Temporary Associate Director, Mass AI Hub Data Commons Collaborative

The Massachusetts Technology Collaborative has established the Massachusetts Artificial Intelligence Hub (Mass AI Hub) as its newest operating division focused on furthering the Commonwealth’s position as a global leader in artificial intelligence innovation. This pioneering initiative will drive cutting-edge collaboration between government, industry, startups, and academia, pursue solutions to the world’s most critical challenges, and unlock economic opportunities for businesses and residents across the state.

The AI Hub will strive to make AI technology more accessible to small and large enterprises in the state’s key sectors, enable researchers, entrepreneurs, and startups to pursue the development and commercialization of innovative new ideas, and, most importantly, the AI Hub will work to prepare the state’s workforce for the emerging opportunities in AI and will strive to enable all citizens to benefit from the inevitable changes that AI will introduce into society.

The AI Hub is seeking to appoint a temporary Associate Program Director for its emerging Data Commons Collaborative, a stakeholder-driven initiative focused on enhanced access to public and private datasets that will catalyze the discovery of new product innovations in artificial intelligence.  The Data Commons Collaborative will be developed in partnership with the Artificial Intelligence Compute Resource (AICR) that is being established at the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center (MGHPCC).

This is a 10-15 hour a week position. 

Role & Responsibilities

Reporting to the Mass AI Hub Director, the Temporary Associate Program Director for the Data Commons Collaborative is responsible for ensuring that the development and deployment of AI in Massachusetts aligns with the public interest and respects the values and rights of the Commonwealth's citizens. The Temporary Program Director for the Data Commons Collaborative will oversee the technical development and implementation of operating guidelines and standards for a data commons platform intended to support end-to-end development and lifecycle management of AI models and algorithms in priority sectors in the Commonwealth.

The Temporary Program Director for the Data Commons Collaborative will be responsible for guiding the deliberations of the Data Commons Collaborative working group for the AI Hub.  This role will include providing professional support for workstreams that establish policies and program requirements for data management and accessibility (infrastructure), data security and compliance (governance), and developing and implementing a use case prioritization framework.   This Working Group will inform the policies of the Mass AI Hub as it relates to the selection and sequencing of key priority sectors, the legal and ethical considerations with accessing data, and identifying operating guidelines required for a data commons, including data collection, sharing, access and usage best practices.

The Temporary Associate Program Director for the Data Commons Collaborative will work to further develop and implement the vision, plans, and policies for the Data Commons, with an emphasis on understanding the unique needs and requirements of data contributors to the Data Commons, particularly state agencies and quasi-governmental organizations.  This individual will work closely with the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center to coordinate and align the resources being made available from the MGHPCC’s newly established Artificial Intelligence Compute Resource.  The Temporary Associate Program Director for the Data Commons Collaborative will also work in partnership with Mass Tech Collaborative staff, including members of the Innovation Institute cluster development team and other internal teams across MassTech.

Requirements

High Priority Skills and Experience

Strategy and Vision

• Proven leader with a demonstrated track record of developing and managing a complex data strategy and artificial intelligence data platform. 
• Demonstrated ability to envision both the business and technical needs of a data commons.
• Passion for service and recognition of this once-in-a-generation opportunity to establish Massachusetts as a global leader in the ethical use of artificial intelligence. 

Knowledge and Experience

• Current knowledge of trends in the data management and artificial intelligence ecosystem.
• Current knowledge and experience in data generation, data availability and accessibility, data quality and standards, inter-state and international data cooperation, and legal and ethical considerations for data collection, usage and sharing.
• Familiarity of ModelOps practices for the development of domain specific AI models
• Ability to think and act creatively to develop programs, collaborative partnerships and alliances.
• Experience working with complex multi-party collaborations.
• Experience with technical membership trade associations is preferred.

Management and Collaboration

• Proficient in creating and delivering relevant conceptual or technical presentations to support stakeholder communications.

Personal Characteristics

• Honesty & integrity.
• Brings a positive, enthusiastic, can-do attitude.
• A good listener who is not ego driven.
• Able to relate well to a broad base of stakeholders across industry, academia, and government in an open constructive manner that inspires collaboration and engenders mutual trust.

Requirements

• Fifteen  years of professional experience in research, development, and/or industry.
• A combination of working in academia, federal research labs, and industry is preferred.
• Ability to work at the Boston or Westborough office as required or attend offsite meetings/events often not accessible by public transportation.

** This position requires candidates to be able to work at our Westborough or Boston Massachusetts office at least two days per week. This is not a fully remote position. **

Benefits

MassTech offers a hybrid work schedule and a competitive total rewards package.