OpenAI
Cyber Operations Lead, Critical Harm Operations
Part remote, part office, you need to live within commuting distance of a named location.
Hybrid · San Francisco
Employer listed it 3 weeks ago · Added 5 days ago
Been open since 3 weeks ago, still being checked, but it has been live a while.
Salary
$252,000 to $335,000
Location
Hybrid · San Francisco
Timezone
Not stated
Contract
Full-time
Experience
Lead
Category
Operations
Published by the employer
Remote flexibility
Hybrid
This role is only partly remote, the employer expects time in the office around San Francisco, Hybrid, so you need to live within commuting distance.
What the employer says
- Source listing states candidate location: "San Francisco, Hybrid"
- Listing mentions "Hybrid"
What Nomaders makes of it
- Not suitable if you plan to move between countries
The quotes above are the employer's own words; the reading is ours. Always check the original listing and employment terms before working from another country.
About the role
About the Team
Critical Harm Operations sits within User Safety & Risk Operations and builds enforcement systems for the most severe user-safety risks—including Frontier Risk and Material Harm—that are accurate, fast, defensible, and scalable. The Cyber vertical turns policy into reviewer standards, calibrated judgment, quality systems, escalation paths, and safe automation.
About the Role
We’re looking for a senior cybersecurity and cyber intelligence practitioner who is also an operations leader, strategist, and people manager. You’ll bring sound cyber judgment, strong analytical and automation instincts, and the ability to stay close to the work while setting direction, managing and developing people, aligning partners, building programs from 0→1, and translating ambiguity into durable operating systems.
This role combines senior individual-contributor depth with direct people-management accountability. You’ll personally shape complex cyber judgments, operating models, SOPs, quality systems, and automation strategies while building, coaching, and holding accountable a high-performing team. You’ll also lead through influence across FTEs, BPO partners, and cross-functional teams. Baseline operational health—including quality, queue coverage, productivity, and SLA adherence—is table stakes; success is additionally measured by durable improvements to decision quality, stakeholder alignment, reviewer capability, and the systems that run the operation.
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:
Set the strategic direction for Cyber Operations and translate high-level organizational priorities into a clear operating model, roadmaps, SOPs, escalation paths, quality goals, and safe-access strategies.
Serve as the senior cybersecurity and cyber intelligence expert for complex and high-risk decisions across ChatGPT, API, Codex, agents, and emerging product surfaces.
Build trust, create clarity, navigate disagreement, and move people through ambiguity across FTEs, BPO partners, and cross-functional teams.
Turn policy ambiguity, quality misses, appeals, and reviewer disagreement into clear decision rules, calibration examples, training, and tooling requirements.
Build and scale reviewer capability through onboarding, certification, coaching, feedback, recurring calibration, and close partnership with vendor leadership.
Own operational health across Cyber Operations, including queue coverage, reviewer productivity, quality metrics, SLA adherence, escalation hygiene, and proactive identification of performance gaps before downstream teams need to flag them.
Use analysis and automation to diagnose root causes, surface risk, prioritize high-leverage fixes, and reduce manual effort.
Build durable quality and evaluation systems that improve decision quality through calibration, adjudication, monitoring, and feedback loops.
Build new operational capabilities from 0→1, then scale them: define the problem, align partners, test the model, establish metrics, and turn what works into repeatable operations.
Present crisp recommendations, tradeoffs, and operational strategy to executives and internal and external partners; represent Cyber Operations in high-stakes discussions and launch decisions.
You might thrive in this role if you:
Have 8+ years of experience in cybersecurity, cyber intelligence, threat intelligence, incident response, security research, or a related field, including 4+ years of leading teams.
Built and scaled a cyber operations, cyber intelligence, or abuse-prevention capability across regions, products, or a large user base.
Designed and launched human-in-the-loop automation or evaluation systems that materially improved safety, quality, or operational scale.
Bring strong cyber judgment and can reason deeply about attacker behavior, emerging threats, abuse patterns, and ambiguous dual-use activity.
Have built or improved high-stakes operations, reviewer programs, QA systems, escalation workflows, or vendor/BPO programs—and can translate high-level strategy into execution.
Are highly analytical and can turn operational data into clear priorities, root-cause diagnoses, and measurable improvements.
Requirements
The employer hasn't listed requirements separately, they're described in the role summary above and on the original listing.
Benefits
No benefits package published with this listing. Ask about it at first interview.
How to apply
- 1Check the flexibility label above, hybrid, matches where you plan to live and work.
- 2Tailor your CV to the role at OpenAI, mentioning your remote working experience.
- 3Apply directly on the employer's careers page using the button below. Nomaders never handles your application.
Found 5d ago. Last checked 23 Sept. Always confirm the details on the original posting, salary and location can change after publication.
Listing sourced from Company boards.
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