Head of Operations

One year term based on grant funding. 

Work is primarily on-site in lab. 

‍Position Overview 

MIT FutureTech is hiring for a Head of Operations role. This is an exciting opportunity to support a rapidly growing lab who work on socially impactful AI and computing research, and rapidly develop cutting-edge skills and experience.

Salary

MIT Pay Grade 10 ($97,150 - $162,640)

Principal Duties and Responsibilities (Essential Functions**) 

• Operations 
  • Reviews, evaluates, and approves schedules, plans, and proposals to assist researchers in facilitating their work and overcoming logistical challenges. 
  • Manages operations and administration for the project including coordinating with MIT or CSAIL units that support FutureTech (FT) in administration, finance, IT, compliance, communications and outreach. 
  • Manages project timelines, resources, and deliverables to ensure efficient progress in FT’s goals 
  • Allocates FT resources, including financial, technical and personnel o Coordinates with internal team members and external stakeholders to ensure seamless project execution. o Explains and clarifies complex information for staff by providing technical advice and in-depth content knowledge 
  • Implements relevant MIT or CSAIL administrative requirements, policies and procedures for the FT  
  • Determines appropriate administrative action based on experience, rules and precedent 
  • Implements, and ensures compliance with, MIT, CSAIL and external regulations and guidelines 
• Analysis and reporting 
  • Contributes to research writing  
  • Assists in grant development  
  • Develops methods for collecting project data and ensures tracking of key program/project metrics.   
  • Analyzes program/project data and provides recommendations to the Director 
• Project planning 
  • Develops strategic plans for FT 
  • Implements operational plans to support goals o Develops methods for tracking progress and key metrics o Analyzes data on progress to suggest next steps and resolve issues 
• Fiscal 
  • Develops and manages project budget, monitoring expenses, reconciling, forecasting 
  • Works with CSAIL Fiscal Staff to provide relevant reports and documentation for Institute or Lab requirements 
• Leadership and Talent Management  
  • Manages project staff, provides or delegates day-to-day supervision of staff 
  • Serves as leader of FT talent acquisition and recruiting effort along with Lab and MIT resources 
  • Reviews job expectations, focused on meeting specific standards or targets, with program staff 
  • Provides, or delegates, that formal Performance Evaluation is performed  
  • Ensures key Human Resources guidelines and initiatives are meet 
  • Provides corrective feedback to employees with performance problems 
  • Engages Lab or MIT HR for serious employee relations concerns 
• Other duties as needed or required. 

Supervision Received 

Reports to Project Director 

Works under moderate oversight     

Supervision Exercised

‍Manages project staff 

Qualifications & Skills 

MINIMUM REQUIRED EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE: 

Bachelor’s degree required.  

Minimum 5-7 years of administration, project/program management, or operations experience required.  

Experience managing others and leading projects, programs, or functions 

In-depth understanding of principles and practice of managing a complex organization 

PREFERRED EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE: 

Prior experience in project management or operations, preferably in research, academic, or technology-oriented environment 

Research paper and grant writing experience. 

About MIT FutureTech 

MIT FutureTech is an interdisciplinary group of computer scientists, engineers, and economists who study the foundations of progress in computing and Artificial Intelligence: the trends, implications, opportunities and risks.  Economic and social change is underpinned by advances in computing: for instance, improvements in the miniaturization of integrated circuits, the discovery and refinement of algorithms, and the development and diffusion of better software systems and processes. We aim to identify and understand the trends in computing that create opportunities or risks and help leaders in computing, scientific funding bodies, and government to respond appropriately. 

Our research therefore helps to answer important questions including: Will AI progress accelerate or decline – and should it? What are the bottlenecks to growth from AI, and how can they be solved? What are the risks from AI, and how can we mitigate them? 

To support our research, we run seminars and conferences to better connect the field of computer scientists, economists and innovation scholars to build a thriving global research community. 

To disseminate it, we advise governments, nonprofits and industry, including via National Academies panels on transformational technologies and scientific reliability, the Council on Competitiveness’ National Commission on Innovation and Competitiveness Frontiers, and the National Science Foundation’s National Network for Critical Technology Assessment. 

Our work has been funded by Open Philanthropy, the National Science Foundation, Microsoft, Accenture, IBM, the MIT-Air Force AI accelerator, and the MIT Lincoln Laboratory. 

Some of our recent outputs:  

• The AI Risk Repository: A Comprehensive Meta-Review, Database, and Taxonomy of Risks from Artificial Intelligence 
• Beyond AI Exposure: Which Tasks are Cost-Effective to Automate with Computer Vision? 
• How industry is dominating AI research   
• The Quantum Tortoise and the Classical Hare: A simple framework for understanding which problems quantum computing will accelerate (and which it will not)  
• A workshop on AI scaling and its implications for AI development, automation, and more  
• The Great Inflection? A Debate About AI and Explosive Growth   
• There’s plenty of room at the Top: What will drive computer performance after Moore’s law?   
• Deep Learning's Diminishing Returns: The Cost of Improvement is Becoming Unsustainable  
• America’s lead in advanced computing is almost gone  
• The Decline of Computers as a General Purpose Technology: Why Deep Learning and the End of Moore’s Law are Fragmenting Computing  
• How Fast Do Algorithms Improve?  

Some recent articles about our research: 

• Techcrunch: MIT researchers release a repository of AI risks 
• CNN: AI and the labor market: MIT study findings 
• TIME: AI job replacement fears and the MIT study 
• Boston Globe: AI's impact on jobs according to MIT 

You will be working with Dr. Neil Thompson, the Director of MIT FutureTech. Prior to starting FutureTech, Dr. Thompson was a professor of Innovation and Strategy at the MIT Sloan School of Management.  His PhD is in Business & Public Policy from Berkeley.  He also holds Master’s degrees in: Computer Science (Berkeley), Economics (London School of Economics), and Statistics (Berkeley).  Prior to joining academia, Dr. Thompson was a management consultant with Bain & Company, and worked for the Canadian Government and the United Nations. 

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About the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) 

CSAIL is one of the world’s top research centers for computer science and artificial intelligence (currently ranked #1).  It has hosted 9 Turing awards winners (the “Nobel Prize of Computing”) and has pioneered many of the technologies that underpin computing.

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How to apply

Please use this form to register interest in this role or to submit a general expression of interest.

Selected candidates will be first interviewed via Zoom. We are recruiting on a rolling basis and may close applications early if we find a suitable candidate, so please apply as soon as possible to maximize your chances.

** To comply with regulations by the American with Disabilities Act (ADA), the principal duties in position descriptions must be essential to the job. To identify essential functions, focus on the purpose and the result of the duties rather than the manner in which they are performed. The following definition applies: a job function is essential if removal of that function would fundamentally change the job.