Research Program Manager

OpenAI
San Francisco, CA2026-08-31

About the job

As a Research Program Manager, you will embed with research teams and help drive some of the most technically complex and consequential work behind OpenAI’s model development. Depending on your focus, your work may span training, reasoning, evaluations, compute, research infrastructure, safety, model launch readiness, and governance. You will translate evolving research priorities into actionable programs, help teams navigate technical and operational tradeoffs, and keep important work moving as new issues emerge. This is a hands-on technical role: you will engage directly with research workflows, experimental results, technical systems, and engineering constraints; not simply coordinate from the sidelines.

Responsibilities

- Translate evolving research priorities into actionable programs

- Help teams navigate technical and operational tradeoffs

- Engage directly with research workflows, experimental results, technical systems, and engineering constraints

- Drive technically complex and consequential work behind model development spanning training, reasoning, evaluations, compute, research infrastructure, safety, model launch readiness, and governance

- Move complex, ambiguous technical initiatives forward across multiple teams and stakeholders

Qualifications

Minimum

- Have 5+ years of experience in research program management, technical program management, or related roles in fast-moving environments

- Can engage substantively with researchers and engineers on topics such as model training, experimental design, model safety, evaluation methods, data workflows, compute infrastructure, or distributed systems

- Are comfortable working directly with technical tools, research data, experimental results, or operational workflows to understand problems and develop practical solutions

- Have a strong track record of moving complex, ambiguous technical initiatives forward across multiple teams and stakeholders

- Can distinguish what is known from what is uncertain, ask incisive technical questions, and help teams make sound decisions with incomplete information

- Know how to introduce structure without creating unnecessary processes, and care about making researchers more effective

- Bring a high bar for quality and can recognize when evidence, evaluation results, or execution plans need closer scrutiny

- Communicate clearly across technical and nontechnical audiences, including researchers, engineers, and organizational leaders

- Take ownership without waiting for perfect conditions, adapt quickly as priorities change, and follow difficult problems through to resolution

Preferred

No preferred qualifications listed.