Sr. Director – Head of Artificial Intelligence Practice

Visa is a world leader in payments technology, facilitating transactions between consumers, merchants, financial institutions and government entities across more than 200 countries and territories, dedicated to uplifting everyone, everywhere by being the best way to pay and be paid.

At Visa, you'll have the opportunity to create impact at scale — tackling meaningful challenges, growing your skills and seeing your contributions impact lives around the world. Join Visa and do work that matters — to you, to your community, and to the world.

Progress starts with you.

Visa Consulting and Analytics VCA, the consulting arm of Visa, is a global team of industry experts in strategy, marketing, operations, risk, money movement and digital consulting, with decades of experience in the payments industry.

As Artificial Intelligence becomes foundational to business transformation, VCA is establishing and scaling a dedicated AI Practice to guide clients on their journey toward AI first organizations.

The Senior Director Artificial Intelligence Practice will serve as the VCA North America leader for AI advisory and transformation agenda. This role is responsible for defining the vision, strategy and operating plan for the practice, shaping and selling complex AI transformation engagements, building reusable frameworks and assets, and serving as a trusted advisor to C level executives at Visa’s most strategic clients.

You will work closely with a multidisciplinary team across strategy, data science, engineering and product, while collaborating closely with Visa’s product, technology and global teams. This Senior Director will scale Visa’s AI consulting capabilities and help our clients become AI first enterprises.

This is a highly visible market facing role driving innovation, commercial growth and client impact.

Specific responsibilities include:

Practice Leadership and Strategy

• Define and execute the VCA North America strategy for the AI Practice, including offerings, go to market motions and commercial growth targets.
• Own practice level financials, including revenue, pipeline development, profitability and operating model design.
• Build scalable methodologies, frameworks, playbooks and accelerators for enterprise AI transformation.
• Represent Visa in the market through thought leadership, conference speaking and industry engagement.

Client Advisory and Delivery

• Lead end to end AI consulting engagements, from opportunity identification through strategic road mapping, design and execution.
• Conduct AI maturity assessments, define AI first operating models and develop organizational enablement and change frameworks.
• Partner with clients to design and implement secure, scalable enterprise architectures, including LLM, RAG, MLOps and LLMOps, and AI governance structures.

Commercial Growth and Solution Development

• Shape, price and support the sale of large scale AI transformation programs.
• Build client facing AI solutions and advisory offerings that help clients grow revenue, optimize operations and monetize their data assets.
• Collaborate with internal teams Product, Technology, Risk, Data Science and external vendors to create integrated AI solutions.
• Drive development of reusable assets, market points of view and intellectual property.

Team Leadership and Talent Development

• Lead, mentor and grow a cross functional team of consultants, strategists, data scientists and technologists.
• Foster a culture of innovation, experimentation and continuous learning.
• Support recruitment efforts to scale the AI Practice.

This is a hybrid position. Expectation of days in office will be confirmed by your hiring manager.

Basic Qualifications

• 12 or more years of work experience with a Bachelor’s Degree or at least 10 years of work experience with an Advanced degree (e.g. Masters/MBA /JD/MD), or a minimum of 5 years of work experience with a PhD

Preferred Qualifications

• 15 or more years of experience with a Bachelor’s Degree or 12 years of experience with an Advanced Degree (e.g. Masters, MBA, JD, or MD), PhD with 9+ years of experience
• Deep understanding of AI/ML technologies, including LLMs, RAG architectures, prompt engineering, model governance, and AI risk.
• Familiarity with enterprise architectures, cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure), data engineering, and MLOps/LLMOps best practices.
• Experience designing AI operating models and business processes for enterprise-scale transformation.
• Demonstrated success selling and delivering large transformation engagements.
• Experience building consulting practices, including IP development, solution design, team structure, and GTM.
• Strong executive storytelling and ability to influence senior stakeholders across business and technology.
• Exceptional communication, synthesis, and presentation abilities.
• Collaborative, team-oriented, and committed to developing talent.
• Curious, innovative, and up to date with digital and emerging technology trends
• Ability to lead cross-functional teams and manage complex projects in dynamic environments.
• Technology mindset, curious, up to date with digital trends and applications

Work Hours: Varies upon the needs of the department.

Travel Requirements: This position requires travel 5-10% of the time.

Mental/Physical Requirements: This position will be performed in an office setting.  The position will require the incumbent to sit and stand at a desk, communicate in person and by telephone, frequently operate standard office equipment, such as telephones and computers.

Visa is an EEO Employer.  Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or protected veteran status.  Visa will also consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with EEOC guidelines and applicable local law.

Visa will consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with applicable local law, including the requirements of Article 49 of the San Francisco Police Code.

U.S. APPLICANTS ONLY: The estimated salary range for this position is 179,300 to 369,000 USD per year, which may include potential sales incentive payments (if applicable). Salary may vary depending on job-related factors which may include knowledge, skills, experience, and location. In addition, this position may be eligible for bonus and equity. Visa has a comprehensive benefits package for which this position may be eligible that includes Medical, Dental, Vision, 401 (k), FSA/HSA, Life Insurance, Paid Time Off, and Wellness Program.