Enterprise Change Management - Head of Innovation

Northern Trust; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 165,000 - 288,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

401(k) and pension

health and welfare benefits

paid time off

Job summary

Northern Trust’s ECM organization seeks a Head of Innovation in Chicago to lead AI-enabled transformation across enterprise programs. You will partner with end users and leadership to identify opportunities, prototype solutions, and drive production adoption while aligning with governance, policies, and risk controls.

You will design multi-year roadmaps, integrate AI capabilities, and build scalable, measurable outcomes across ECM pillars.

Job description

About Northern Trust

As a global leader in innovative wealth management, asset servicing, asset management and banking services, Northern Trust (Nasdaq: NTRS) is proud to guide the world’s most successful individuals, families, corporations and institutions.

Since 1889, we have aligned our efforts with our three guiding Principles That Endure: Service, Expertise, and Integrity. Together, they reflect the three cornerstones of business conduct which we strive to instill in our employees, whom we call partners, and to provide to our clients and the communities we serve worldwide.

With more than 135 years of financial experience and over 24,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.

The ECM Head of Innovation role focuses on driving innovative outcomes working with NT’s AI tooling and capabilities to drive influence, compliance, transparency and productivity returns alongside the Enterprise Change Management Office. The ECM Head of Innovation will interact and engage with all levels of Northern Trust to inspire and drive consistency and scalability in order to achieve sustainable success in change delivery across the enterprise.

We are seeking an individual to operate at the intersection of AI, data and business transformation. This individual will be required to work directly with end users and leadership teams to understand workflows, identify transformation opportunities, rapidly prototype solutions and drive production adoption. The ideal candidate combines strong technical expertise with exceptional business acumen and excels in ambiguous, high-impact environments where technology and organizational change must advance together.

The Head of Innovation will be responsible for setting up and overseeing the internal structure for innovation across ECM, defining and implementing an executable framework and supporting the adoption of innovation programs and structures across the bank. This will include creating and/or updating policies, procedures, and controls that align with organizational goals, innovation structures and regulatory requirements.

Business Process Transformation

• Design future-state operating models that leverage technology and AI to improve efficiency, risk-management, and decision-making
• Embed alongside core ECM delivery pillars (EPMO, G&O and OCM) and Business teams to understand current state processes and identify opportunities to augment or automate workflows using AI, data products and automation technologies
• Deploy and integrate AI, analytics and workflow solutions into enterprise platforms and business processes
• Build prototypes and production ready solutions that demonstrate measurable business value
• Partner with enterprise initiatives (e.g. AI Horizon) to leverage capability and inform strategic journey aligned to Change adoption, improvement and driven productivity solutions
• Design multi-year implementation roadmaps to power accelerated and transparent execution, automated workflow management and uplifted controls, reporting, oversight and monitoring; influence product, platform, and data roadmaps based on real-world business needs and adoption patterns
• Develop integrations, APIs, automation workflows, and custom applications that connect enterprise systems and data assets
• Work closely with architecture, engineering, and platform teams to ensure innovative solutions are scalable and supportable
• Responsible for continuous improvement and automation of business processes, leveraging tools and technology to automate intake, assessments and/or reporting

Organizational Change Acceleration

• Partner with Hub & Spoke enterprise Change teams to drive adoption, training and stakeholder engagement and business readiness
• Be a Change Champion across ECM and the wider enterprise, support implementation of solutions and drive uplift of innovation skills across ECM’s partners through AI enablement and other tooling
• Define and implement strategic feedback loops; capturing insights from deployment activities and user interactions
• Work closely with Organizational Change Management (OCM), to support the stand up of ECM’s center of excellence and advisory capability across NT, with an enhanced readiness and adoption toolkit

Professional And Technical Competencies

• Strong ability to understand complex business problems and rapidly translate them into pragmatic technical solutions
• Experience implementing AI copilots, agentic workflows, RAG architectures, or intelligent automation solutions
• Familiarity with orchestration frameworks, vector databases, and prompt engineering concepts
• Hands-on experience with Azure, AWS, or GCP preferred
• Experience working with enterprise data platforms such as Snowflake, Databricks, Azure Data Platform, or similar
• Ability to influence stakeholders and build alignment across business, technology, risk, and operations teams
• Comfortable engaging with both senior executives and technical practitioners
• Able to explain complex technical concepts in simple business language
• Thrives in fast-moving environments with evolving requirements and unclear problem definitions
• Focuses on measurable business impact rather than technical implementation alone
• Takes responsibility from problem identification through deployment, adoption, and value realization

Knowledge, Skills & Experience Required

• Bachelor's degree in Business Administration, Management, or a related field. An advanced degree or certification in Program Management (PMP, CAPM) and/or Organizational Change Management (CCMP, CMS) is preferred.
• Proven experience in executing and implementing AI models and/or tooling, preferably within a change management context.
• Strong understanding of change management principles and practices, and the ability to apply this understanding for automation, RPA and AI enablement.
• Excellent organizational and leadership skills, with the ability to manage complex processes and workflows.
• Strong analytical skills, with the ability to create reports and provide insights into the change management process.
• Ability to identify, scope, plan and assess change initiatives
• Experience with portfolio, program and change management applications/tools, and the ability to oversee their use within a business context.

Salary Range

$164,600 - 288,000 USD

Salary range is a good faith estimate of base pay. Northern Trust provides a comprehensive benefits package including retirement benefits (401k and pension), health and welfare benefits (medical, dental, vision, spending accounts and disability), paid time off, parental and caregiver leave, life & accident insurance, and other voluntary and well-being benefits. Northern Trust also provides a discretionary bonus program that may include an equity component.

Work Authorization

Applicants must be authorized to work in the U.S. without the need for employment-based visa sponsorship now or in the future. Northern Trust will not sponsor applicants for U.S. work visa status for this opportunity (no sponsorship is available for H-1B, L-1, TN, O-1, E-3, H-1B1, F-1, J-1, OPT, CPT or any other employment-based visa).

Working with Us

As a Northern Trust partner, you will be part of a flexible and collaborative work culture, which has a strong history of financial strength and stability. Movement within the organization is encouraged, senior leaders are accessible, and you can take pride in working for a company committed to an inclusive workplace and assisting the communities we serve.

Philanthropy is deeply rooted in Northern Trust’s history and is an essential element of our culture. Employees around the world give their time and talent to work for the greater good of their communities.

Reasonable Accommodation

Northern Trust is committed to working with and providing adjustments to individuals with health conditions and disabilities. If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please email our HR Service Center at [e-mail], or alternatively you can discuss your individual requirements with the recruiter you are working with.