Sr Manager, Data Operations & Management

McDonald's Corporation; Hyderabad; On-site; INR 4,000,000 - 7,000,000; Full time

Job summary

McDonald’s Corporation in Hyderabad seeks an experienced AI/ML Platform Lead to drive strategy, architecture, and enablement of enterprise AI/ML platforms on Google Cloud Platform. You will build scalable services, governance, and self-service tooling to accelerate data science and AI initiatives while partnering with security, risk, and legal teams.

You will lead platform engineering, ensure reliability, and mentor engineers across data, AI, security, and operations teams in a fast-paced,

Qualifications

• 7-10+ years in AI/ML Platform Engineering or related fields.
• Strong expertise in GCP services (Vertex AI, BigQuery, Dataflow, Cloud Storage, IAM).
• Experience with IaC (Terraform), CI/CD, and cloud-native practices.
• Proficiency in Python and platform services/API development.
• Experience with Kubernetes, containers, and serverless architectures.
• Knowledge of governance, security controls, and auditability for AI platforms.
• Excellent stakeholder management and cross-functional collaboration.

Responsibilities

• Define and drive AI/ML platform strategy, roadmap, and architecture.
• Build and manage core platform services, templates, and accelerators.
• Ensure platform scalability, reliability, and governance across teams.
• Deliver self-service capabilities and developer tooling to improve productivity.
• Establish observability, monitoring, and SLAs/SLOs for AI platforms.
• Collaborate with Security, Risk, Legal, and EA teams on governance.

Skills

GCP expertise

Vertex AI

Terraform

CI/CD

Python

Kubernetes

DevSecOps

Cloud Architecture

Security & Compliance

Stakeholder Management

Tools

GitHub Actions

Airflow

Astronomer

Kubernetes

Docker

Vertex AI

BigQuery

Job description

About McDonald’s:

One of the world’s largest employers with locations in more than 100 countries, McDonald’s Corporation has corporate opportunities in Hyderabad. Our global offices serve as dynamic innovation and operations hubs, designed to expand McDonald's global talent base and in-house expertise. Our new office in Hyderabad will bring together knowledge across business, technology, analytics, and AI, accelerating our ability to deliver impactful solutions for the business and our customers across the globe.

Position Overview

Position Summary:

AI/ML Platform Lead

We are seeking an experienced AI & ML Platform Lead to drive the strategy, architecture, engineering, and enablement of enterprise AI/ML platform capabilities on Google Cloud Platform. This role is responsible for building and managing scalable AI/ML platform services, governance controls, development standards, self-service capabilities, and platform automation that enable Data Science and AI/ML Operations teams to rapidly build, deploy, and manage AI solutions securely and efficiently.

Key Responsibilities

Platform Strategy & Architecture

• Define and drive the AI/ML platform strategy, roadmap, and architecture.
• Design scalable, secure, and reusable platform capabilities on GCP and Vertex AI.
• Establish platform standards, reference architectures, and engineering best practices.
• Evaluate and adopt emerging AI platform technologies.

AI/ML Platform Engineering

• Build and manage core AI/ML platform services, frameworks, and shared capabilities.
• Develop reusable templates, accelerators, and automation solutions.
• Enable standardized development and deployment patterns across AI teams.
• Ensure platform scalability, reliability, and maintainability.

Platform Governance & Controls

• Define platform governance, onboarding standards, and guardrails.
• Implement security, access management, compliance, and audit controls.
• Establish governance for AI agents, models, APIs, and platform services.
• Partner with Enterprise Architecture, Security, Risk, and Legal teams.

Self-Service & Enablement

• Deliver self-service capabilities for AI engineers and data scientists.
• Create platform standards, documentation, and reusable assets.
• Drive platform adoption and improve developer experience.
• Promote consistent engineering practices across AI initiatives.

Platform Observability & Reliability

• Establish platform monitoring, logging, alerting, and operational dashboards.
• Drive reliability, resilience, performance, and capacity planning.
• Define platform SLAs, SLOs, and operational readiness standards.
• Partner with AI/ML Operations for production support readiness.

Leadership & Stakeholder Management

• Lead AI/ML platform engineering initiatives and roadmap execution.
• Mentor engineers and foster platform engineering best practices.
• Collaborate with Data, AI, Security, Infrastructure, and Operations teams.
• Communicate platform strategy, progress, risks, and outcomes to leadership.

Required Qualifications

• 7-10+ years of experience in AI/ML Platform Engineering, Cloud Platform Engineering, or Data & AI Platform development, preferably on GCP.Strong expertise in GCP services including Vertex AI, BigQuery, Dataflow, Cloud Storage, Cloud Run, Cloud Functions, IAM, Networking, and related platform technologies.
• 5+ years of experience designing, building, and managing enterprise-scale AI/ML platforms, reusable services, and self-service capabilities.
• Experience with platform automation, Infrastructure as Code (Terraform preferred), CI/CD frameworks, and cloud-native engineering practices.
• Strong proficiency in source code management, code quality, and DevSecOps practices using GitHub, GitHub Actions, pytest, SonarQube, or similar tools.Experience developing platform services, APIs, automation frameworks, and integrations using Python.Hands-on experience with Vertex AI platform capabilities, including Workbench, Model Registry, Feature Store, Vector Search, Generative AI services, and related platform components.
• Experience with workflow orchestration platforms such as Astronomer, Airflow, or equivalent technologies.Strong knowledge of containerization, Kubernetes, Docker, and serverless architectures.Experience establishing platform governance, security controls, access management, compliance standards, and auditability for AI/ML platforms.Understanding of Responsible AI, AI governance, and agent lifecycle controls, including onboarding, access, deployment, monitoring, and observability.
• Experience building developer tooling, reusable templates, accelerators, and self-service capabilities to improve engineering productivity and platform adoption.
• Strong understanding of platform reliability, observability, scalability, performance, and operational readiness.
• Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills, with the ability to collaborate across engineering, security, architecture, operations, and business teams.

McDonald’s is the world’s leading global foodservice retailer with over 40,000 locations in over 100 countries. Approximately 95% of McDonald’s restaurants worldwide are owned and operated by independent local business owners. At McDonald’s, we lead through our values centered on inclusivity, service, integrity, community, and family. Here is your chance to get in on something special as we grow our corporate team in India and allow you to grow your career.