AI Portfolio and Pipeline Lead in Leeds

Division: Data, Technology and Innovation

Department: AI Product Delivery

Salary: National (Edinburgh and Leeds) ranging from £72,100 to £90,000 and London from £79,300 to £100,000 per annum (salary offered will be based on skills and experience)

This role is graded as: Technical Specialist – Regulatory

About The FCA And Team

We regulate financial services firms in the UK, to keep financial markets fair, thriving and effective. By joining us, you’ll play a key part in protecting consumers, driving economic growth, and shaping the future of UK finance services. The Data, Technology and Innovation (DTI) division enables the FCA to be a digital‑first, data‑led smart regulator by delivering a secure, agile, and cost‑effective technology and data ecosystem that drives better decisions, transparency, and operational efficiency. Working alongside the wider AI Programme (which will continue to oversee/coordinate AI activity across the FCA), the department will partner with business leads to shape and deliver work in priority areas — Authorisations, SPC, EMO and Anti‑Money Laundering.

Role Responsibilities

• Own the end‑to‑end intake and triage of AI demand, shaping ambiguous ideas into well‑defined opportunities with clear users, outcomes, assumptions, and decision points.
• Translate complex business challenges into feasible AI use cases, advising on options, constraints, and best practices across data, models, governance, and delivery.
• Organise high‑profile pipeline and scoping activity, including designing and facilitating scoping workshops with senior stakeholders and subject‑matter experts to identify highest‑value AI opportunities.
• Manage the AI backlog and pipeline through Discovery and POCs, balancing strategic priorities, risk, and delivery capacity to progress the most valuable and complex initiatives.
• Own and support value assessment and sizing, interpreting internal and external drivers to recommend prioritisation based on benefits, costs, risks, dependencies, and time‑to‑value.
• Facilitate prioritisation and governance forums, guiding stakeholders through complex trade‑offs and clearly communicating decisions to both technical and non‑technical audiences.
• Line manage a small team of direct reports and associated supplier resources, ensuring quality, pace, and value across scoping and delivery activities.
• Partner with the AI programme and wider DTI teams to align on standards, governance, and the target operating model, sharing and resolving specialist issues.

Minimum Skills Required

• Demonstrable experience leading complex, high‑profile work and engaging senior stakeholders across business and technical domains.
• Extensive analytical capability with a history of shaping ambiguous problems into structured opportunities, hypotheses and clear outcomes, using a pragmatic approach to assessing complexity, feasibility, effort, risk, dependencies and expected value.
• Solid working understanding of AI platforms, common delivery patterns and constraints, with the ability to engage technical teams and discuss solution trade‑offs effectively.

Essential

• Skilled at senior stakeholder engagement, workshop facilitation and structured problem definition, including turning multiple viewpoints into a clear decision‑ready narrative.
• Ability to work cross‑functionally across data, engineering, product, risk and change to translate business problems into feasible AI opportunities.
• Experience managing a demand backlog and pipeline, maintaining flow into Discovery/POCs and adapting priorities based on capacity, risk and strategic direction.
• Ability to assess and articulate value: sizing benefits, costs and complexity and producing light‑touch business cases to support prioritisation and investment decisions.
• Understanding of AI delivery constraints and governance (e.g., data quality, model performance, assurance, privacy/security), and ability to recommend best practices to improve outcomes.
• Clear communicator who can explain AI concepts and trade‑offs without jargon, producing crisp updates and recommendations for technical and non‑technical audiences.

Benefits

• 28 days annual leave plus bank holidays.
• Hybrid model where employees work a minimum of 40% in the office each month (expectation of 50% for senior leaders). Changing from September to a minimum of 50% in the office each month (expectation of 60% for Directors and Executive Directors).
• Non‑contributory pension (8–12% depending on age) and life assurance at eight times your salary.
• Private healthcare with Bupa, income protection, and 24/7 Employee Assistance.
• 35 hours of paid volunteering annually.
• A flexible benefits scheme designed around your lifestyle.

Our values & culture

Our colleagues are the key to our success as a regulator. We are committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive culture: one that’s free from discrimination and bias, celebrates difference, and supports colleagues to deliver at their best. We believe that our differences and similarities enable us to be a better organisation – one that makes better decisions, drives innovation, and delivers better regulation. If you require any adjustments due to a disability or condition, your recruiter is here to help - reach out for tailored support. We welcome diverse working styles and aim to find flexible solutions that suit both the role and individual needs, including options like part‑time and job sharing where applicable.

Disability Confident: our hiring approach

We’re proud to be a Disability Confident Employer, and therefore, people or individuals with disabilities and long‑term conditions who best meet the minimum criteria for a role will go through to the next stage of the recruitment process. In cases of high application volumes, we may progress applicants whose experience most closely matches the role’s key requirements.

Useful information and timeline

Advert Closing: 17th May

CV Review/Shortlist: 19th May

First Stage Interviews W/C: 25th May

Second Stage Interviews W/C: 1st June

Your Recruiter will discuss the process in detail with you during screening for the role, therefore, please make them aware if you are going to be unavailable for any date during this time.