Safety Response Operations Lead

About the team

The Trust, Safety & Risk Operations function protects OpenAI’s products, users, and business from abuse, fraud, scams, regulatory gaps, and other new and evolving threats. This work sits at the meeting point of operations, compliance, user trust, and safety, with close collaboration across Legal, Policy, Engineering, Product, Go-To-Market, and external partners to keep the platform safe, compliant, and trustworthy for a global audience.

The Global Safety Response Operations team provides around-the-clock coverage for user safety, risk, and regulatory escalations across OpenAI’s products. It manages the highest-priority issues that require human judgment and fast action, serving as the central escalation and execution function for safety operations while delivering timely, empathetic, and consistent support.

About the role

The Global Safety Response Operations Lead is a hands-on team lead who manages a regional Safety Response team and also personally works on high-risk cases. The position blends frontline safety operations, people leadership, process ownership, and cross-functional coordination.

You will guide Safety Response Analysts who manage OpenAI’s most sensitive and high-impact matters, while also directly contributing to work on complex, high-risk, or highly visible cases. You will own the handling of severe escalations in your region and ensure the right communication and follow-through with cross-functional stakeholders.

You will be responsible for helping your region consistently achieve utilization, quality, and SLA goals, while acting as the operational point of contact for Product, Policy, Legal, Investigations, and regional partners.

This is a global 24/7 operation and requires flexibility for rotating schedules, including nights, weekends, and holidays, as part of a leadership on-call model.

What you'll do

• Manage, coach, and support a regional team of Safety Response Analysts so they maintain strong performance, engagement, and reliable decision-making.
• Own regional operating metrics such as utilization, SLA performance, backlog health, and quality standards.
• Oversee the most complex and sensitive cases and act as the first escalation point and incident lead for the region.
• Spend 20–30% of your time on frontline work, including investigations, enforcement actions, and legal or regulatory escalations.
• Work closely with Product, Policy, Legal, Investigations, and local market teams to deliver safety outcomes and reduce risk.
• Improve operational processes, including workflows, tools, automation, and escalation routes.
• Spot emerging issues and trends, and convert frontline observations into recommendations for policy, product, or enforcement changes.

What we're looking for

• At least 5 years of experience in Trust & Safety, Risk Operations, Investigations, Fraud, Annotation, or platform integrity.
• At least 4 years of people management experience or senior operational ownership.
• Strong judgment in uncertain, high-risk situations, with the ability to balance speed, accuracy, and defensibility in sensitive cases.
• Clear and credible communication skills for escalation write-ups, legal or policy briefings, and incident coordination with leadership and product teams.
• Ability to connect frontline operations with strategic decision-makers, turning complex cases into structured insights and strategic direction into practical team guidance.
• Proven ability to influence without direct authority and build trust across Product, Policy, Legal, Investigations, and regional stakeholders.
• Solid understanding of content moderation, user safety, fraud, or developer risk frameworks, including the legal, policy, and technical factors behind enforcement.
• Comfort with data, tooling, and automation to improve quality, efficiency, and scale.
• Ability to lead calmly and effectively in a 24/7, high-pressure environment, including during incidents, spikes, and regulatory or reputational events.

Additional information

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company focused on ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. The organization aims to advance AI capabilities and deploy them safely through its products. It values safety, human needs, and a wide range of perspectives, voices, and experiences.

OpenAI is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or any other protected status under applicable law.

Background checks will be handled in accordance with applicable law. Applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered in line with relevant legal requirements, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act for US-based candidates. For unincorporated Los Angeles County workers, criminal history may be considered relevant to duties such as protecting company hardware from theft, loss, or damage; returning all company hardware and related data upon termination; maintaining confidentiality of proprietary and non-public information; and accessing secure information technology systems with related security obligations.

If you believe the job posting is non-compliant, a report can be submitted through the provided compliance form. Questions unrelated to posting compliance will not receive a response.

Reasonable accommodations are available for applicants with disabilities through the provided accommodations link.

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The company also states its belief that artificial intelligence can help solve major global challenges and that the benefits of AI should be broadly shared.