Legal Program Manager (Regulatory Compliance)

OpenAI; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

OpenAI is seeking a Legal Program Manager focused on regulatory compliance to build and manage cross‑functional programs translating counsel’s guidance into practical operations. Initial focus may include content moderation disclosures and frontier AI governance, with priorities shaped by the team.

Based in San Francisco, CA or New York, NY, you will partner with in‑house counsel and product, engineering, and governance teams to implement evidence collection, reporting, and compliance workflows

Qualifications

• 6+ years in program management, regulatory compliance, or related fields in tech-forward or regulated environments.
• Experience working with in-house legal teams; regulatory matters experience and in-house technology exposure are strongly preferred.
• Proven ability to scale compliance programs and translate legal or regulatory requirements into operational workflows and documentation.
• Take ownership of complex projects, set milestones, synthesize cross-functional input, and build trust across legal, technical, and business teams.
• Bring strong organizational, analytical, and communication skills; exercise sound judgment under pressure and adapt to changing priorities.
• Hands-on, with enthusiasm for AI technology and the ability to learn unfamiliar technical concepts quickly in fast-moving environments.
• Familiarity with content moderation, online safety, frontier AI governance, data governance, privacy, or emerging technology law is a plus.
• Data analysis or SQL skills, or relevant certifications such as PMP, PMI-ACP, CPA, or CISSP, a plus.

Responsibilities

• Lead regulatory compliance programs end to end: define scope, owners, milestones, dependencies, risks, and escalation paths, and drive execution with counsel and cross-functional partners.
• Translate counsel’s regulatory guidance into repeatable workflows, controls, and documentation.
• Build partnerships across Product, Engineering, User Operations, Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC), Global Affairs, Communications, and Go-to-Market to align program priorities and deliverables.
• Support regulatory inquiries, audits and investigations with counsel, organizing evidence and responses to support timely, accurate communication and reporting.
• Maintain a reliable source of truth for obligations, controls, decisions, evidence, and reporting.
• Identify execution risks and compliance gaps, track remediation, and elevate blockers; ensure counsel review for legal conclusions.

Skills

Program management

Regulatory compliance

Cross-functional collaboration

Legal liaison

Tools

SQL

Job description

About the Team

OpenAI’s Legal team helps advance our mission by tackling novel legal issues in AI. Our team brings together professionals across technology, privacy, intellectual property, corporate, employment, tax, regulatory, and litigation. Our regulatory compliance work turns legal requirements into practical programs that support responsible AI development and deployment.

About the Role

As a Legal Program Manager focused on regulatory compliance, you will build and manage cross‑functional programs that translate counsel’s guidance into practical, sustainable operations. Your initial focus may include content moderation and/or frontier AI governance, with the mix shaped by team priorities and your strengths.

You will partner with internal and external counsel, other legal program managers, and technical and business teams to coordinate implementation, evidence collection, reporting, and ongoing compliance. You’ll build repeatable systems that scale across regulations, products, and jurisdictions, helping teams navigate emerging requirements with clarity and sound judgment.

This full‑time role is based in San Francisco, CA, or New York, NY.

In this role, you will:

• Lead regulatory compliance programs end to end: define scope, owners, milestones, dependencies, risks, and escalation paths, and drive execution with counsel and cross‑functional partners.
• Translate counsel’s regulatory guidance into repeatable workflows, controls, and documentation. Depending on your portfolio, this may include content moderation disclosures, transparency reporting, reporting and appeals workflows, or frontier AI model launch readiness, evaluation and risk‑management evidence, and incident reporting.
• Build strong partnerships across Product, Engineering, User Operations, Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC), Global Affairs, Communications, and Go‑to‑Market to align program priorities and deliverables.
• Support regulatory inquiries, audits and investigations with counsel, organizing evidence and responses to support timely, accurate communication and reporting.
• Maintain a reliable source of truth for obligations, controls, decisions, evidence, and reporting. Demonstrate compliance readiness and control effectiveness, and improve program timeliness and evidence quality.
• Identify execution risks and compliance gaps, track remediation, and elevate blockers. Establish clear success measures and operating cadences, keeping legal conclusions subject to counsel’s review.

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Have 6+ years of experience in program management, regulatory compliance, or related fields in a tech‑forward or highly regulated environment, including relevant legal, regulatory, or compliance program experience.
• Have experience working with an in‑house legal team; regulatory matters experience and in‑house technology experience are strongly preferred.
• Have demonstrated experience building and scaling compliance programs, translating legal or regulatory requirements into operational workflows, and maintaining reliable documentation and evidence in partnership with counsel.
• Take ownership of complex projects, set and achieve milestones, synthesize cross‑functional input, and build trust across legal, technical, and business teams.
• Bring strong organizational, analytical, and communication skills. Exercise sound judgment under pressure, adapt to changing priorities, and make progress through ambiguity.
• Are resourceful and hands‑on, with enthusiasm for AI technology and the ability to quickly learn unfamiliar technical concepts and navigate fast‑moving technical environments.
• Bring familiarity with content moderation, online safety, frontier AI governance, data governance, privacy, or emerging technology law as a plus. Depth in either content moderation or frontier AI governance is valuable; expertise in both is not required.
• Bring data analysis or SQL skills, or relevant professional qualifications such as PMP, PMI‑ACP, CPA, or CISSP, as a plus.

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 Aff…

Background checks for applicants will be administered in accordance with applicable law, and qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment consistent with those laws, 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: 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.

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