plus benefits

Contract: Permanent

Hours: Full-time (we’re happy to discuss flexible working arrangements)

Location: Stratford, London Office-based with high flexibility (typically 2 days per week in the office)

Closing date: 17 November 2026 23:55

Visa sponsorship: You must be eligible to work in the UK to apply for this vacancy. Cancer Research UK is not able to offer visa sponsorship.

At Cancer Research UK, we exist to beat cancer.

We are professionals with purpose, beating cancer every day. But we need to go much further and much faster. That's why we're looking for someone talented, someone determined, someone like you.

We’re looking for an exceptional Head of AI Implementation & Enablement to lead Cancer Research UK’s AI Centre of Excellence (AI CoE), enabling CRUK to get maximum value from AI to accelerate progress towards beating cancer by driving the safe, effective and scalable adoption of AI across the organisation. In this role, you’ll be accountable for establishing governance, frameworks, standards and an operating model that empowers teams to adopt AI with confidence and pace whilst ensuring responsible AI use and proportionate risk management.

Working in partnership with the Data and Technology Senior Leadership Team, our Organisational Effectiveness and Talent team and leaders across CRUK, you will ensure AI priorities are embedded within organisational roadmaps, that innovation and pilot use cases have a clear route to scale, and that AI investments ultimately create meaningful outcomes for CRUK’s customers, stakeholders, and life‑saving mission.

What will be some of the main responsibilities?

• Understand business outcomes and priorities. Understand what the business is trying to achieve and where AI could get it there sooner. Partner with Data and Technology domain leads and with Data and Technology SLT to build those priorities into domain roadmaps, with clear outcomes linked to the customers and stakeholders each domain serves.
• Shape and prioritise AI opportunities. Help product managers and domain teams identify, shape and prioritise AI opportunities by value. Provide the patterns and standards that let them deliver AI safely and consistently without CoE involvement in every build.
• Run a portfolio of AI experiments and pilots. Set clear success criteria up front and track the value delivered against them. Scale successes into sustainable, business‑owned services, and stop those that do not deliver.
• Create paved paths for governance and approval. Design and own CRUK’s AI governance framework (risk tiers, lifecycle controls and responsible‑AI standards) from experimentation through to retirement. Make approval fast and proportionate, so most use cases clear quickly. Define clear triggers so that only the most complex, high‑risk or novel cases need input from Data Privacy, Information Security, Legal or other experts. Set and report on targets for time‑to‑approval.
• Maintain the AI inventory and report. Keep an inventory of AI tools, agents and use cases. Report value, risk, assurance and progress to the AI Steering Group.
• Drive AI adoption and literacy. Build communities of practice and develop skills so AI becomes part of everyday ways of working across CRUK.
• Build consensus. Create alignment among stakeholders with differing priorities, AI maturity and risk appetites, around proportionate approaches that balance innovation, risk management and delivery.
• Lead and develop the AI CoE team. Role model collaborative and inclusive behaviours.

What skills are we looking for?

• Practical understanding of generative AI, large language models and AI agents (their capabilities, limitations and risks) and of the AI market and supplier landscape.
• Experience leading large-scale organisational change, successfully embedding new technologies, operating models or ways of working across complex stakeholder environments.
• Experience scaling pilots into business‑owned services, setting outcomes and objectives, and measuring benefits and ROI.
• Excellent senior stakeholder management and influencing skills, with the ability to build consensus where viewpoints and risk appetites differ.
• Comfortable making decisions and giving direction in fast‑moving, ambiguous environments where technology, regulation and organisational expectations continue to evolve.
• Experience leading and developing a team, with a collaborative, inclusive approach and a commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion.
• Proven experience designing and operating AI governance and responsible frameworks in a complex organisation, from policy through to practical implementation, enabling rapid adoption of AI.
• A track record of making governance an enabler, using proportionate, risk‑based controls that let teams move quickly and safely.

What will I gain?

Each and every one of our employees contributes to our progress and is supporting our work to beat cancer. We think that’s impressive.

In return, we make sure you are supported by a generous benefits package, a wide range of career and personal development opportunities and high-quality tools, policies and processes to enable you to do your job well.

Our benefits package includes a substantial retirement plan, a generous and flexible leave allowance, discounts on anything from travel to technology, gym membership, and much more.

We don’t forget people have lives outside of work too and so we actively encourage a flexible working culture.

Our work – from funding cutting‑edge research to developing public policy – will change the world. It’s exciting to be part of our team.

We actively encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and cultures, in particular those from ethnic minority backgrounds who are currently under‑represented.

We want to see every candidate performing at their best throughout the job application process, interview process and whilst at work. We therefore ask you to inform us of any concerns you have or any adjustments you might need to enable this to happen.

Unfortunately, we are unable to recruit anyone below the age of 18, so that we can protect young people from health & safety and safeguarding risks.

Commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion.