AI Data Project Manager ( US or Canada)

Description

Defined.ai is a leading provider of high-quality, ethically sourced data for Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) model training. We host the world's largest AI marketplace and offer end-to-end services to help companies accelerate their AI solutions. Backed by significant funding and recognized globally for our commitment to ethical AI, we operate in a fast-paced, innovative environment with offices in Seattle and Lisbon.

Who are we looking for?

The AI Data Project Manager is responsible for planning, scoping, costing, and operationally designing customer projects involving AI and data services. The role works closely with Sales, Operations, Supplier Management, and customers to translate customer requirements into clear project plans, delivery models, staffing requirements, pricing, and execution strategies.
This is a highly cross-functional, individual-contributor role for someone who understands how AI and data projects are executed and can move effectively between customer requirements, commercial considerations, and operational delivery.
We are looking for a candidate who has experience in AI data services, data collection, data annotation, transcription, translation, data evaluation, machine learning operations, or another technology-enabled services environment.
This is not a software engineering, cloud architecture, or systems architecture position. The focus is on project scoping, operational solution design, costing, customer requirements, and delivery planning.

Requirements:

• 3+ years of experience in project management, program management, operations, solutions, or consulting within the AI data services industry.
• Experience managing projects involving multiple stakeholders, teams, suppliers, or external partners.
• Strong understanding of project planning, requirements gathering, resource planning, and execution.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Experience working with budgets, costing, pricing, staffing, or resource planning.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to manage multiple opportunities and projects simultaneously.
• Strong attention to detail and organizational skills.
• Ability to work independently in a fast-paced environment.
• Ability to translate ambiguous customer requirements into structured project plans.

Experience in one or more of the following environments is strongly preferred:

• AI data services
• Data annotation
• Data collection
• Data labeling
• LLM evaluation
• Speech or language data
• Transcription
• Translation
• Human-in-the-loop AI
• Crowdsourcing
• AI model evaluation
• Content moderation
• Data operations

Nice-to-have: Experience at companies providing AI data, localization, crowdsourcing, BPO, or technology-enabled data services is particularly valuable.

What you'll do:

Project Scoping & Planning

• Review customer requirements and translate them into clear, executable project plans.
• Work with Sales and customers to understand project objectives, scope, deliverables, timelines, quality requirements, and constraints.
• Determine the resources, skills, languages, geographies, suppliers, and operational capabilities required to execute projects.
• Develop project assumptions, dependencies, risks, milestones, and execution plans.
• Identify gaps or ambiguities in customer requirements and work with stakeholders to resolve them.
• Ensure proposed project approaches are operationally feasible before commitments are made to customers.

Costing & Pricing

• Develop project cost models based on labor requirements, geography, supplier rates, quality requirements, project complexity, and operational assumptions.
• Develop staffing and capacity models for customer projects.
• Support the development of customer pricing and commercial proposals.
• Analyze different delivery approaches to identify the optimal balance of cost, quality, scalability, and timeline.
• Work with Sales, Finance, Supplier Management, and Operations to validate project economics.

AI & Data Services

• Have a strong understanding of AI data-service workflows, including:
  • Data collection
  • Image and video annotation
  • Audio and speech data
  • Transcription
  • Translation
  • LLM and AI evaluation
  • Data validation and quality assurance
  • Human-in-the-loop AI workflows
• Determine the appropriate operational approach for different project requirements.
• Understand how project specifications affect staffing, cost, timeline, quality, and delivery risk.
• Stay current with emerging AI data-service methodologies and industry practices.

Customer & Sales Support

• Partner with Sales teams during customer discovery and opportunity development.
• Participate in customer calls to understand requirements and explain proposed delivery approaches.
• Translate customer requirements into clear internal execution requirements.
• Support development of proposals, Statements of Work, RFP responses, and RFI responses.
• Prepare project scopes, methodologies, timelines, staffing models, assumptions, and pricing inputs.
• Serve as a key point of contact between Sales and delivery organizations during the presales process.

Supplier & Operations Coordination

• Work with Supplier Management to identify appropriate suppliers and contributor pools for customer projects.
• Define required supplier capabilities, geographic coverage, language capabilities, capacity, and rates.
• Validate supplier availability and costs against proposed project requirements.
• Coordinate with Operations and Project Management teams to ensure proposed approaches can be successfully delivered.
• Support transition of awarded projects from presales into production.
• Identify operational risks and develop mitigation strategies.

Proposal & RFP/RFI Support

• Develop project plans, execution methodologies, and operational approaches for RFPs, RFIs, and other customer requests.
• Contribute to technical and commercial proposals.
• Develop assumptions, staffing models, quality approaches, timelines, and pricing inputs.
• Coordinate information across Sales, Operations, Supplier Management, Finance, and other internal stakeholders.
• Ensure customer commitments are aligned with operational capabilities.

Cross-Functional Project Leadership

• Coordinate multiple stakeholders to move opportunities from requirements through solution definition and delivery handoff.
• Track open questions, decisions, dependencies, and risks.
• Communicate project requirements clearly across technical, operational, commercial, and customer-facing teams.
• Drive timely resolution of issues that could affect scope, cost, quality, or delivery.
• Maintain accurate project documentation and ensure key assumptions are captured.

Typical Deliverables

• Project scopes
• Project plans
• Execution methodologies
• Staffing models
• Capacity models
• Cost models
• Pricing inputs
• Statements of Work
• RFP/RFI responses
• Project assumptions
• Operational workflows
• Supplier requirements
• Quality frameworks
• Timelines and milestones
• Customer presentations
• Presales-to-delivery handoff documentation

What This Role Is Not
This is  not a software engineering role.
This is  not a cloud architecture role.
This is  not a systems integration role.
This is  not a traditional IT Project Manager role focused primarily on software implementation.
The successful candidate should be comfortable working with AI and data concepts but does not need to be a software engineer or technical architect.

Success Measures
Success in this role is demonstrated through:

• Accurate and complete project scoping.
• Development of commercially viable project approaches.
• Accurate project costing and resource planning.
• Successful coordination between Sales, Operations, Supplier Management, and customers.
• High-quality proposals, SOWs, and RFP/RFI responses.
• Identification and mitigation of operational risks before project launch.
• Efficient transition of awarded projects into delivery.
• Ability to independently manage complex customer requirements.
• Strong customer and internal stakeholder relationships.

Benefits 
You spend a lot of your time at work, so it should be challenging, fun and interesting. At Defined.ai it will be all of those things and more. Here’s what we offer: 

• Flexible working schedule and hybrid model . We know comfort can boost creativity and performance, so you can manage your schedule and work both from one of our modern office spaces or home. 

• Excellent career development opportunities in a high growth company.  With us, you can accomplish your career goals and follow a well-described career path with the support of your supervisor. 

• Culture of feedback and continuous improvement.  AI is a fast-paced area, so we keep track of tech trends, and we always ask for feedback. 

• An international and diverse team . We have more than 23 nationalities at our 3 locations, 
  and we provide language classes. 

• Continuous training opportunities . You can choose from many options: leveraging hand-on workshops, unlimited access to Coursera and formal development opportunities. 

• We love to foster a great office vibe . We believe that a comfortable environment makes 
  a difference, so we provide daily breakfast and lunch, weekly happy hours to unwind,
  extra time-off, and even in-office massages to keep you relaxed and energized. 

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