Special Projects Lead

About the Role

As the Special Projects Lead on OpenAI's Intelligence and Investigations (I2) team, you will serve as a strategic and operational partner to the team's leadership, ensuring the organization is aligned, efficient, and positioned for impact. You will drive the setting and tracking of objectives and key results (OKRs), develop and report on business metrics, and manage high-priority initiatives that advance I2's mission.

This role blends strategy, execution, and cross-functional influence. You'll oversee strategic planning cycles, create executive-ready overviews of I2's achievements, track performance, and identify opportunities to improve operations and outcomes. You'll also manage external engagements and partnerships, act as the connective tissue across teams, and elevate the way I2 operates and communicates its success.

This role is based in San Francisco, CA. We use a hybrid work model of 3 days in the office per week and offer relocation assistance to new employees.

In this role, you will:

• Partner with I2 leadership to define and track team OKRs, ensuring alignment with OpenAI's priorities and goals.

• Build and maintain performance dashboards, metrics, and visualizations that drive data-informed decision-making.

• Act as a Chief of Staff for I2-streamlining team operations, strengthening knowledge management, and improving organizational effectiveness.

• Represent the I2 team in cross-functional initiatives with partners across Legal, Policy, Global Affairs, Comms, and Product.

• Prepare high-quality strategic summaries, reports, and visual presentations that showcase I2's impact to leadership and external stakeholders.

• Identify new opportunities to strengthen I2's success and operational capabilities.

• Program manage external engagements, workshops, and partnerships from planning to delivery.

• Lead special projects and operational improvements across the team, driving key initiatives from conception through execution.

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Have 7+ years of experience in strategy, operations, program management, or Chief of Staff roles in dynamic and high-impact environments.

• Are highly skilled in building and tracking metrics, OKRs, and performance frameworks that align teams on impact.

• Excel at stakeholder management and cross-functional collaboration, with the ability to influence at all levels.

• Have exceptional written, visual, and executive communication skills, including the ability to craft concise, compelling strategic materials.

• Are a strong systems thinker with a passion for operational excellence and process improvements.

• Can manage multiple high-stakes projects simultaneously with structure, prioritization, and clarity.

• Are deeply aligned with OpenAI's mission and motivated by building a safer and more responsible AI ecosystem.

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity.

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.

For additional information, please see OpenAI's Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement.

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with applicable law, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act. For unincorporated Los Angeles County workers: we reasonably believe that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship with the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of a conditional offer of employment: protect computer hardware entrusted to you from theft, loss or damage; return all computer hardware in your possession (including the data contained therein) upon termination of employment or end of assignment; and maintain the confidentiality of proprietary, confidential, and non-public information. In addition, job duties require access to secure and protected information technology systems and related data security obligations.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities, and requests can be made via this link.

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At OpenAI, we believe artificial intelligence has the potential to help people solve immense global challenges, and we want the upside of AI to be widely shared. Join us in shaping the future of technology.

Compensation Range: $320K - $325K