Susana Chicano
San Francisco,CA
Summary
Data Operations and Program Manager with deep experience building, scaling, and governing high-quality data pipelines that power AI-driven products. Known for a strong systems-level perspective—able to see the big picture across workflows, data interactions, and platform architecture, and rapidly translate complex data flows into clear, actionable insights for core teams.
Frequently act as a force multiplier by identifying structural issues, inefficiencies, and data gaps early—often surfacing problems in minutes that would otherwise take teams hours to diagnose. Partner closely with the Product, Engineering, Data Science, and Data Platform teams to turn ambiguity into production-ready systems with rigorous quality controls.
Experienced in vendor management, data quality frameworks, human-in-the-loop workflows, and cross-functional execution across fast-moving, high-stakes environments. Passionate about building reliable data foundations for safe, interpretable, and high-performing AI systems.
Overview
7
7
years of professional experience
Work History
Data Program Manager, AI Insights & Data Operations
CRUNCHBASE
San Francisco, USA
01.2019 - Current
- Own and scale end-to-end data operations powering company-level insights used by millions of users, spanning ingestion, labeling, quality control, evaluation, and production deployment.
- Lead the Insights component of Crunchbase's Predictions & Insights AI initiative, architecting systems that generate Growth Insights, News Insights, layoffs, leadership changes, and other business signals at scale.
- Design and operationalize human-in-the-loop workflows supporting classic ML models and Generative AI systems, including prompt engineering, LLM evaluation, and continuous quality improvement.
- Translate product and research requirements into structured data specifications, labeling guidelines, and executable pipelines.
- Partner closely with Data Science to define features, build golden datasets, and support training and evaluation of prediction models.
- Build and maintain data quality frameworks ensuring accuracy, consistency, and trust across high-impact AI outputs, balancing automation with rigorous human review.
- Create, optimize, and scale outsourced vendor workflows to automate data ingestion while maintaining quality through LLM-based evaluation systems with human-in-the-loop oversight.
- Identify risks and bottlenecks across data pipelines and implement process improvements that increase velocity without compromising rigor.
- Collaborate with senior Product, Engineering, and Research leaders to align data strategy with platform roadmaps and long-term AI innovation goals.
- Lead the Guru integration to automate and streamline the data management channel, improving discoverability, operational efficiency, and cross-team knowledge flow.
- Led a flagship GenAI project using Python and Instructor libraries to generate 39 structured company signals exposed via API, including 7 Notable Events, Growth Insights, and extracted company and executive data powering core company insights and prediction systems. This work was foundational to the re-launch of the platform as Crunchbase.ai, enabling the shift from a passive data aggregator to an opportunity-creation engine driven by Predictions and Insights.
- Scaled GenAI-driven insights now in production, including ~368K Growth Insights and large-scale News Insights such as: Awards (57K+), Legal Proceedings (39K+), Office Openings (17K+), Partnership Announcements (99K+), Product Launches (116K+), Layoffs (17K+), and Leadership Changes (112K+).
- Own and evolved core company signal domains including Funding, Acquisitions, and IPOs, ensuring production-quality data pipelines that power downstream analytics, insights, and prediction models.
- Since joining Crunchbase in August 2019, helped scale foundational datasets: Organizations from ~1M to 4.1M+, Funding Rounds from ~281K to 758K+, M&A events from ~158K to 320K+, and IPOs from ~17K to 54K+.
- Built the first LLM evaluation proof-of-concept at Crunchbase, now under active development and adoption by the Data Platform team.
- Created AI-powered POCs for article deduplication and company disambiguation using LLMs and Cursor; both are now production-ready workflows.
- Developed a competitive data benchmarking framework that uncovered critical data gaps and directly informed immediate actions by the CTO, VP-level leaders, and Data Engineering.
- Scaled and optimized outsourced data operations, accelerating data ingestion while preserving trust and quality through evaluation-first design.
- Acted as a key product feedback partner, continuously influencing UX and workflow improvements adopted across the platform.
- Led initiatives from conceptualization through prototyping to production, influencing stakeholders across Data Ops, Data Science, Data Platform, and LLM Engineering.
- Recognized as a culture carrier and multiple-time award recipient for leadership, collaboration, and impact.
- Currently leading GenAI v4 initiatives focused on further improving reliability, scale, and evaluability of AI-generated company insights.
Education
Bachelor of Arts - Economics and Business Administration
University of Malaga
Malaga, SpainNanodegree - Data Analytics
Udacity
Nanodegree - Programming With Python & SQL
Udacity
Marketing Certificate (IDP) - Marketing
UC Berkeley Extension
Programming With Python - Computer Programming
Codeacademy
Skills
- Data operations strategy
- AI and LLM pipelines
- Human-in-the-loop workflows
- Data quality frameworks
- Vendor management
- Cross-functional leadership
- Research partnerships
- Process optimization
- Snowflake and Sisense expertise
- LLM prompting techniques
- ML data workflows
- Cursor product prototyping
- Jupyter Notebooks proficiency
- Python programming
- SQL proficiency
Websites
Languages
- English, bilingual
- Spanish, native
- Catalan, proficient
Languages
Spanish
Native/ Bilingual
English
Full Professional
Catalan
Limited
Affiliations
Women in Data - 2018-2020
Timeline
Data Program Manager, AI Insights & Data Operations
CRUNCHBASE
01.2019 - Current
Bachelor of Arts - Economics and Business Administration
University of Malaga
Nanodegree - Data Analytics
Udacity
Nanodegree - Programming With Python & SQL
Udacity
Marketing Certificate (IDP) - Marketing
UC Berkeley Extension
Programming With Python - Computer Programming
Codeacademy