Research Engineer, Research Scientist, AI Systems Engineer

OpenAI

AI research engineer automating research workflows at OpenAI, an AI research and deployment company. Building evaluations, agents, infrastructure, and training systems to accelerate safe, high-quality research.

Posted 8/5/2026full-timeSan Francisco • California • 🇺🇸 United StatesMid-LevelSenior💰 $295,000 - $445,000 per yearWebsite

Core Competencies

Role fit

Core Competencies

Use this summary to align your resume positioning with the role.

Demonstrates expertise in LLM Training, Model Evaluations, and Research Infrastructure, with a strong ability to automate research workflows and enhance research productivity through effective collaboration and rigorous scientific thinking.

Highest-signal resume keywords

LLM TrainingModel EvaluationsAgent SystemsData Pipeline DevelopmentResearch Infrastructure

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills

Model TrainingExperiment DesignSynthetic Data GenerationResearch Workflow AutomationEvaluation Metrics Development

Soft Skills

Effective CollaborationRigorous ThinkingProblem-Solving

Tools & Technologies

Research InfrastructureExperiment-Orchestration SystemsSandboxed Runtimes

Industry Keywords

Large-Scale Distributed SystemsAI CapabilitiesResearch ProductivityModel CapabilitiesSafety and Privacy

Tech Stack

Tools & technologies

Distributed Systems

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Design evaluations for research judgment, hypothesis generation and testing, and long-horizon experiment execution
Turn real research workflows and model failures into data and evaluation flywheels
Improve model research capabilities through agent harnesses, synthetic data, RL environments, and model training
Build and maintain safe, reliable integrations between models and OpenAI’s research infrastructure
Develop research agents, experiment-orchestration systems, and sandboxed runtimes supporting real research workflows
Create metrics and economic models to understand RSI’s effects on research productivity, model capabilities, and safety of internal deployments
Work across research, engineering, product, and infrastructure to automate research workflows and improve research productivity
Contribute across the full lifecycle of model training, evaluation, and deployment

Requirements

What you’ll need

Research or engineering experience across LLM training, model evaluations, agent systems, synthetic data, research infrastructure, or large-scale distributed systems
Strong generalist ability to move between open-ended research and practical implementation
Ability to turn ambiguous problems into clear results
Effective collaboration across systems, data, model training, evaluations, and research teams
Experience building and maintaining data pipelines, tooling, and infrastructure for emerging AI capabilities
Comfort working on problems without clear definitions or established playbooks
Rigorous thinking about scientific quality, research taste, safety, privacy, reliability, performance, and scale
Excitement about using increasingly capable AI systems to accelerate meaningful research

Benefits

Comp & perks

Equity
Medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family, with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts
Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses (parking and transit)
401(k) retirement plan with employer match
Paid parental leave (up to 24 weeks for birth parents and 20 weeks for non-birthing parents)
Paid medical and caregiver leave (up to 8 weeks)
Flexible PTO for exempt employees and up to 15 days annually for non-exempt employees
13+ paid company holidays
Multiple paid coordinated company office closures throughout the year
Paid sick or safe time
Mental health and wellness support
Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage
Annual learning and development stipend
Daily meals in offices
Meal delivery credits as eligible
Relocation support for eligible employees
Charitable donation matching
Wellness stipends
Immigration and sponsorship support may be provided based on individual circumstances