Technical Program Manager, AI Delivery for Public Sector & Defence

Requirements

• Who are we? Cohere is the leading security-first enterprise AI company.
• We build cutting-edge foundation AI models and end-to-end products that are designed to solve real-world business problems.
• We’re training and deploying frontier models for enterprises who are building AI systems.
• We believe that our work is instrumental to the widespread adoption of AI and we are looking for folks that want to be part of that.
• This is a highly specialized role requiring an individual who understands technical program delivery, the technical complexity of frontier AI models and the unique
• You will be the critical bridge between our cutting-edge AI capabilities and the specific needs of Canadian federal departments, provincial agencies, Crown corporations, and defence organizations.
• You'll navigate complex procurement processes, stringent security requirements, data sovereignty concerns, and regulatory compliance while ensuring our customers successfully deploy and scale our AI solutions.
• In this role, you'll collaborate with our Strategic Customer team, Applied ML (AML) Engineering, Forward Deployed Engineering (FDE), Platform, Product, and Go-to-Market teams, serving as the technical program lead and trusted advisor for our most sensitive and high-impact government engagements.
• experience as a customer-facing Technical or Engineering Program Manager in AI/ML consulting, technology transformation, or enterprise software delivery. - Excellent executive communication and stakeholder management. -
• Experience working with government, defence, or heavily regulated customers (public sector, defence contractors). - Proven track record managing complex, multi-stakeholder technical programs with stringent compliance requirements. - Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field; advanced degree or technical certs a plus.
• Technical Background: - Strong understanding of enterprise software deployment architectures (cloud, on-premises, hybrid, air-gapped) - Working knowledge of or
• experience with modern AI: LLMs, agentic systems, MCP, RAG, fine-tuning, evals, and responsible AI would be a strong differentiator - Comfortable discussing API integrations, model inference, data pipelines, and ML operations with technical stakeholders.
• Government & Defence Acumen: - Deep understanding of how government organizations procure, evaluate, and deploy technology - Familiarity with Canadian government
• Experience with Algorithmic Impact Assessments or AI ethics frameworks is a strong asset - Eligible to obtain Canadian government security clearance (Top Secret preferred) Nice to Have: - Active Canadian government security clearance (Secret or Top Secret) - strong preference for active Top Secret clearance - Bilingual (English/French) proficiency - Background in or strong familiarity with Canadian defence, intelligence, or critical infrastructure sectors -