This is an as-told essay based on a conversation with Mo Zohourian, who works as a contractor for AI training companiesspecialized in sales management. His work and project rates have been confirmed by Business Insider. Zohourian also consults on AI for small businesses and founded Annotation Academy, an educational platform for AI training. This story has been edited for length and clarity.
I moved to Canada from Iran in 2023 and started looking for work. I had 15 years of experience in entrepreneurship and sales management, but after successive interviews I was not hired.
I had been applying for jobs for about ten months when I saw an ad on LinkedIn offering work for $15 an hour train AIno experience necessary. Since I didn’t have a job, I said, ‘Okay, I’ll try,’ but I was skeptical. I didn’t even tell my wife I was starting it until I got the first payment.
A few years later, I built a career around AI. I now earn €100 per hour AI evaluation as a specialist in sales management. I also advise small businesses on using AI and have launched a platform to teach others how to become AI trainers.
It’s been crazy. When I started, I never thought AI would be my profession.
My sales experience has helped me move into higher-paying AI training projects
Initially the work was inconsistent and I was still looking for a full-time job.
About three months later I got a project for $30 an hour. The company I worked for had assessments you could take, and if you passed them you were eligible to work on more important projects. I took and passed exams in English Literature, Reasoning and Mathematics. I started making $35 an hour.
I started working for several companies. Sometimes I made $45 an hour on a project, other times $70. There is no baseline. Sometimes a project pays less than the project you did before it. As a freelancer you don’t have the same influence. It is what it is. You can take it or leave it.
Everything changed when the expert jobs became visible. The biggest increase in compensation and consistent work occurred when I was assigned sales projects because that was my expertise.
Initially the expert projects were limited to STEM fields such as physics, chemistry and coding. As soon as they started looking for sales experts, I already had a good track record of high-quality tasks across all platforms so I could start working on projects. If I hadn’t had a history on these platforms, I don’t think I would have gotten the higher paying sales projects.
Now I work as a sales manager expert on high-stakes projects. I have been consistently doing projects for $100 an hour for the past ten months.
These projects are so different from when I started AI evaluation, when everything was so simple: just write a prompt, write two answers, and write a simple justification. Now, with agentic AI and the more powerful models, the tasks are completely different and more complex.
I work a lot, but AI training gave me flexibility and the freedom to start my own business
About three months after I started AI evaluation, I stopped applying for a full-time job, but I still thought AI training was a transitional job. It wasn’t until about a year of AI training that I knew for sure that this was what I wanted to do.
I normally spend 20 to 40 hours a week on AI training. There may be a one to two week break, or even a month long break, in a project. I always have the option to start another project. But because I have my own business, I use those windows to be more focused on what I do personally.
My priority at the moment is my business. I started a company as AI consultant helping small businesses use AI more efficiently. I got my first client, a meal prep company, through someone I met at a party last year. I also launched Annotation Academy, an online platform where I teach people how to conduct AI evaluation. I got my first paying customer for that on launch day in June.
I work a lot, from early in the morning to late at night. But because I can set my own schedule, I still have the luxury of spending time with my son: dropping him off, picking him up, and taking him to class. I can live a life I love in a way I couldn’t live if I had a full-time job.
My businesses are profitable, but I don’t pay myself a salary from them. Because of my AI evaluation taskcan I reinvest that money in the company for future expansion and live off my AI evaluation income.
When I started AI training, I had some savings and wasn’t under a lot of financial pressure. That helped me stay on top of the AI evaluation when the work was inconsistent. The tasks were also much easier then, which allowed me to grow in the work as the tasks became more difficult. But there is currently a huge demand for people who can deliver and who have done so domain expertise.
This job has changed my life in a good way. After working in sales for 15 years, I was hooked. You think you can develop faster in an industry on which you have laid a foundation. But for me, I could never find the rapid progress I found in AI training.
