Senior Mechanical Commissioning Lead — Critical Facilities

OpenAI; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

OpenAI is seeking a Mechanical Commissioning Lead to drive planning, readiness, QA/QC, and test execution oversight for our complex infrastructure projects. You will ensure mechanical systems are installed, started, balanced, and tested to support reliable facility performance, reporting to the Commissioning Project Lead.

This role is 100% onsite with projects in Texas or Georgia, requiring 8+ years in mechanical commissioning and strong coordination with designers, vendors, and electrical

Qualifications

• 8+ years in mechanical commissioning, construction, field engineering, startup, testing, balancing coordination, or owner representative experience on complex technical infrastructure projects.
• Strong knowledge of mechanical system startup, functional performance testing, controls interfaces, cooling or ventilation systems, hydronic systems, and equipment/vendor startup workflows.
• Experience reviewing commissioning specifications, inspection checklists, functional test scripts, vendor startup procedures, test reports, and trend evidence.
• Ability to coordinate field execution across contractors, equipment vendors, QA/QC teams, commissioning partners, and project leadership.
• Strong practical judgment around readiness, safety, sequencing, test prerequisites, performance validation, and risk escalation.
• Comfort working in construction environments with evolving schedules and multiple parallel work fronts.
• Clear technical writing skills and discipline in maintaining logs, test evidence, issue records, and decision history.
• Ability to be present at the project site during critical mechanical installation, startup, controls checkout, functional testing, and integrated testing windows.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain the mechanical commissioning scope, readiness criteria, inspection strategy, and discipline test execution plan.
• Review mechanical design packages, specifications, submittals, method statements, controls narratives, sequence assumptions, and testing requirements for commissionability and risk.
• Coordinate mechanical QA/QC inspections with contractors and vendor field/test engineers, including installation checks, pre-functional readiness, deficiency capture, and closeout tracking.
• Own mechanical commissioning procedure development and review, including equipment startup, functional testing, controls verification, balancing prerequisites, failure mode validation, and integrated systems testing inputs.
• Coordinate with equipment vendors on factory/site acceptance requirements, startup support, test prerequisites, documentation packages, and vendor participation during critical tests.
• Support readiness and execution for cooling, ventilation, hydronic, pumping, heat rejection, controls, and other project-specific mechanical systems.
• Lead discipline-level review of mechanical test results, deficiencies, corrective actions, retest requirements, trend logs, and acceptance evidence.
• Maintain mechanical commissioning dashboards and status inputs for the Commissioning Project Lead, including risk items, resource needs, test readiness, and issue ageing.
• Partner with the Electrical Commissioning Lead on cross-discipline dependencies, including power availability, controls integration, emergency modes, heat load scenarios, and integrated testing sequences.
• Support turnover by confirming mechanical documentation, as-built evidence, test records, trend data, and outstanding issue disposition are complete and usable by operations.

Skills

Mechanical commissioning

Field engineering

Startup testing

Balancing coordination

Controls verification

Vendor coordination

Electrical commissioning

Education

Professional engineering license (PE)

Tools

Commissioning platforms

Trend tools

Job description

OpenAI is seeking a Mechanical Commissioning Lead to drive planning, readiness, QA/QC, and test execution oversight for our complex infrastructure projects. You will ensure mechanical systems are installed, started, balanced, and tested to support reliable facility performance, reporting to the Commissioning Project Lead.

This role is 100% onsite with projects in Texas or Georgia, requiring 8+ years in mechanical commissioning and strong coordination with designers, vendors, and electrical