Technical Deployment Lead, Forward Deployed Engineering - Tokyo at OpenAI

Tokyo, Japan

OpenAI Logo
Not SpecifiedCompensation
Senior (5 to 8 years), Expert & Leadership (9+ years)Experience Level
Full TimeJob Type
UnknownVisa
Technology, AIIndustries

Requirements

  • 7+ years of customer-facing technical delivery leadership
  • Track record of successfully leading large, complex, high-stakes customer engagements where customer outcomes depended on tight coordination and fast decision making, ideally involving AI
  • Excel in high ambiguity environments and know how to simplify complex and dynamic work
  • Move fluidly between system level understanding and execution level detail; can dive into customer workflows/data, map constraints, sketch architectures and move ambiguous problems to shipped systems
  • Think strategically and pattern-match; able to step back from execution detail, recognise broader trends across deployments, and connect customer needs to scalable, reusable solutions
  • Have strong technical fluency and sharp [skills implied in context]

Responsibilities

  • Own the technical delivery plan for multiple interdependent workstreams; translate business objectives into a roadmap with milestones, dependencies, and acceptance criteria
  • Run day-to-day engineering execution; track and drive delivery across OpenAI FDE and customer teams; keep progress unblocked and sequenced; make real-time trade-offs on scope and priority to protect the critical path
  • Embed with customer teams to land production deployments and drive adoption; map workflows, shape tools/integrations, and translate requirements into a delivery plan; lead onboarding, adoption, and change management
  • Partner with Product and Research so platform components and research workstreams land in time to support deployment goals
  • Codify solution patterns and evals; extract reusable patterns and package field signals to improve product and models
  • Own value cases and ROI; set impact hypotheses, baselines, and KPIs; run pre-/post-deployment measurement and report to exec sponsors

Skills

Key technologies and capabilities for this role

Technical Project ManagementDeploymentPrototypingMVPChange ManagementCustomer EngineeringWorkflow MappingDependency ManagementRoadmap InfluenceProduction Systems

Questions & Answers

Common questions about this position

What is the location and work arrangement for this role?

The role is based in Tokyo with a hybrid model requiring 3 days in the office, and relocation assistance is offered. Travel up to 25-50% is required.

What are the key responsibilities of the Technical Deployment Lead?

You will own the technical delivery plan for multiple workstreams, translate business objectives into roadmaps, run day-to-day execution across teams, embed with customers to drive adoption, and partner with Product and Research.

What skills and qualities are needed to succeed in this role?

Success requires deep technical project management expertise, extreme ownership of outcomes, high judgment under pressure, and the ability to immerse in customer workflows and solve complex engineering problems at pace.

What is the team like at OpenAI's Forward Deployed Engineering?

The FDE team turns research breakthroughs into production-grade systems, embeds deeply with customers to solve high-leverage problems, and operates at the intersection of deployment and development, working closely with Research, Product, and Partnerships.

What makes a strong candidate for this Technical Deployment Lead role?

Strong candidates have deep technical project management expertise, experience owning end-to-end delivery of complex systems, the ability to make real-time trade-offs under pressure, and a track record of driving customer adoption and impact.

OpenAI

Develops safe and beneficial AI technologies

About OpenAI

OpenAI develops and deploys artificial intelligence technologies aimed at benefiting humanity. The company creates advanced AI models capable of performing various tasks, such as automating processes and enhancing creativity. OpenAI's products, like Sora, allow users to generate videos from text descriptions, showcasing the versatility of its AI applications. Unlike many competitors, OpenAI operates under a capped profit model, which limits the profits it can make and ensures that excess earnings are redistributed to maximize the social benefits of AI. This commitment to safety and ethical considerations is central to its mission of ensuring that artificial general intelligence (AGI) serves all of humanity.

San Francisco, CaliforniaHeadquarters
2015Year Founded
$18,433.2MTotal Funding
LATE_VCCompany Stage
AI & Machine LearningIndustries
1,001-5,000Employees

Benefits

Health insurance
Dental and vision insurance
Flexible spending account for healthcare and dependent care
Mental healthcare service
Fertility treatment coverage
401(k) with generous matching
20-week paid parental leave
Life insurance (complimentary)
AD&D insurance (complimentary)
Short-term/long-term disability insurance (complimentary)
Optional buy-up life insurance
Flexible work hours and unlimited paid time off (we encourage 4+ weeks per year)
Annual learning & development stipend
Regular team happy hours and outings
Daily catered lunch and dinner
Travel to domestic conferences

Risks

Elon Musk's legal battle may pose financial and reputational challenges for OpenAI.
Customizable ChatGPT personas could lead to privacy and ethical concerns.
Competitors like Anthropic raising capital may intensify market competition.

Differentiation

OpenAI's capped profit model prioritizes ethical AI development over unlimited profit.
OpenAI's AI models, like Sora, offer unique video creation from text descriptions.
OpenAI's focus on AGI aims to create AI systems smarter than humans.

Upsides

OpenAI's $6.6 billion funding boosts its AI research and computational capacity.
Customizable ChatGPT personas enhance user engagement and satisfaction.
OpenAI's 'Operator' AI agent could revolutionize workforce automation by 2025.

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