Central Garden & Pet

Senior Director, Artificial Intelligence

Central Garden & Pet$175K — $275K *
Enterprise Technology
8 - 10 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • 10+ years in senior enterprise technology leadership
  • Expertise in AI/ML platforms and cloud systems
  • Proven track record in scaling technical organizations
  • Experience with enterprise architecture strategies
  • Strong vendor negotiation and platform strategy skills
  • Financial modeling and investment assessment capabilities
  • Excellent executive communication and influence skills

Responsibilities

  • Define and maintain the AI strategy and roadmap
  • Lead and expand the AI Center of Excellence
  • Establish standard AI engineering practices across the company
  • Ensure compliance and ethical guidelines for AI deployment
  • Create and lead AI learning and enablement programs
  • Manage vendor relationships and evaluate emerging AI tools
  • Develop financial models for AI investments and forecast expenses

Benefits

  • Comprehensive Medical, Dental, and Vision Insurance
  • Free Life and Disability Insurance
  • Health and Dependent Care Flexible Spending Accounts
  • 401k with company match and annual discretionary contribution
  • Paid vacation, holidays, and sick time
  • Employee Assistance Program
  • Access to free online courses
  • Education Assistance for degrees and certifications
  • Referral Program with cash bonus
  • Access to on-demand pay
  • Paid parental leave
Full Job Description
Description

The Senior Director, Artificial Intelligence defines and operationalizes the enterprise AI strategy, architecture, and learning ecosystem in direct support of the company's core business priorities: growth acceleration, operational efficiency, and scalable portfolio integration through M&A. This role leads the AI Center of Excellence and serves as the senior technical authority for AI platforms, governance, and enablement.

This leader ensures AI investments translate into measurable business value by accelerating innovation, improving decision intelligence, and embedding AI capability into the workforce. The role bridges enterprise architecture, business strategy, and human capability - shaping both the technology landscape pertaining to AI and the organization's ability to use it competitively. A core mandate of the position is to help in building an AI-empowered workforce by ensuring employees have the training, knowledge and tools needed to leverage AI in their daily activities.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

AI Strategy & Direction
  • Define and maintain the enterprise AI vision and multi-year roadmap
  • Align AI investments to growth, efficiency, and M&A integration priorities
  • Issue formal statements of architectural direction for AI platforms
  • Anticipate emerging technologies and guide adoption decisions
  • Ensure AI strategy aligns with enterprise architecture principles

Leadership of the AI Center of Excellence
  • Lead and scale the AI Center of Excellence (AI COE)
  • Establish reusable frameworks, playbooks, and delivery models
  • Standardize AI engineering practices across the enterprise
  • Promote enterprise-wide AI fluency and adoption
  • Create a scalable operating model for AI delivery

AI Architecture & Assurance
  • Provide architectural assurance for AI initiatives in flight
  • Review designs for scalability, security, and sustainability
  • Partner with Enterprise Architecture and Architecture Review Board
  • Prevent platform fragmentation and tool sprawl
  • Maintain technical coherence across the AI landscape

Standards, Governance & Practices
  • Establish AI lifecycle engineering standards
  • Define model governance and ethical AI guardrails
  • Create deployment and monitoring frameworks
  • Ensure compliance, privacy, and risk management
  • Maintain enterprise trust in AI systems

Enterprise AI Learning & Enablement Strategy
  • Define and lead enterprise AI learning strategy
  • Build structured AI fluency programs across roles
  • Develop training libraries and best practice repositories
  • Partner with HR and Learning & Development to institutionalize AI skills
  • Grow internal AI champions and power-user communities
  • Measure workforce AI maturity and adoption

Vendor & Ecosystem Management
  • Manage strategic relationships with AI platform vendors
  • Lead evaluation of emerging tools and ecosystems
  • Drive vendor selection aligned with architecture principles
  • Negotiate enterprise partnerships and cost structures with CIO
  • Prevent vendor sprawl through disciplined strategy

Financial & Business Partnership
  • Model AI platform cost structures and investments
  • Partner with finance to forecast AI operating expenses
  • Develop business cases with business leaders
  • Ensure ROI visibility and measurable outcomes
  • Balance innovation speed with cost discipline

AI Industry Liaison & R&D Leadership
  • Serve as liaison to AI research and innovation ecosystem
  • Maintain relationships with industry thought leaders
  • Translate external innovation into enterprise capability
  • Lead enterprise R&D pilots with business units
  • Represent the company in AI forums and partnerships
  • Position the organization as an AI-forward enterprise

Roadmapping & Enterprise Alignment for AI
  • Build AI enablement roadmaps with Enterprise Architecture
  • Align with Architecture Review Board priorities
  • Sequence platform evolution intentionally
  • Prioritize capabilities based on business value
  • Define long-term AI maturity trajectory


QUALIFICATIONS
  • Senior enterprise technology leadership experience (ideally 10+ years)
  • Deep expertise in AI/ML platforms and cloud ecosystems
  • Proven ability to scale technical organizations
  • Enterprise architecture strategy experience
  • Vendor negotiation and platform strategy expertise
  • Financial modeling and investment prioritization skills
  • Executive communication and influence capability
  • Ability to translate technology into business outcomes
  • Experience building high-performing teams
  • Strategic systems thinker
  • Builder of platforms, not just projects
  • Balances innovation with discipline
  • Collaborative across business and technology
  • Trusted advisor to executive leadership
  • Bias for clarity and simplification
  • Operates comfortably at enterprise scale

POSITION INFORMATION
  • This position pays $175,000-275,000 per year based on experience and location

BENEFITS PACKAGE & EMPLOYEE PROGRAMS
  • Comprehensive Medical, Dental, and Vision Insurance
  • Free Life and Disability Insurance
  • Health and Dependent Care Flexible Spending Accounts
  • 401k with 3% company match and annual employer discretionary contribution
  • Paid vacation, holidays and sick time
  • Employee Assistance Program
  • Access to thousands of free online courses
  • Discounts on cell phones, movie tickets, gym memberships, and more!
  • Education Assistance (both college degrees and professional certifications)
  • Referral Program with cash bonus
  • Access to on-demand pay
  • Paid parental leave


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About Central Garden & Pet

Central Garden & Pet Company is a leading innovator, marketer and producer of quality branded products for the lawn & garden and pet supplies markets. Headquartered in Walnut Creek, California, Central Garden & Pet Company produces and distributes a wide range of products under many brands including Pennington, Nylabone, Kaytee, Amdro, and Aqueon. The company was founded in 1980 and has grown to become one of the largest lawn and garden and pet supplies companies in the United States.
Learn more about Central Garden & Pet
Size
6,500 employees
Market Cap
$2 billion
Industry
Net Income
$130.7 million
Founded
2018
Revenue
$2.8 billion
NASDAQ

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