Research Program Manager - Model Evals and Safety

Reflection; New York (NY); On-site; USD 120,000 - 150,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Top-tier compensation

Comprehensive health benefits

Fully paid parental leave

Paid time off

Daily meals provided

Job summary

Reflection is seeking a Research Program Manager to lead the development of model evaluations and safety protocols. This integral role requires an experienced leader to build systems from the ground up, collaborating with teams to ensure AI safety at every stage of development.

The ideal candidate will have over 7 years of experience in technical program management and a strong understanding of AI safety methodologies. With a focus on fostering a culture of continuous improvement, you will help shape the future of our model development.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of experience in technical program management, research operations, or ML engineering.
• Experience with model evaluation, AI safety, and regulatory frameworks.
• Ability to establish new functions or programs from scratch.

Responsibilities

• Build the infrastructure for model evaluations and safety.
• Establish workflows and decision frameworks for safety evaluations.
• Create visibility structures for leadership regarding model safety.

Skills

Technical program management

Model evaluation

AI safety

Stakeholder management

Education

7+ years in technical program management or related field

Job description

Our Mission

Reflection’s mission is to build open superintelligence and make it accessible to all. We’re developing open weight models for individuals, agents, enterprises, and even nation states. Our team of AI researchers and company builders come from DeepMind, OpenAI, Google Brain, Meta, Character.AI, Anthropic and beyond.

About The Role

Research Program Managers at Reflection are high‑leveraged leaders and operators who embed directly with research and infrastructure teams to accelerate the pace of frontier model development. They are not project trackers. They are force multipliers who bring clarity to ambiguity, drive decisions when the path forward is unclear, and ensure that the work happening across multiple teams connects into a coherent whole.

This is a foundational role. Reflection is building model evals and safety from the ground up, and this RPM will be at the center of that effort. You won’t be stepping into an established function with existing processes and tooling. You will be the person who figures out what this function needs to look like, stands it up, and makes it real. That means defining the evaluation frameworks, building the operational infrastructure for model safety, establishing the processes that connect evals to the model development lifecycle, and laying the groundwork for how Reflection interfaces with the broader safety ecosystem. This is 0‑to‑1 work in its purest form.

You bring a first‑responder mentality. When things go sideways, you don’t wait to be asked. You jump in, assess the situation, cut through noise, align the people who need to be aligned, and drive resolution.

What You’ll Do

• Build the foundational infrastructure for model evals and safety at Reflection. Define the evaluation frameworks, tooling requirements, and operational processes that will underpin how we assess model capabilities, risks, and readiness for release.
• Stand up model safety operations as a function, including establishing the workflows, review cadences, and decision frameworks that connect safety evaluation to the model development and release lifecycle.
• Partner with research and engineering leads across pre‑training, mid‑training, and post‑training to embed safety and evaluation checkpoints into the development process in a way that is rigorous without being a bottleneck.
• Drive the scoping and prioritization of eval science and eval infrastructure investments, working with technical leads to determine what to build in‑house, what to adopt, and where to invest research effort.
• Establish Reflection’s engagement with the external safety ecosystem, including third‑party assessments, academic partnerships, and industry safety frameworks. Represent the company’s safety posture to external stakeholders with credibility and clarity.
• Create visibility and reporting structures that give leadership a clear, honest picture of model safety status, evaluation coverage, and open risks, so they can make informed decisions at the pace the business requires.
• Champion a culture of blameless post‑mortems and continuous learning, turning every safety‑relevant finding into a concrete improvement to our systems and processes.

About You

• 7+ years of experience in technical program management, research operations, or ML engineering, with demonstrated experience standing up new functions, teams, or programs from scratch.
• Familiar with the landscape of model evaluation and AI safety, including evaluation methodologies, red‑teamings, alignment research, and the evolving regulatory and industry safety ecosystem.
• Deep enough technically to engage with researchers and engineers on topics like model behavior, evaluation design, data pipelines, and safety‑critical system architecture.
• Proven ability to build structures where none exists. You’ve taken ambiguous mandates and turned them into functioning programs with clear ownership, measurable outcomes, and durable processes.
• Strong stakeholder management skills spanning deeply technical ICs, research leadership, and external partners. You build trust through competence and follow‑through.
• Excited to build from zero to one. We are a small, fast‑moving team and this role will help define how model safety and evaluation works at Reflection.
• Motivated by enabling researchers and engineers to build the world’s most capable open‑weight AI systems, responsibly.

What We Offer

We believe that to build superintelligence that is truly open, you need to start at the foundation. Joining Reflection means building from the ground up as part of a small talent‑dense team. You will help define our future as a company, and help define the frontier of open foundational models.

We want you to do the most impactful work of your career with the confidence that you and the people you care about most are supported.

• Top‑tier compensation: Salary and equity structured to recognize and retain the best talent globally.
• Health & wellness: Comprehensive medical, dental, vision, life, and disability insurance.
• Life & family: Fully paid parental leave for all new parents, including adoptive and surrogate journeys. Financial support for family planning.
• Benefits & balance: paid time off when you need it, relocation support, and more perks that optimize your time.
• Opportunities to connect with teammates: lunch and dinner are provided daily. We have regular off‑sites and team celebrations.