Sr. Director, AI Platform Engineering & Enablement
Ford · Dearborn, MI, United States ·
- Work mode
- Onsite
- Seniority
- Senior
- Category
- Devops
- Experience
- 12+ years
In this position...
This role requires a leader who brings deep technical knowledge of enterprise AI platforms and the strategic judgment to look across every platform EPEO offers — spanning leading AI and cloud platform providers — and define where AI belongs, what it should change, and how the organization gets there. This is not an operational role. It is the most forward-looking mandate in the platform organization: a cross-cutting AI strategy and enablement function with authority across all platform organizations.
The Senior Director, AI Platform Engineering & Enablement brings two equally weighted mandates. On the engineering side, this leader applies deep technical judgment to evaluate, architect, and govern how AI capabilities are integrated across EPEO’s platform portfolio — ensuring what is deployed is the right capability, properly engineered, and fit for the business functions it serves. On the enablement side, this leader ensures AI capabilities from our major providers are not just procured but actively activated, governed, and embedded into how our platforms operate. This person does not wait for the organization to ask what AI can do. They already know, and they have a plan.
What you'll do...
AI Portfolio Strategy & Platform Assessment
Own the cross-platform AI strategy across all of EPEO’s platform portfolio:
Maintain a comprehensive, enterprise-wide view of how AI is strategically positioned across every platform EPEO operates — what is deployed, what it is being used for across business functions, whether it is the right capability for the problem, and where gaps or redundancies exist
Continuously evaluate AI capabilities across all major providers and platforms against EPEO’s current operating model:
Leading cloud platform AI services and infrastructure
Enterprise AI assistant and productivity platforms
Frontier AI model providers and API platforms
Emerging AI providers and infrastructure primitives
Define and own the cross-platform AI strategy roadmap — a prioritized, forward-looking plan for how AI should evolve across the platform organization over the next one to three years
Identify where AI creates step-change opportunities in platform operations: what can be automated, augmented, or fundamentally re-architected rather than incrementally improved
Challenge existing platform assumptions — bring a clear-eyed view of where current approaches should be replaced by AI-native alternatives, not just enhanced by them
AI Enablement Across the Platform Organization
Drive activation and adoption of AI capabilities across all platforms EPEO operates:
Partner with Platform Engineering, Developer Experience, Employee Experience, Foundational Platform, and Digital Core Platforms to move AI capabilities from available to embedded — integrated into how platforms are built, operated, and improved across the enterprise
Serve as the strategic AI advisor across all platform organizations — providing a consistent, cross-cutting AI lens that individual platform teams cannot maintain on their own
Build and govern the AI portfolio framework for EPEO: how AI investments are categorized, evaluated for fit, measured for value, and reported to executive leadership
Drive internal alignment across platform organizations on AI priorities, sequencing, and shared standards — operating with influence across teams that do not report directly into this role
Develop internal AI platform fluency — bring platform engineering and SRE leadership along on the AI journey through structured evaluation frameworks and shared strategic context
AI Governance, Risk & FinOps
Establish the governance and financial management layer for AI across the enterprise platform portfolio:
Build and own the AI governance framework spanning all providers: model selection criteria, acceptable use policies, data classification standards for AI inputs, and enterprise risk guardrails
Own AI FinOps as a strategic discipline:
Consumption visibility and cost attribution by platform, team, and use case
Model tier efficiency and cost-per-outcome tracking
Enterprise-wide ROI reporting on AI investment across all platform providers
Budget governance and spend forecasting for AI at the EPEO portfolio level
Ensure AI enablement activities meet enterprise standards for security, compliance, intellectual property protection, and responsible use
Partner with CISO, Legal, and Compliance to maintain a risk management framework for AI that scales with adoption and adapts to evolving regulatory requirements
Vendor Strategy & Provider Relationships
Lead EPEO’s strategic AI vendor relationships at the architecture and roadmap level:
Engage leading AI and cloud platform providers as strategic partners — not just commercially but at the technical and roadmap level, influencing provider direction based on EPEO’s scale and enterprise needs
Maintain a forward-looking technology radar for AI: evaluate emerging models, agentic frameworks, and AI infrastructure patterns for enterprise applicability before they become mainstream
Lead vendor capability assessments that go beyond marketing materials — forming independent, technically grounded views of where each provider’s AI platform is heading and what it means for EPEO’s business functions
Manage the AI provider portfolio as a strategic asset: evaluate concentration risk, capability overlap, and investment sequencing across providers
Cross-Functional Platform Partnership
Partner closely with platform organizations across EPEO to ensure AI strategy translates into embedded, operating reality:
Platform Engineering — align AI enablement priorities with core infrastructure and platform delivery roadmaps, ensuring AI capabilities are built into the platform layer, not bolted on
Developer Experience — collaborate on how AI changes the way engineers build, test, and ship software across the enterprise, identifying where AI augments the inner and outer loop
Employee Experience — partner on how AI-enabled platform capabilities reach and serve the broader workforce, extending value beyond engineering to all business functions
Foundational Platform — work in close alignment on shared infrastructure, data, and runtime services that underpin AI workloads across EPEO’s portfolio
Digital Core Platforms — engage on how AI strategy intersects with the core systems and business platforms that power enterprise operations, ensuring AI enablement spans both modern and foundational technology layers
Partner with Security, Legal, and Compliance to ensure AI adoption across all platform organizations meets enterprise risk, data handling, and regulatory standards
Executive Alignment & Strategic Communication
Build and maintain executive-level alignment on AI platform strategy and investment:
Present well-formed AI strategy recommendations to senior and executive leadership — including business cases, opportunity cost of inaction, and multi-year investment prioritization
Provide clear executive visibility into EPEO’s AI platform health: adoption, governance posture, FinOps efficiency, and transformation progress
Represent the AI platform strategy at internal leadership forums, external industry events, and in strategic vendor conversations
Translate a fast-moving AI landscape into clear, actionable direction for the platform organization — synthesizing vendor signals, market developments, and internal data into decisions leadership can act on
How success is achieved...
Maintaining a current, rigorous, and independent view of how AI is positioned across EPEO’s entire platform portfolio
Identifying platform transformation opportunities ahead of the organization — forming views before consensus exists and bringing well-formed recommendations to leadership
Driving AI enablement through influence, not authority — building trust and alignment across platform organizations that do not report directly into this role
Translating complex AI developments into clear, enterprise-wide strategic direction that supports business functions and that leadership can act on with confidence
Governing AI investments with the rigor of a FinOps discipline — not just tracking spend but connecting it to platform value and business outcomes
Building and maintaining strategic vendor relationships that give EPEO early access to AI capabilities and influence over provider roadmaps
You'll have...
AI Platform & Technical Expertise
12+ years of experience in technology, including significant hands-on platform strategy, enterprise architecture, or AI infrastructure leadership
Deep working knowledge of the enterprise AI provider landscape across leading cloud platforms, enterprise AI assistant and productivity platforms, and frontier AI model providers — able to evaluate technical capabilities and architectural fit, not just vendor positioning
Demonstrated experience assessing and rationalizing AI portfolios at enterprise scale — you have looked across a large organization’s AI landscape, identified what belongs and what doesn’t, and made recommendations that were acted on across business functions
Hands-on background in cloud platform architecture sufficient to evaluate AI capabilities at the architectural level — not just vendor positioning
Experience designing or governing enterprise AI governance, FinOps, and enablement frameworks from the ground up — not inheriting and maintaining, but building and standing up
Strong understanding of LLM architecture, agentic patterns, RAG, multi-model orchestration, and AI infrastructure primitives at enterprise scale
Leadership Profile
A strategically-oriented leader who combines technical credibility with the ability to drive organizational change through influence
Comfortable operating at both extremes:
Senior leadership strategy and investment discussions spanning technology, business functions, and enterprise priorities
Deep technical and architectural conversations with platform engineering and vendor engineering teams
Proven ability to operate with a long time horizon in an environment where the technology changes quarterly — holding a multi-year strategic view while remaining responsive to a rapidly evolving AI landscape
Experience leading in large, matrixed engineering organizations (5,000+ engineers) where influence without direct authority is the primary mode of getting things done
Genuine intellectual curiosity about the AI frontier — you follow research, engage vendors at the technical level, form independent views, and are rarely surprised by what ships
Track record of managing strategic AI vendor relationships with hyperscalers and AI-native companies at the architecture and roadmap level
Enterprise Context
Experience in a Fortune 500 or large-scale enterprise environment with complex regulatory, compliance, and security requirements
Demonstrated ability to build the business case for multi-million dollar AI platform investments and present to C-suite and board-level stakeholders
Background in cloud platform engineering, enterprise architecture, or a CTO-adjacent strategy role strongly preferred — credibility in this role requires having built the platforms you are now strategizing about
You may not check every box, or your experience may look a little different from what we've outlined, but if you think you can bring value to Ford Motor Company, we encourage you to apply!
As an established global company, we offer the benefit of choice. You can choose what your Ford future will look like: will your story span the globe, or keep you close to home? Will your career be a deep dive into what you love, or a series of new teams and new skills? Will you be a leader, a changemaker, a technical expert, a culture builder…or all of the above? No matter what you choose, we offer a work life that works for you, including:
• Immediate medical, dental, vision and prescription drug coverage
• Flexible family care days, paid parental leave, new parent ramp-up programs, subsidized back-up child care and more
• Family building benefits including adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, fertility treatments, and more
• Vehicle discount program for employees and family members and management leases
• Tuition assistance
• Established and active employee resource groups
• Paid time off for individual and team community service
• A generous schedule of paid holidays, including the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day
• Paid time off and the option to purchase additional vacation time.
This position is a leadership level 4.
Final determination of salary grade will be based on candidate's skills and experience, and base salary will be set within the applicable range according to job scope, responsibility and competitive market value.
For more information on salary and benefits, click here: https://fordcareers.co/LL4Benefits
Visa sponsorship is not available for this position.
Candidates for positions with Ford Motor Company must be legally authorized to work in the United States. Verification of employment eligibility will be required at the time of hire.
We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, religion, color, age, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability status or protected veteran status. In the United States, if you need a reasonable accommodation for the online application process due to a disability, please call 1-888-336-0660.
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