Supply Chain Business Operations Manager, AI Strategy

About You and The Role

You will be the owner of AI strategy and execution for Zipline’s Supply Chain Business Operations function. In this role, you will translate urgent operational pain points across supplier management, material planning, inventory health, sourcing, and manufacturing readiness into production-grade AI-assisted workflows that materially increase aircraft availability, reduce production delays, and lower supplier-caused quality incidents. This work matters because Zipline’s delivery network and flight operations depend on predictable supply of airframe, avionics, and mission-critical parts across multiple manufacturing sites and global suppliers. You will report to Supply Chain leadership while operating at the intersection of field operations, manufacturing, supplier industrialization, data engineering, and product engineering to drive measurable, auditable improvements in a regulated, safety-conscious hardware environment. 

Location: in-person at HQ, South San Francisco; travel 5–15% for supplier and cross-site engagements (Asia, North America, others as needed).

What You'll Do

• Own the end-to-end mandate for AI-enabled supply chain products: identify opportunities, build prototypes, validate with frontline teams, and deliver production rollouts with documented KPIs and runbooks.
• In the first 90 days, deliver a validated, automated web app concurrently with a supporting business process and monitoring strategy that measurably improves a core supply chain metric: on-time delivery, quality, or cost.; by 12 months, scale at least one AI product into production which reliably automates a planning and or sourcing workflow. 
• Design and deploy AI-assisted workflows, copilots, agents, automations, and decision-support tools that reduce manual work, improve decision quality, and make supply chain teams faster and more effective.
• Partner with Supply Chain, Engineering, Data, IT, Finance, Manufacturing Operations, and external vendors to translate operational pain points into AI-enabled product requirements, prototypes, adoption plans, and measurable business outcomes.
• Build the data foundations, process maps, and feedback loops needed for reliable AI workflows, including data quality checks, source-of-truth alignment, human-in-the-loop review, and clear ownership models.
• Use SQL, Python, BI tools, and AI/LLM platforms to prototype and operationalize tools that synthesize supplier, ERP, MRP, inventory, production, cost, and risk data into actionable recommendations.
• Lead change management for AI-enabled ways of working, including training users, documenting workflows, measuring adoption, gathering feedback, and iterating quickly with frontline and leadership stakeholders.
• Establish practical governance for AI use in supply chain operations, balancing speed with accuracy, security, auditability, and appropriate human oversight while continuing to develop executive-ready insights and recommendations.

What You'll Bring

• Experience driving operational improvement through data, systems, automation, AI tools, or technical program leadership in a fast-paced, high-growth environment.
• Fluency in SQL and Python or similar scripting tools; you can work directly with messy operational data and turn it into usable products, workflows, or decision systems.
• Hands-on experience using AI tools, LLMs, copilots, agents, workflow automation platforms, or data products to improve business processes.
• The ability identify where AI will genuinely improve a workflow, where it will not, and what data, controls, adoption plan, and operating process are required for it to work reliably. You have a strong instinct for spotting poor AI output before it reaches users, and you care deeply about avoiding tools that look polished but produce confusing, unreliable, or low-trust results.
• Strong skills for translating ambiguous business needs into clear requirements, prototypes, roadmaps, and measurable implementation plans.
• Hands-on experience with supply chain, ERP, MRP, supplier management, manufacturing, or planning data models and can connect technical system behavior to operational outcomes.
• Confidence while navigating ambiguous, high-stakes environments where the right answer requires strategic judgment, hands-on building, and strong cross-functional adoption leadership.

Success Signals (first 6–12 months)

• In the first 90 days, deliver a validated, automated web app concurrently with a supporting business process and monitoring strategy that measurably improves a core supply chain metric: on-time delivery, quality, or cost.
• By 12 months, scale at least one AI product into production which reliably automates a planning and or sourcing workflow. 

What Else You Need To Know

Zipline is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws or our own sensibilities.

We value diversity at Zipline and welcome applications from those who are traditionally underrepresented in tech. If you like the sound of this position but are not sure if you are the perfect fit, please apply!