AI and Applications Lead--Manager 3

RELOCATION ASSISTANCE: No relocation assistance available

CLEARANCE REQUIRED FOR START: Yes

CLEARANCE TYPE: Secret

TRAVEL: Yes, 10% of the Time

Description

At Northrop Grumman, our employees have incredible opportunities to work on revolutionary systems that impact people's lives around the world today, and for generations to come. Our pioneering and inventive spirit has enabled us to be at the forefront of many technological advancements in our nation's history - from the first flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to stealth bombers, to landing on the moon. We look for people who have bold new ideas, courage and a pioneering spirit to join forces to invent the future, and have fun along the way. Our culture thrives on intellectual curiosity, cognitive diversity and bringing your whole self to work — and we have an insatiable drive to do what others think is impossible. Our employees are not only part of history, they're making history.

Northrop Grumman Corporate serves as the center of excellence supporting our global operations and business objectives. As the backbone of the enterprise, Corporate drives enterprise initiatives, provides strategic leadership, and delivers critical shared services that enable our sectors to deliver secure, affordable, and integrated solutions. By fostering collaboration and ensuring alignment across the business, Corporate Northrop Grumman empowers our teams to provide timely, mission-enabling information, superior situational awareness, and unparalleled support for customers across the U.S. and its allies.

We’re looking for you to join our team as AI and Applications Lead, Manager 3, Project Velocity.

This role is available for full time telecommuting. This role will require the ability to travel domestically up to 10 to 15% of the time for site visits and cross-functional engagements.

The AI and Applications lead is the technical architect and delivery owner for Project Velocity, the enterprise’s AI-enabled technology modernization program for pricing and estimating. This role designs and deploys the full suite of AI tools—from BOE document search and similar bid retrieval through Cost Volume generation, automated price analysis, and compliance AI. The role also owns several other key technology initiatives across Pricing and Estimating led by Corporate P&E.

Major stakeholders for this project will include Sector P&E Directors as well as our CFO Council and I2 and CIDO Leadership

Key Responsibilities

• Architect and deliver the Project Velocity platform.
• Build and deploy AI applications on the P&E roadmap.
• Lead the architecture, development, and deployment of AI-powered solutions to modernize pricing and estimating processes.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to identify and prioritize automation and analytics opportunities within pricing workflows.
• Develop, implement, and maintain AI and machine learning models that support cost estimation, pricing analysis, and proposal generation.
• Design and optimize data pipelines for ingesting, processing, and analyzing structured and unstructured pricing-related information.
• Implement and oversee document search, retrieval, and classification tools to accelerate proposal development and BOE creation.
• Integrate AI solutions with existing enterprise platforms and ensure robust security, compliance, and auditability.
• Establish best practices for model validation, performance monitoring, and responsible AI governance.
• Provide subject matter expertise on the latest advancements in AI/ML as applied to pricing, estimating, and business analytics.
• Support user adoption through training, documentation, and stakeholder engagement.
• Track and report key performance metrics to demonstrate value and inform continuous improvement efforts.

Basic Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree with a minimum of 8 years of related professional experience in pricing, estimating, contracts, global supply chain, business management, or program management; OR a Master’s degree with 6 years of related professional experience as described.
• Extensive experience supporting pricing and estimating in U.S. Government, commercial, or international proposals.
• Strong working knowledge of FAR/DFARS and relevant audit standards.
• Demonstrated experience leading teams or initiatives focused on process improvement and technology modernization for pricing, estimating, or business management functions.
• Experience presenting and explaining complex information to diverse stakeholders, including executive leadership.
• Ability to travel domestically up to 25–40% of the time for site visits and cross-functional engagements.
• An active U.S. Government Secret level security clearance within a reasonable period of time following hire is required for this role.

Preferred Qualifications

• Prior experience in aerospace and defense or government contracting environments.
• Working knowledge of automation tools for proposal generation, cost analysis, and BOE development.
• Functional management past experience is preferred as this role will require people management indirectly across multiple functions
• Experience developing and mentoring geographically dispersed teams across multiple business units.
• Certifications in project management (PMP, Agile, Six Sigma) or technical domains (AWS, Databricks, Microsoft Azure).
• Experience with document processing pipelines (OCR, PDF extraction, metadata tagging).
• Knowledge of cost estimating concepts (BOEs, WBS, learning curves, rate structures) — enough to design AI tools that serve estimators, even without being an estimator.
• Databricks or AWS certifications.
• Master’s degree in a technical field or MBA with technical background.

Primary Level Salary Range: $159,500.00 - $239,300.00

The above salary range represents a general guideline; however, Northrop Grumman considers a number of factors when determining base salary offers such as the scope and responsibilities of the position and the candidate's experience, education, skills and current market conditions.

Depending on the position, employees may be eligible for overtime, shift differential, and a discretionary bonus in addition to base pay. Annual bonuses are designed to reward individual contributions as well as allow employees to share in company results. Employees in Vice President or Director positions may be eligible for Long Term Incentives. In addition, Northrop Grumman provides a variety of benefits including health insurance coverage, life and disability insurance, savings plan, Company paid holidays and paid time off (PTO) for vacation and/or personal business.

The application period for the job is estimated to be 20 days from the job posting date. However, this timeline may be shortened or extended depending on business needs and the availability of qualified candidates.

Northrop Grumman is an Equal Opportunity Employer, making decisions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, national origin, age, veteran status, disability, or any other protected class. For our complete EEO and pay transparency statement, please visit http://www.northropgrumman.com/EEO. U.S. Citizenship is required for all positions with a government clearance and certain other restricted positions.