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About This Role
Career Area:
Technology, Digital and DataJob Description:
Your Work Shapes the World at Caterpillar Inc.
When you join Caterpillar, you're joining a global team who cares not just about the work we do – but also about each other. We are the makers, problem solvers, and future world builders who are creating stronger, more sustainable communities. We don't just talk about progress and innovation here – we make it happen, with our customers, where we work and live. Together, we are building a better world, so we can all enjoy living in it.
Job Summary:
The AI Accelerator is a key enabler of Caterpillar’s next chapter — designed to enable and scale AI adoption and progress across the enterprise. Its mission is to identify opportunities, run experiments, accelerate adoption, ensure AI value realization, support strategic partner engagement, and help develop the frameworks to scale AI solutions globally.
We are building a team of experienced and visionary Applied AI Product Managers to partner directly with our business and functional teams, helping them shape and execute their AI roadmaps and bring high\-value AI capabilities to life. This unique role sits at the intersection of business strategy, technical AI/ML capabilities, and user experience. The ideal candidate will have a deep understanding of AI principles, a passion for solving user problems, and a proven ability to guide technical teams in bringing complex AI capabilities from the lab to production.
### What You Will Do:
- Shape the Business Team’s AI Roadmap: Embed with assigned business functions to help them define their AI vision, priorities, and roadmap. Identify high\-impact opportunities where applied AI can deliver real business value for that team — you’re enabling their roadmap, not running a central product line.
- Translate Insights to Requirements: Work closely with stakeholders, business analysts, and users to understand needs. Translate these needs into clear, concise Epics, User Stories, and PRDs (Product Requirements Documents) that specifically address the unique constraints and capabilities of AI/ML systems.
- Build to Learn (Forward\-Deployed Mindset): Rapidly prototype AI solutions alongside business users — building quick, functional proofs\-of\-concept with leading AI tools (e.g., Claude, Copilot, low\-code agent builders) to validate value before committing to full production builds.
- Lead the AI Development Lifecycle: Collaborate daily with Data Scientists, ML Engineers, and Software Engineers to manage the AI prototype development lifecycle, including drafting PRDs, technical discovery, agentic workflow design/development and evaluating success.
- Transfer Capability: Build frameworks and playbooks that business teams can use to more independently identify, define and build prototypes. Progressively shift ownership to the business.
- AI Governance and Compliance: Advocate for and ensure that AI products are developed according to Caterpillar’s AI governance and compliance requirements.
### What You Will Have:
- Strategic Vision: Ability to look beyond current constraints and help a business team see and articulate where AI can take them.
- Builder: Comfort getting into the weeds — spec driven development for quick prototypes, testing prompts, and standing up working demos rather than only writing specs.
- Data\-Driven Decision Making: Relies heavily on metrics, data, and experimentation to guide product prioritization.
- Bias for Action: Proactive and results\-oriented, with a track record of successfully shipping complex products.
- Cross\-functional Collaboration: A natural collaborator who can build consensus and drive outcomes across diverse engineering, data science, and business teams.
### Considerations for Top Candidates:
- Extensive professional experience (typically 5\+ years), with proven experience as a Product Manager focused on Agentic AI, Generative AI, Machine Learning, or AI\-powered products (typically 3\+ years).
- A solid understanding of the AI lifecycle, common model types (e.g., NLP, Computer Vision, Predictive Models, LLMs), feature engineering, and the challenges of deploying and monitoring models in production environments (MLOps). Don’t need to be an expert, but familiarity with tradeoffs and problem types i.e. predictive modeling vs. agentic AI will be important.
- Demonstrated ability to personally build functional prototypes using modern AI tooling (spec driven development and/or low code tools) — a forward\-deployed sensibility that pairs product judgment with the ability to build.
- Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to articulate complex AI concepts to non\-technical business leaders and users, as well as define detailed requirements for technical teams.
- Proven ability to define and execute a product roadmap based on quantitative data and user research.
- Direct experience or degree in Data Science or Engineering — nice to have.
- Experience with cloud\-based ML platforms (e.g., AWS Sagemaker, Google AI Platform, Azure ML) — nice to have.
- Prior experience managing products in a specific industry (e.g., FinTech, Healthcare, E\-commerce) — nice to have.
- Familiarity with A/B testing frameworks for evaluating and improving model\-driven features — nice to have.
### Why This Role Matters:
Caterpillar is investing in AI to transform how we work — making our teams faster, sharper, and more effective across the enterprise. This role is critical to putting intelligent tools directly into the hands of the people who run our business, helping each function reimagine its work and realize real value from AI. You’ll be at the forefront of shaping how Caterpillar becomes an AI\-native company.
Additional Information:
This position will have the option to be based out of our Mossville, IL; Denver, CO or Irving, TX offices.
\#LI
\#BI (used to post on Built In Chicago)
What You Will Get:
Working with a Fortune 100 leader, you can build your career on a global scale and take advantage of development opportunities with emerging technologies. We’ve created an inclusive environment for you to explore your passions, make an impact and do the work that really matters. Join Us.
About Caterpillar
Caterpillar Inc. is the world’s leading manufacturer of construction and mining equipment, off\-highway diesel and natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines and diesel\-electric locomotives. For nearly 100 years, we’ve been helping customers build a better, more sustainable world and are committed and contributing to a reduced\-carbon future. Our innovative products and services, backed by our global dealer network, provide exceptional value that helps customers succeed.
Summary Pay Range:
$159,120\.00 \- $258,570\.00
Compensation and benefits offered may vary depending on multiple individualized factors, job level, market location, job\-related knowledge, skills, individual performance and experience. Please note that salary is only one component of total compensation at Caterpillar.
Benefits:
Subject to plan eligibility, terms, and guidelines. This is a summary list of benefits.
- Medical, dental, and vision benefits\*
- Paid time off plan (Vacation, Holidays, Volunteer, etc.)\*
- 401(k) savings plans\*
- Health Savings Account (HSA)\*
- Flexible Spending Accounts (FSAs)\*
- Health Lifestyle Programs\*
- Employee Assistance Program\*
- Voluntary Benefits and Employee Discounts\*
- Career Development\*
- Incentive bonus\*
- Disability benefits
- Life Insurance
- Parental leave
- Adoption benefits
- Tuition Reimbursement
- These benefits also apply to part\-time employees
This position requires working onsite five days a week.
Relocation is available for this position.
Visa Sponsorship is not available for this position.Posting Dates:
June 8, 2026 \- June 21, 2026
Any offer of employment is conditioned upon the successful completion of a drug screen.
Caterpillar is an Equal Opportunity Employer, Including Veterans and Individuals with Disabilities. Qualified applicants of any age are encouraged to apply.
Not ready to apply? Join our Talent Community.
Salary Context
This $159K-$258K range is above the median for AI Product Manager roles in our dataset (median: $189K across 161 roles with salary data).
View full AI Product Manager salary data →Role Details
About This Role
AI Product Managers define what AI features get built and why. They translate business problems into ML-solvable tasks, work with engineering to scope model requirements, and own the metrics that determine if an AI feature is working. The role requires a rare combination of technical fluency and product instinct.
Unlike traditional product management, AI PM work involves managing uncertainty at a fundamental level. Your model might work 90% of the time. What happens the other 10%? What's the user experience when the AI is wrong? How do you measure 'good enough' for a probabilistic system? These questions don't have easy answers, and the AI PM is the person responsible for finding them.
Across the 3,823 AI roles we're tracking, AI Product Manager positions make up 5% of the market. At Caterpillar, this role fits into their broader AI and engineering organization.
AI Product Manager roles are growing as companies realize that shipping AI features requires different product thinking than traditional software. The best candidates combine product management experience with enough technical depth to have productive conversations with ML engineers about model capabilities and limitations.
What the Work Looks Like
A typical week includes: reviewing model evaluation results with the ML team, defining success metrics for a new AI feature, conducting user research on how customers respond to AI-generated outputs, writing product requirements that include accuracy thresholds and fallback behaviors, and presenting the AI roadmap to leadership. You're the translator between technical capability and business value.
AI Product Manager roles are growing as companies realize that shipping AI features requires different product thinking than traditional software. The best candidates combine product management experience with enough technical depth to have productive conversations with ML engineers about model capabilities and limitations.
Skills Required
Technical fluency with ML concepts is essential, though you won't be writing models. Expect to understand training data, evaluation metrics, model limitations, and responsible AI practices. SQL and basic Python are increasingly expected. Experience with A/B testing, data analysis, and product analytics is baseline. Understanding LLM capabilities and limitations is now a core requirement.
The differentiator is AI-specific product thinking: knowing when to use ML vs. heuristics, understanding the cost of training data collection, designing graceful degradation for model failures, and building products that improve with usage data. Experience with AI safety, bias mitigation, and responsible AI deployment is increasingly important.
Strong postings describe specific AI products the PM will own, mention the ML team structure, and talk about measurement methodology. Look for companies that have already shipped AI features. Roles at companies that are 'exploring AI' often mean you'll spend a year defining the strategy before any building happens.
Compensation Benchmarks
AI Product Manager roles pay a median of $213,800 based on 583 positions with disclosed compensation. Senior-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $227,400. Disclosed range: $159K to $258K.
Across all AI roles, the market median is $200,100. Top-quartile compensation starts at $253,500. The 90th percentile reaches $307,500. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Engineering Manager ($275,000) and AI Safety ($274,200). By seniority level: Entry: $97,880; Mid: $165,000; Senior: $227,400; Director: $247,800; VP: $250,000.
Caterpillar AI Hiring
Caterpillar has 7 open AI roles right now. They're hiring across AI/ML Engineer, AI Product Manager, Prompt Engineer, Data Scientist. Positions span Irving, TX, US, Pittsburgh, PA, US, Chicago, IL, US. Compensation range: $183K - $258K.
Location Context
Across all AI roles, 15% (590 positions) offer remote work, while 3,217 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (2,643 roles, $211,000 median); San Francisco (2,168 roles, $253,000 median); Los Angeles (1,792 roles, $191,580 median).
Career Path
Common paths into AI Product Manager roles include Product Manager, Data Analyst, Technical Program Manager.
From here, career progression typically leads toward Director of AI Product, VP Product, Head of AI.
The most effective path is PM experience plus self-directed AI education. Take Andrew Ng's courses, build a small ML project, and learn enough Python to read model evaluation code. The goal isn't to become an ML engineer. It's to have credibility in technical conversations and to understand what's possible, what's hard, and what's a bad idea.
What to Expect in Interviews
AI interviews typically combine coding challenges (Python-focused), system design questions tailored to the role, and discussions about your experience with relevant tools and frameworks. Strong candidates demonstrate both technical depth and the ability to make pragmatic engineering tradeoffs. Prepare portfolio projects that demonstrate end-to-end capability rather than isolated skills.
When evaluating opportunities: Strong postings describe specific AI products the PM will own, mention the ML team structure, and talk about measurement methodology. Look for companies that have already shipped AI features. Roles at companies that are 'exploring AI' often mean you'll spend a year defining the strategy before any building happens.
AI Hiring Overview
The AI job market has 3,823 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 112 entry-level, 1,798 mid-level, 1,516 senior, and 397 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 15% of the market (590 positions). The remaining 3,217 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.
The market median for AI roles is $200,100. Top-quartile compensation starts at $253,500. The 90th percentile reaches $307,500. Highest-paying categories: AI Engineering Manager ($275,000 median, 41 roles); AI Safety ($274,200 median, 55 roles); Research Engineer ($260,000 median, 434 roles).
AI Product Manager roles are growing as companies realize that shipping AI features requires different product thinking than traditional software. The best candidates combine product management experience with enough technical depth to have productive conversations with ML engineers about model capabilities and limitations.
The AI Job Market Today
The AI job market spans 3,823 open positions across 15 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (2,629), Data Scientist (322), AI Software Engineer (279). These three account for the majority of open positions, though smaller categories often have higher per-role compensation because of specialized skill requirements.
The seniority mix tells a story about where AI teams are in their maturity. Entry-level roles (112) are outnumbered by mid-level (1,798) and senior (1,516) positions, reflecting that most companies are past the 'build a team from scratch' phase and need experienced engineers who can ship production systems. Leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level) total 397 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.
Remote work availability sits at 15% of all AI roles (590 positions), with 3,217 requiring on-site or hybrid attendance. The remote share has stabilized after the post-pandemic correction. Senior and specialized roles (Research Scientist, ML Architect) are more likely to be remote-eligible than entry-level positions, partly because experienced hires have more negotiating power and partly because these roles require less hands-on mentorship.
AI compensation is structured in clear tiers. The market median sits at $200,100. Top-quartile roles start at $253,500, and the 90th percentile reaches $307,500. These figures include base salary with disclosed compensation. Total compensation (including equity, bonuses, and sign-on) runs 20-40% higher at companies that offer those components.
Category matters for compensation. AI Engineering Manager roles lead at $275,000 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $140,000. The spread between highest and lowest-paying categories reflects the premium on specialized technical skills versus broader analytical roles.
The most in-demand skills across all AI postings: Python (1,979 postings), Aws (1,190 postings), Azure (899 postings), Rag (839 postings), Gcp (726 postings), Pytorch (595 postings), Prompt Engineering (595 postings), Claude (540 postings). Python dominates, appearing in the vast majority of role descriptions regardless of category. Cloud platform experience (AWS, GCP, Azure) is the second most common requirement. The newer entrants to the top skills list (RAG, vector databases, LLM APIs) reflect the shift from traditional ML toward generative AI applications.
Frequently Asked Questions
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