Lead Associate Principal, AI Solutions

To be considered for this position, applications and resumes are accepted only through our careers site by directly applying to the posted job. We do not accept unsolicited resumes or sales solicitations from staffing agencies. Any OCC employee wishing to submit a referral must do so through their Workday account. Any resume submitted outside of an active job posting will not be considered for employment.

What You'll Do:

This role is OCC’s primary interface between the business and its AI transformation agenda. Rather than waiting for use cases to arrive, the AI Solutions Lead embeds with assigned business functions to understand how work gets done, identify where AI creates meaningful opportunity, and build the roadmap that sequences those opportunities from quick wins through to AI-native operating models. The role then owns each initiative from problem definition through to adoption, bringing enough technical depth to assess feasibility, evaluate vendors, and support contained citizen-led development without duplicating the engineering capability that sits in the CTO’s organization.

Primary Duties and Responsibilities:

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each primary duty satisfactorily.

AI Opportunity Identification & Transformation Roadmap

Embed with assigned business functions to develop a grounded understanding of how workflows, where decisions are made, and where AI can create the most meaningful change in how the organization operates.

Identify AI opportunities that redesign how work gets done rather than layer automation on top of existing processes; distinguish between use cases that deliver incremental improvement and those that change the operating model.

Build and maintain the AI transformation roadmap for assigned functions: sequencing initiatives by impact, feasibility, and readiness, from immediate quick wins through to longer-term AI-native transformation.

Partner with functional leaders to build a shared, realistic view of what AI-native operations look like in their area and what it takes to get there.

Use Case Delivery

Own the full lifecycle of assigned use cases: problem definition, stakeholder requirements, scoping, acceptance criteria, delivery oversight, and post-launch adoption.

Translate business problems into technically grounded requirements precise enough that the CTO’s engineering team can begin architecture design without a separate discovery phase.

Own the primary relationship between the business unit and the CTO’s engineering team for assigned initiatives, translating clearly in both directions.

Define the definition of done: what gets built must solve the problem it was designed to solve.

Design and execute adoption plans for assigned use cases: track usage post-launch, identify friction, and drive resolution until users are genuinely working with the solution.

Communicate roadmap, performance, and trade-offs to business stakeholders and leadership for assigned use cases.

Escalate enterprise-level adoption patterns and systemic barriers to the AI Enablement & Change Lead.

Contribute to portfolio reviews with current status, outcome data, and risk flags for assigned use cases.

Technical Evaluation & Advisory

Assess the technical feasibility of proposed use cases before they enter any pipeline: what is executable, what data prerequisites exist, and what the realistic path to production looks like.

Lead vendor and tool evaluations for non-centralized use cases, producing build-vs-buy recommendations defensible to the business, the CTO, and ORM.

Citizen-Led AI Development

Support business units pursuing contained, non-critical AI development or POCs where the CTO team has assessed the initiative as outside the centralized pipeline; provide technical guidance, scoping, and governance guardrails so work proceeds within ORM’s approved framework.

Support organizational AI capability development across functions: help teams understand what AI tools can do in their specific context and how to use them well.

Define clear boundaries for each citizen-led initiative: what can proceed with guided self-service, what needs central engineering involvement, and what requires full Working Group oversight.

General Duties

Keep assigned use case status, outcomes, and risk flags current for portfolio reporting.

Maintain strong working relationships with assigned business functions and the CTO’s engineering teams.

Support a strong risk management and governance environment for all AI initiatives.

Regularly communicate use case progress and value delivery to the Head of AI Strategy.

Supervisory Responsibilities:

None

Qualifications:

The requirements listed are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the primary functions.

Deep understanding of financial services or capital markets operations; experience in post-trade, clearing, custody, or comparable financial market infrastructure strongly preferred.

Track record of operating at the intersection of business strategy and technical delivery: has produced specifications that engineering teams have built from, and business cases that senior leaders have approved.

Experience identifying technology opportunities inside a business — proactively finding where AI creates value, not just responding to requests.

Working knowledge of modern AI architectures, including retrieval-augmented generation, agent frameworks, and large language model evaluation, sufficient to assess vendor claims, scope POCs, and produce requirements engineering teams can act on.

Demonstrated ability to drive post-launch technology adoption: accountable through genuine usage, not just go-live.

Familiarity with model risk governance expectations and their implications for AI use in a regulated financial environment.

Technical Skills:

AI architecture assessment: retrieval-augmented generation, agent frameworks, and large language model evaluation

Requirements specification for AI systems and use case feasibility analysis

Vendor and tool evaluation methodology for AI platforms in regulated environments

Data analysis and familiarity with data pipeline concepts relevant to AI use cases

Process analysis and workflow mapping to support use case scoping and AI readiness work

Analytics and BI tools (e.g., Power BI, Tableau) and collaboration platforms (e.g., Jira, Notion)

Education and/or Experience:

7 or more years of experience in financial services technology or strategy, with at least five years in post-trade or capital markets infrastructure

Domain knowledge in at least one of the following: tokenization and digital asset infrastructure, collateral management and margining, or extended-hours clearing and settlement operations

Certificates or Licenses:

N/A — relevant AI product management, project management, or domain certification is a plus

About Us

The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) is the world's largest equity derivatives clearing organization. Founded in 1973, OCC is dedicated to promoting stability and market integrity by delivering clearing and settlement services for options, futures and securities lending transactions. As a Systemically Important Financial Market Utility (SIFMU), OCC operates under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. OCC has more than 100 clearing members and provides central counterparty (CCP) clearing and settlement services to 19 exchanges and trading platforms. More information about OCC is available at www.theocc.com.

Benefits

A highly collaborative and supportive environment developed to encourage work-life balance and employee wellness. Some of these components include: