AI Engagement Manager

ABOUT THE ROLE:

AI Engagement Managers are the senior seat at Varick. You own client accounts end to end — from the first conversation with a CFO to the AI agents running in production to the second and third engagements that follow — and you lead the Forward Deployed Strategists and Engineers doing the work on the ground.

This is a role for people who have already run a real engagement at a top-tier firm and want to run them with sharper teeth, faster cycles, and outcomes that actually ship. You decide what we sell, how we scope it, who we say no to, and what we sell next. You are the person the CFO calls back. You are also the person your team looks to when an exec pushes back and the room gets quiet. You need to be able to walk into a room of operators twice your tenure and reframe the problem.

WHAT YOU'LL DO:

• Lead the team on the ground — Forward Deployed Strategists and Engineers report to you during the engagement, and you're accountable for what they ship and how the client experiences it

• Sit across from CFOs, COOs, and CROs — run the executive cadence, present findings, defend recommendations under pressure

• Run the motion end to end — first meeting, pre-meeting brief, post-meeting follow-up, custom demo, engagement letter, expansion — and tighten the playbook for everyone behind you

• Translate ambiguous business problems into engagements with clear outcomes, ROI targets, and exec sponsors — and hold the line on scope when clients try to drift

• Identify opportunities to expand accounts post-deployment — map the org, find the next set of high-leverage workflows, and convert one engagement into three

• Feed every account back into Varick's playbooks, patterns, and platform so the next EM moves twice as fast

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR:

• A track record of owning — not contributing to — a 7- or 8-figure engagement at a top-tier consulting firm (McKinsey, BCG, Bain) or equivalent, where you ran the team, owned the client relationship, and were on the hook for the outcome

• Executive presence. You hold a room of C-suite stakeholders, push back on a COO without losing them, and make a CFO feel like you understand their P&L better than their own team does

• First-principles thinker. You don't reach for the framework or the template — you reason from the actual business problem and back into a recommendation that holds up under stress-testing

• People leadership. You've run a team of consultants or operators and made them better. Your reports have gone on to do bigger things because of how you ran your engagements

• Founder or operator instincts. You've built something, run a P&L, or owned an operating function — and you know what it feels like when the work actually has to ship, not just get presented

• AI-native. You use AI tools every day, you've followed the space closely, and you have a real point of view on where agents work, where they don't, and what's coming next. You can scope an AI implementation and communicate clearly with engineers about what to build

• Extreme ownership. You run your engagements with minimal oversight, and you're accountable for the outcome, not the output

• Based in SF or willing to relocate. Comfortable with 10-20% travel to client sites.

HELPFUL EXPERIENCE:

• Engagement Manager / Project Leader / Case Team Leader at MBB (McKinsey, BCG, Bain), especially with a digital, AI, finance, or operations focus

• Principal or VP at a top investment bank or PE firm with operating-side exposure to portfolio companies

• Former COO, VP Operations, or Chief of Staff at a high-growth company — you've sat on the buy side of a consulting engagement and know what makes one actually work

• Founder or early operator at a company that sold into the enterprise, particularly into the office of the CFO or COO

• Hands-on experience deploying AI tools in a real business context, even if you weren't the one writing the code

WHY VARICK:

• Early to the thesis. We bet on this category before it was obvious — and we're already working with billion-dollar companies

• Real ownership, not slide-deck purgatory. If you're tired of making recommendations that never get implemented, or spending a month polishing a deck no one reads, come build something that actually ships and runs

• High-bar team. Everyone here is someone you'll want to learn from — operators, engineers, and strategists at the top of their craft.

• Direct access to operators and executives (CFOs, COOs, ops leads), with none of the layers, decks-for-decks-sake, or process overhead of a traditional firm

• You own the full loop: find the problem, frame it, scope the solution, see it ship, see it run

• Small, early team — your judgment shapes the product, the playbooks, and how Varick scales

*We are an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or protected veteran status. Employment is subject to a standard confidentiality and non-disclosure agreement.