AI Strategist - Hybrid, CA

WON•Oakland, CA

4d•Hybrid

About The Position

WON redesigns how a business works, focusing on both customer experience and internal operations for retail, consumer brands, travel, hospitality, financial services, and private equity portfolios. The firm emphasizes a hands-on approach, with senior practitioners directly involved in the work. AI is seen as a tool to enhance the capabilities of exceptional people, increasing capacity without replacing judgment. This specific role is within the Operational Intelligence discipline, which focuses on improving business workflows. The firm offers a program-based approach, working across defined areas like customer experience, marketing operations, and forecasting/inventory, benchmarking performance, identifying opportunities, and executing improvements throughout the engagement. This role will primarily focus on retail and consumer brands, with the potential for expansion. The position reports to the AI Practices Lead and requires the individual to be the primary point of contact and operate accounts independently, with the Practices Lead providing support for notable conversations or decisions.

Requirements

Startup experience, either building or operating within a startup environment, with a proven ability to create playbooks while delivering work.
Client-facing experience with the maturity to lead executive conversations, deliver difficult feedback, and refocus discussions on business problems.
Deeply AI-native with practical experience building AI-enabled tools, products, custom agents, or workflows. Must be able to demo and discuss an Applied AI case study.
Sufficient technical and analytical fluency to understand agent systems, data connections, backend architectures, APIs, and implementation trade-offs, even without being the primary engineer.
SQL/Python experience is valuable.
Ability to read a P&L, understand the revenue model of e-commerce businesses (e.g., Shopify), and build financial models.

Nice To Haves

Experience as an operator within a consumer or e-commerce brand.
Published writing or presentations on applied AI.

Responsibilities

Manage client accounts end-to-end, serving as the primary point of contact, setting strategic direction, and involving the AI Practices Lead for significant discussions or decisions.
Lead the program delivery rather than focusing on single solutions, managing long-term client engagements across various business areas.
Drive discovery based on defined business areas, benchmarking performance, and staying embedded within client operations and communication channels to identify opportunities proactively.
Develop the business case for all scoped work, including expected impact, costs, and measurement criteria.
Create precise specifications for specialist engineers and analysts, direct their delivery across concurrent projects, and ensure successful adoption of implemented systems.
Ensure the quality and profitability of client accounts and identify repeatable solutions that can be developed into defined offerings.
Manage multiple accounts concurrently without compromising quality, client trust, or profit margins.