OpenAI’s People team aims to hire, engage, and retain world-class talent to safely build and deploy universally beneficial Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). The HR team, a vital subset of the People team, supports a diverse group of scientists, engineers, and business professionals, with expertise in employee relations, immigration, compensation and benefits, learning and development, project management, and more.
About the Role
We’re looking for a highly analytical and strategically minded Equity Programs, Strategy and Analytics Lead to join OpenAI’s People team. This is a high-impact individual contributor role at the intersection of compensation, corporate finance, and people strategy focused on shaping and supporting OpenAI’s equity and executive compensation programs.
You’ll partner closely with senior leaders across Legal, Finance, and People to help drive decisions around equity design, budgeting and forecasts, and M&A integration. In this role you’ll build models, develop strategies, and lead complex analyses while making key decisions that influence how we attract, retain, and reward world-class talent.
Whether you come from a compensation background or strategic finance/FP&A, you’ll thrive in this role if you bring a sharp quantitative toolkit, strong business judgment, and a desire to architect systems that are both financially sound and aligned with OpenAI’s values.
This role reports to our Head of Equity Program Strategy and Executive Compensation.
Key Responsibilities:
Equity and Executive Compensation Strategy
Design and evolve long-term incentives, including new hire, refresh, promotion, and recognition programs.
Conduct compensation benchmarking analyses for executive and mission-critical roles; evaluate peer group data and pay positioning.
Build and maintain robust equity models (e.g., grant size calculators, share pool forecasts, scenario planning).
Advise on equity philosophy and policy development, including eligibility criteria, vesting schedules, and vehicle design (e.g., RSUs vs. options).
Evaluate the impact of valuation changes, recapitalizations, and market dynamics on program sustainability.
Analytics & Financial Modeling
Build and maintain dashboards and reporting tools that track the effectiveness of equity programs against key outcomes such as retention, dilution, hiring plan alignment, and cost efficiency.
Create cost-of-talent frameworks and conduct sensitivity analyses across geographies, levels, job ladders, and hiring plans.
Partner with Finance on forecasting stock-based compensation expense to ensure alignment with budgeting and financial reporting needs.
Build equity-related models for strategic scenarios, including tender offers, liquidity planning, and headcount growth.
M&A Integration & Compensation Committee Support
Lead compensation and equity modeling for M&A scenarios, including conversion mechanics and retention planning.
Own equity due diligence for M&A, partnering with Legal and Finance to assess plan structures, validate key assumptions, and ensure smooth integration post-close.
Draft high-quality Compensation Committee materials including exec pay proposals, equity usage forecasts, and program impact assessments.
Cross-Functional Collaboration
Partner with Legal, Finance, Total Rewards, Recruiting, and HRBPs to align on plan design, equity mechanics, budgeting, and employee communications.
Collaborate with internal systems and analytics teams to deliver scalable, automated compensation tools and workflows.
Drive education and enablement efforts to build compensation fluency among People partners, recruiters, and business leaders.
We’re Seeking:
7+ years of experience in compensation, finance, or people analytics, ideally with exposure to equity compensation and/or total rewards design.
Strong financial modeling skills and comfort navigating ambiguity in high-growth or fast-evolving environments.
Experience analyzing complex datasets and turning insights into business decisions.
Advanced Excel or Google Sheets proficiency; SQL and/or analytics tools (Python, R, Tableau) is a plus.
Clear, persuasive communication skills; able to simplify complex quantitative topics for diverse audiences.
High integrity, ownership, and attention to detail in handling sensitive data.
Workplace & Location
This role is based in our San Francisco office and we aren't considering remote applications. We offer relocation support to new employees, and we use a hybrid work model: three days in the office per week with optional work from home on Thursdays and Fridays.
Our open-plan offices have height-adjustable desks, conference rooms, phone booths, well-stocked kitchens full of snacks and drinks, three in-house prepared meals daily, a private outdoor space for working in the sun or socializing, nap rooms, private bike storage, and more.
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
.
Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with applicable law, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act. 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.
We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities.
OpenAI Global Applicant Privacy Policy
At OpenAI, we believe artificial intelligence has the potential to help people solve immense global challenges, and we want the upside of AI to be widely shared. Join us in shaping the future of technology.
Compensation
$240K + Offers Equity
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