Why This Job is Featured on The SaaS Jobs
This Policy Manager role sits at a point of growing importance in the SaaS ecosystem: how AI products are governed as they move from research into widely used, subscription delivered services. The remit spans legislative and regulatory monitoring across regions, plus the translation of technical realities into policy positions that can inform product and launch decisions, which is increasingly central for SaaS companies operating at global scale.
For a SaaS career, the role builds durable leverage in cross functional operating models where policy, legal, product, and go to market must stay aligned. It develops repeatable skills in building internal decision frameworks, running coordinated policy workstreams, and communicating trade offs to mixed audiences, all of which transfer to other SaaS environments facing privacy, IP, safety, and sector specific compliance pressure.
The listing signals a fit for professionals who prefer structured analysis paired with pragmatic execution, and who are comfortable owning ambiguity as issues evolve. It also suits someone who enjoys synthesizing inputs from multiple regions and disciplines into clear written guidance, and who wants their work to influence how a SaaS organization prioritizes and ships capabilities in regulated contexts.
The section above is editorial commentary from The SaaS Jobs, provided to help SaaS professionals understand the role in a broader industry context.
Job Description
About the Team
OpenAI’s mission is to ensure that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We believe that achieving our goal requires effective engagement with public policy stakeholders and the broader community impacted by AI. Accordingly, our Global Affairs team builds authentic, collaborative relationships with public officials and the broader AI policymaking community to inform and support our shared work in these domains. We ensure that insights from policymakers inform our work and - in collaboration with our colleagues and external stakeholders - support the development of regulation, industry standards, and safe and beneficial development of AI tools.
About the Role
OpenAI is seeking a highly organized and skilled Policy Manager with exceptional writing, analytical, program management, and strategic thinking abilities to join our Global Affairs team, in the Policy Development and Operations team. The Policy Development and Operations team is responsible for identifying, tracking, and analyzing emerging legislative and regulatory proposals globally. They lead and coordinate the development of global public policy positions that are informed by legislative trends and OpenAI’s unique technical expertise, coordinate policy campaigns across regions, and integrate regional perspectives in order to represent Global Affairs in company-wide initiatives such as product launches.
Reporting to the Head of Policy Development and Operations, you will play a central role in developing proactive policy positions by working closely with regional teams to analyze legislative and regulatory proposals and provide issue-area expertise. You will synthesize legislative trends and regional insights, apply cross-functional perspectives, and exercise policy judgement to clearly articulate key decisions, trade-offs, and areas of alignment or disagreement. You will also help evolve the team’s policy development processes and systems to support effective engagement across regions and campaigns, enabling Global Affairs to prioritize issues, allocate resources, and respond to emerging policy developments. In addition, you will also contribute to the Global Affairs team’s broader thinking about what proactive policies to advance and advocate for and how to best position those policies to succeed around the globe.
This is a deeply collaborative role that will leverage OpenAI’s existing strengths across the organization, including both policy and technical functions. You will collaborate with the rest of the Global Affairs regional and functional teams, as well as with representatives from legal, product policy, research, and go-to-market. In particular, you will be responsible for working closely with regional teams to ensure that their perspectives are represented in integrated Global Affairs documents, forums, and decisions. You will also be responsible for helping build cross-regional understanding and shared resources for the Global Affairs team to use.
OpenAI releases industry-leading research and tools. You will face new challenges as the impact of cutting edge generative AI technologies continues to be explored and as the needs of the organization evolve. The policy team is a fast-paced environment and flexibility is essential. You will be accountable for setting clear priorities and balancing tensions, including the cadence of this work — quicker than academic research, and more deliberate than the most rapid response policy projects —- and the need to balance technical rigor with accessibility for a policy audience.
This role may be based in San Francisco, CA, or Washington, D.C. and may require frequent travel to participate in meetings and events with key stakeholders. We offer relocation assistance to new employees.
You should thrive in this role if you:
Enjoy diving deep into technical details and then making and communicating connections across technology, policy, and politics.
Thrive in a fast-paced environment that requires you manage a diverse set of issues and complex stakeholders and to scale new organizations, processes, and functions quickly.
Collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams, especially across technical and policy teams, and are comfortable aligning a diverse range of internal and external partners.
Manage teams, people, and organizational growth effectively and with kindness.
Enjoy program management and are extremely organized and comfortable tracking a wide range of details and keeping a range of stakeholders on task.
Are passionate about the promise of technology and the future of artificial intelligence and thoughtful about its potential risks.
We're looking for a blend of:
Experience working at the intersection of technology, policy, and politics and translating complex socio-technical issues to diverse audiences, ideally with a focus on AI.
Experience working on technology policy either in government or on a policy team at another technology company.
Demonstrated subject-matter expertise across multiple AI-related technology policy domains, with particular depth or interest in areas such as privacy, connected devices, copyright, and health-related policy issues, and the ability to rapidly build expertise in new areas and apply sound policy judgment in ambiguous environments.
Demonstrated ability to analyze and engage on complex regulatory and legislative proposals, including analyzing draft text, developing positions, and supporting negotiations
Experience driving external policy initiatives such as thought leadership, white papers, and participation in industry coalitions that advance responsible technology development and policy positions.
Excellent written and oral communication and presentation skills, experience briefing senior officials, and an ability to understand and communicate with both technical and policy specialists.
Ability to execute in fast and flexible environments through rapid cycles of analysis, decision, and action.
Sound judgment and outstanding personal integrity.
Genuine care and knowledge about the impact of technology on society.
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 Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement.
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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