Advisory Consultant - AI and Innovation

Escalent; India; On-site; INR 1,200,000 - 2,400,000; Full time

Job summary

Escalent is seeking a seasoned professional to lead AI strategy, innovation, and productization efforts. You will shape the AI roadmap, work with AI products, and drive adoption across research, consulting, and corporate functions.

This role reports to the SVP/Head of AI and Innovation and collaborates with tech, product, and development teams. The ideal candidate has 8–12 years in Strategic Research & Insights, is comfortable with cross-functional initiatives, and can balance consultative

Qualifications

• MBA/PG from a reputed management institute.
• 8–12 years in delivering Strategic Research & Insights engagements across industries, focused on international markets.
• Strong exposure to driving revenue growth through account farming, business development support, and productized offerings.
• Strong exposure to internal process innovation/automation.
• Some experience in cross-functional, enterprise-wide initiatives.
• Hands-on exposure to Qualitative and Quantitative Primary Research, Desk Research, and Process Analytics/Innovation.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end ownership of key AI/automation/innovation strategic initiatives.
• Develop understanding of Escalent’s products and tech roadmap to guide AI initiatives.
• Lead AI product development including scoping, planning, and scaling.
• Coordinate with SMEs to define workflows, inputs/outputs, and roadmaps.
• Prepare AI thought leadership materials and internal documentation.

Skills

Qualitative Research

Quantitative Research

Desk Research

Process Analytics

Innovation

AI Tools

Low-code/No-code

Education

MBA or Post Graduation in Management

Tools

AI Toolkits

Low-code/No-code Platforms

Job description

Escalent is an award-winning data analytics and advisory firm that helps clients understand human and market behaviors to navigate disruption. As catalysts of progress for more than 40 years, our strategies guide the world’s leading brands. We accelerate growth by creating a seamless flow between primary, secondary, syndicated, and internal business data, providing consulting and advisory services from insights through implementation. Based on a profound understanding of what drives human beings and markets, we identify actions that build brands, enhance customer experiences, inspire product innovation, and boost business productivity. We listen, learn, question, discover, innovate, and deliver—for each other and our clients—to make the world work better for people.

Role Overview

We are looking for a seasoned professional with expansive Strategy Research and/or Consulting experience, strong exposure to Workflow and Product Development, high degree of AI-and-tech savviness, and a Consultative and Impact oriented mindset. The ideal candidate will play an instrumental role in servicing Escalent’s plans to develop, integrate, adopt, and productize AI and innovation tools/capabilities/offerings, thereby allowing research, consulting, and corporate teams as well as our clients to benefit from AI’s capabilities to foster better, smarter, and efficient workflows.

Unlike typical advisory/consulting profiles, this role is not focused on core research and consulting. Instead, it will report to the SVP and Head of AI and Innovation and be a core part of an enterprise-wide team that’s focused on formulating Escalent’s AI strategy, approach, and roadmap from the perspective of integrating AI tools/capabilities into research/consulting/corporate function workflows as well as developing in-house and monetizable AI products/solutions.

Detailed responsibilities follow:

Overall

• Assume end-to-end ownership of key strategic initiatives in AI/automation/innovation, with a leading role in scoping, planning, executing, and scaling.
• Develop a strong understanding of Escalent group’s products, tools, solutions, and technological roadmap, and leverage it to pivot all AI initiatives, workflows, features, and products.
• Demonstrate a strong capability to link findings and recommendations to desired business impact.
• Present findings and recommendations, while explaining approach and rationale, to senior/executive leadership as and when needed.

AI Product Development

• Scope out research-focused AI products/features/agents with a clear understanding of the use case, intended audience, and desired operational/business impact.
• Work with industry/methodology/technique SMEs, if needed, to chalk out the product/feature/agent workflow, input-output mix, desired functioning, and forward-looking roadmap.
• Where applicable, co-develop the development/implementation and scaling plan, in collaboration with the tech, development, and product teams.
• Where applicable/possible, adopt a hands-on approach on low-code/no-code/vibe-code agent development tools/environments to create the tool/agent.
• Craft and co-implement alpha and beta testing plans, and internal and external rollout roadmaps, to ensure controlled testing, scaled launch, robust adoption, and continuous improvement.
• Double up as an alpha tester focused on ‘breaking’ the product/feature/agent to ensure adequate stress-testing under various edge cases.
• Own the feature and scaling roadmap, and hold the product, tech, development, and infrastructure teams accountable for their respective tasks and timelines.
• Organize and administer demos, show-n-tells, and lunch-n-learns among internal/external audiences to socialize the product/feature/agent, resolve queries, foster adoption, and gather constructive and actionable feedback.
• Support revenue growth and client delight by:
  • Providing product/domain/subject matter expertise on AI/innovation as part of account farming conversations,
  • Contributing to client RFPs/proposals on all things AI, innovation, and automation.
  • Addressing AI-related questionnaires and contract reviews to alleviate any client or compliance concerns regarding the use of AI by demonstrating Escalent’s deliberate, outcome-focused, human-centered, and strategically and technologically robust approach to AI.
• 3P Toolkit Due Diligence and Expansion:
  • Identify relevant AI/innovation tools for any use case, via desk research and internal outreach.
  • Liaise with various tool vendors to understand functional possibilities, evaluate use case fitment, and assess commercial viability.
  • Partner with Compliance and IT teams to vet and whitelist specific tools for test/trials.
  • Conceptualize a trial program and secure licenses for testing.
  • Partner with domain/functional/corporate teams to test various tools to assess their effectiveness and value-add.
• Address internal queries on AI, innovation, and automation tools/techniques/approaches to ensure teams know when (and when not) to use AI, how to use it effectively + efficiently + ethically, which tool/feature/product/agent to leverage, and where to avoid pitfalls.

AI Thought Leadership

• Work with enterprise marketing and other internal team(s) to prepare AI/innovation product dossiers, thought leadership POVs and blogs, consultative whitepapers, etc.
• Exhibit a strong passion for AI and innovation, and stay updated on the latest developments, trends, product/model launches, etc. and their plausible impact on Escalent’s AI strategy/approach/roadmap.
• Internal and SharePoint Documentation:
  • Prepare, maintain, and improve documents on AI-related processes, guidelines, and protocols.
  • Author self-learn collateral on the in-house and approved 3P tool mix, such as tool one-pagers, tool usage decision flowcharts, SharePoint pages and content, etc.

AI Upskilling

• Contribute to Escalent’s ongoing and ever-expanding AI upskilling initiatives by conceptualizing ideas, developing collateral, and administering sessions.

Candidate Profile

• Education:
  • MBA / Post Graduation from a reputed management institute.
• Experience:
  • 8-12 years in delivering Strategic Research & Insights engagements across industries, focused on international markets.
  • Solid experience leading project-based engagements and delivering findings to senior/executive client and internal stakeholders.
  • Strong exposure to driving revenue growth through account farming, business development support, and productized offerings.
  • Strong exposure to internal process innovation/automation.
  • Some experience in cross-functional, enterprise-wide initiatives.
• Methodological / Tool Expertise:
  • Must Have: strong exposure to Qualitative and Quantitative Primary Research, Desk Research, and Process Analytics/Innovation.
  • Good-to-Have: hands-on experience with AI and innovative tools.
  • Big Plus: experience with low-code/no-code/vide-code agent development, and working with tech/development/product teams.
• Team leader with strong interpersonal skills
• Logical and creative thinker with astute analytical aptitude
• Consultative approach to problem solving