Blue Cross Blue Shield

Licenses health insurer brands to members

AI Strategy and Portfolio Principal

Corporate StrategyConfirmed live in the last 24 hours

Full-timeChicago, IL, USA

About the Job

Requirements

A Bachelor of Science degree or equivalent experience is required.
At least 10 years of experience in enterprise technology strategy, governance, portfolio management, or related disciplines is required.
At least 5 years of AI, analytics, or machine learning leadership experience is required.
Experience managing enterprise technology portfolios is required.
Experience leading cross-functional initiatives is required.
Experience presenting to executive leadership is required.
Experience managing strategic technology investments is required.
Experience in the healthcare or payer industry is required.
Ability to translate complex AI concepts into clear business terms for executive audiences and influence and build consensus without direct authority is required.
Strong understanding of Generative AI, large language models, machine learning, AI agents, and foundation models is required.
Strong understanding of RAG architectures and prompt engineering concepts is required.
Strong understanding of model lifecycle management and model governance is required.
Strong understanding of enterprise architecture, technology strategy, and portfolio management is required.
Strong analytical and financial-modeling skills are required.

Responsibilities

Own the enterprise AI product and project portfolio.
Develop and maintain the enterprise AI portfolio strategy and AI capability maturity roadmap, prioritizing investments and balancing cost against value across initiatives.
Establish the AI enablement process, support BCBSA teams with AI business cases, identify and eliminate duplicate AI capabilities across departments, and optimize enterprise AI spending.
Apply enterprise thinking, strategic planning, investment prioritization, cost-benefit analysis, and portfolio-optimization analysis to deliver the AI portfolio roadmap, executive portfolio dashboards, and a repeatable AI business case methodology.
Act as operational lead and subject matter expert supporting the enterprise AI Review Board, ensuring responsible AI policies are followed within Technology Operations.
Review AI use cases to support business-team enablement, maintain the enterprise AI inventory, and define AI approval workflows for tool and model selection in collaboration with Enterprise Architecture and Enterprise Engineering.
Govern models across their lifecycle by providing frameworks and templates teams use to monitor production model inventory, model applicability, drift, hallucination rates, and quality; review retraining schedules and retirement; and conduct periodic model reviews to ensure ongoing business fitness. The role provides oversight frameworks and does not itself perform statistical monitoring.
Apply risk-assessment, data-governance, AI-security, model-evaluation, and performance-measurement discipline, and facilitate consensus on model management decisions.
Partner with FinOps to provide financial and value transparency for the AI portfolio.
Report on AI operating expenses, token and GPU utilization, and cost avoidance; recommend approaches to optimize large language model usage costs and forecast AI spend; support development of AI chargeback models; support enterprise AI licensing with Procurement; and develop and report AI usage metrics such as cost per transaction, employee, and AI interaction.
Define and recommend methods to measure financial and operational value, employee productivity (including time saved and reduced administrative burden), and indirect provider and member experience gains.
Apply financial modeling, cost-benefit analysis, key performance indicator development, and executive reporting to provide leadership dashboards showing organizational AI investments, realized value, successful initiatives, and initiatives that should stop.
Serve as an internal consultant to help business and technology teams select AI solutions by collaborating with stakeholders to evaluate foundation models, commercial and open-source large language models, AI agents and agent frameworks, retrieval-augmented generation architectures, AI orchestration and prompt-management platforms, and AI evaluation tooling.
Collaborate with technology partners, including AI architecture, cloud AI platform, model-evaluation, API-integration, and AI-security experts, to provide defensible recommendations to business teams.
Lead by influence across the enterprise and partner with business leaders and other stakeholders to advance responsible, value-driven AI adoption.
Use influence without authority, consensus-building, negotiation, change-management, facilitation, executive-presentation skills, and program-leadership discipline to align stakeholders and drive enterprise outcomes without direct reporting authority.

Desired Qualifications

A Master of Science degree is preferred.
Cloud AI platform experience with Microsoft Azure AI, Amazon Web Services AI services, and Google Cloud Vertex AI is preferred.
Experience with OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Google Gemini, and Meta Llama foundation models is preferred.
Experience with AI gateway technologies, AI observability platforms, and model monitoring tools is preferred.
AI FinOps and technology portfolio management experience is preferred.
Enterprise Architecture and Agile portfolio management experience is preferred.
Healthcare interoperability, AI procurement, and third-party model evaluation experience is preferred.
Certified Project Management Professional (PMP) certification from PMI is preferred.
Microsoft Certified: Azure AI Engineer Associate certification is preferred.

Job Description Summary:

This role is responsible for the enterprise management, governance, optimization, and value realization of Artificial Intelligence capabilities across the organization. Serving as the enterprise subject matter expert for AI portfolio management, model governance, AI technology selection, and Responsible AI practices, the role ensures AI investments align with strategic priorities, regulatory expectations, and business outcomes while maximizing return on investment and managing technology cost. This role serves as an enterprise advisor and governance leader, partnering across the organization to guide the responsible adoption, management, and optimization of emerging technologies and AI-enabled capabilities. Through influence and collaboration, the role helps ensure investments align to strategic priorities, appropriate governance practices are followed, risks are effectively managed, and measurable business value is realized.

Job Description

Enterprise AI Strategy & Portfolio Management. Own the enterprise AI product/project portfolio. Develop and maintain the enterprise AI portfolio strategy and AI capability maturity roadmap, prioritizing investments and balancing cost against value across initiatives. Establish the AI enablement process, support BCBSA teams with AI business cases, identify and eliminate duplicate AI capabilities across departments, and optimize enterprise AI spending. Applies enterprise thinking, strategic planning, investment prioritization, and cost-benefit and portfolio-optimization analysis to deliver the AI portfolio roadmap, executive portfolio dashboards, and a repeatable AI business case methodology.

AI Model Lifecycle Oversight. Act as operational lead and subject matter expert supporting the enterprise AI Review Board, ensuring responsible AI policies are followed within Technology Operations. Review AI use cases in support of business-team enablement, maintain the enterprise AI inventory, and define AI approval workflows for tool and model selection in collaboration with Enterprise Architecture and Enterprise Engineering. Govern models across their lifecycle by providing the frameworks and templates teams use to monitor the production model inventory, model applicability, drift, hallucination rates, and quality; review retraining schedules and retirement; and conduct periodic model reviews to ensure ongoing business fitness (this role provides oversight frameworks and does not itself perform statistical monitoring). Brings risk-assessment, data-governance, AI-security, model-evaluation, and performance-measurement discipline, and uses facilitation and consensus-building to align stakeholders on model management decisions.

AI Financial Management & Value Measurement. Partner with FinOps to bring financial and value transparency to the AI portfolio. Report on AI operating expenses, token and GPU utilization, and cost avoidance; recommend approaches to optimizing LLM usage costs and forecasting AI spend; support development of AI chargeback models; support enterprise AI licensing with Procurement; and develop and report key AI usage metrics (e.g., cost per transaction, per employee, and per AI interaction). Define and recommend methods to measure financial, operational, employee-productivity, including (for e.g.) time saved, reduced administrative burden, and indirect provider and member experience gains. Applies financial modeling, cost-benefit analysis, KPI development, and executive reporting so leadership dashboards can answer where the organization is investing, what value it is getting, which AI initiatives are succeeding, and which should stop.

AI Technology Advisory & Architecture Guidance. Serve as internal consultant helping business and technology teams select the right AI solution collaborating with key stakeholders evaluating foundation models, commercial and open-source large language models, AI agents and agent frameworks, RAG architectures, AI orchestration and prompt-management platforms, and AI evaluation tooling. Collaborates with partners across technology, including, AI architecture, cloud AI platform, model-evaluation, API-integration, and AI-security expertise to provide, defensible recommendations to business teams

Cross-functional Leadership & Stakeholder Partnership. Lead by influence across the enterprise, partnering with business leaders and other key stakeholders to advance responsible, value-driven AI adoption. Uses influencing-without-authority, consensus-building, negotiation, change-management, facilitation, and executive-presentation skills, together with program-leadership discipline, to align diverse stakeholders and drive enterprise outcomes without direct reporting authority.

The posting range for this position is:

130,300.00 - 188,950.00

Qualifications:

Education

Required BS ; or equivalent experience
Preferred MS

Experience

Required 10+ Years 10+ years of experience in enterprise technology strategy, governance, portfolio management, or related disciplines
5+ years AI, analytics, or machine learning leadership experience
Experience managing enterprise technology portfolios
Experience leading cross-functional initiatives
Experience presenting to executive leadership
Experience managing strategic technology investments
Experience in the healthcare or payer industry

Knowledge Skills and Abilities

Ability to translate complex AI concepts into clear business terms for executive audiences, and to influence and build consensus without direct authority.

Strong understanding of:

Generative AI, large language models, machine learning, AI agents, and foundation models
RAG architectures and prompt engineering concepts
Model lifecycle management and model governance
Enterprise architecture, technology strategy, and portfolio management
Analytical and financial-modeling

Preferred Skills:

Cloud AI platforms: Microsoft Azure AI, Amazon Web Services AI services, and Google Cloud Vertex AI
Foundation models: OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Google Gemini, and Meta Llama
AI gateway technologies, AI observability platforms, and model monitoring tools
AI FinOps and technology portfolio management
Enterprise Architecture and Agile portfolio management
Healthcare interoperability, AI procurement, and third-party model evaluation

Certifications & Licenses

Preferred: Certified Project Management Professional (PMP) - PMI
Preferred: Microsoft Certified: Azure AI Engineer Associate - Microsoft

#LI_HYBRID

The posted salary range is the lowest to highest salary we, in good faith, believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. We may ultimately pay more or less than the hiring range andthis hiringrange may also be modified in the future. A candidate’s position within the hiring range may be based on several factors including, but not limited to, specific competencies, relevant education, qualifications, certifications, relevant experience, skills, seniority, performance, shift, travel requirements, and business or organizational needs. This job is also eligible for annual bonusincentivepay.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including paid time off, 11 holidays, medical/dental/vision insurance, generous 401(k) matching, lifestyle spending account and many other benefits to eligible employees.

Note: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, or any other form of compensation that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole discretion, consistent with the law.

About the Company

Blue Cross Blue Shield

Licenses health insurer brands to members

Blue Cross Blue Shield is a federation of 34 independent member insurers that licenses its brand to these members, who then sell health insurance to individuals, families, and businesses. Each member tailors plans to its local market and markets them under the BCBS brand, with the federation providing branding, licensing, and national services while revenue comes from premiums and investments. The model is decentralized and community-based, giving local companies autonomy for product design and partnerships, supported by shared marketing and advocacy resources. Its goal is to expand access to health insurance and healthcare by combining local flexibility with a strong national brand and support system.

Company size: 1,001-5,000
Company stage: Not listed
Total funding: Not listed
Headquarters: Chicago, IL
Founded: 1910

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