--- title: 'IT Systems Engineer at OpenAI' canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/it-systems-engineer-openai-san-francisco-y4cwqjp73ghm' type: 'job' last_seen: '2026-10-29' --- # IT Systems Engineer at OpenAI - **Company:** [OpenAI](https://feeny.ai/companies/openai) - **Location:** San Francisco, CA - **Compensation:** $187k–$266k - **Employment:** full-time - **Work type:** hybrid - **Posted:** 2026-10-23 - **Last confirmed live:** 2026-10-29 - **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/openai/b73e46a6-881a-4413-835a-94b9d5f35d2f ## Job description ## About the Team The IT System Operations Team provides engineering and operational expertise to the OpenAI IT organization. The team ensures that employee-facing systems, identity workflows, and enterprise applications operate in a predictable, governed, and continuously reliable manner as the organization scales. The Enterprise Platforms pod runs the SaaS applications employees rely on to communicate, collaborate, and manage work. The pod owns application administration, configuration, integrations, operational controls, and complex escalations. We work across Google Workspace, GCP, Slack, Atlassian and service-management tools, ChatGPT Enterprise, and other enterprise applications, partnering with IT Support, Systems Engineering, Identity & Access Foundations, Security, and business teams. ## About the Role We’re looking for an IT Systems Engineer to join our Enterprise Platforms pod, with deep experience in platforms such as Google Workspace, Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and Slack, and a focus on application integration, automation, and internal tools. You’ll connect services across the application portfolio, build tools that simplify work for employees and IT, and own improvements from discovery and design through implementation, rollout, and ongoing operation. The goal is to reduce repeated manual administration and build reusable capability for user migrations, M&A integrations, and broader enterprise platform work. Infrastructure as code is central to how you’ll work. You’ll use Terraform, version control, code review, and automated delivery pipelines as the default approach to managing platform configuration and supporting infrastructure. You’ll pair that foundation with APIs and code to build integrations and tools, simplify administrative workflows, and turn recurring issues into durable engineering improvements. You’ll work across collaboration platforms, cloud integrations, service-management workflows, and ChatGPT Enterprise administration. You’ll also participate in on-call and end-user escalations, helping restore service and improve the systems employees depend on. In this role, you will: - Engineer and operate enterprise platforms through infrastructure as code, using Terraform to manage supported configuration, access, and controls. Build reusable modules, bring existing resources under management, and detect and reconcile configuration drift. Use APIs and automation for capabilities outside provider coverage. - Design, build, and maintain integrations across enterprise applications and cloud services. Own data flows, API access, OAuth clients, service accounts, error handling, and operational monitoring. Partner with cloud and security owners on project setup, permissions, credential handling, and technical handoffs. - Build and improve enterprise application integrations and Jira/service-management workflows for IT, Security, and business teams. Translate operational needs into maintainable configurations, routing, approvals, and automation. - Develop ChatGPT Enterprise workspace administration using APIs and infrastructure as code. Test administrative capabilities and provide Customer Zero feedback to product teams based on real operational needs. - Build reusable internal tools, automation, and autonomous workflows across the enterprise application portfolio, including self-service workflows, administrative utilities, and cross-application processes that support routine operations and user migrations. Use code, APIs, infrastructure as code, and AI or agent workflows with testing, error handling, logging, documentation, and clear boundaries for privileged actions. - Implement agreed platform controls and identify gaps. Validate effective access, sharing, integration, and logging behavior; preserve configuration and test evidence; and document exception requests for the appropriate security and policy owners. - Validate changes through complete employee workflows. Plan rollouts with monitoring and rollback, establish support ownership, and measure reliability, reduced manual effort, and fewer repeat escalations. - Participate in the on-call rotation and handle escalations to support end users, troubleshoot issues, and coordinate resolution with the appropriate teams. You may thrive in this role if you: - Have engineered enterprise platforms at scale, combining hands-on configuration, permissions, and troubleshooting with application integrations, API-based automation, and tools used by employees or IT teams. - Have used AI and agents or agentic automations to improve workflows, applications, and processes, with attention to permissions, reliability, and verification. - Can troubleshoot across applications, identity, permissions, provisioning, networking, and APIs, using evidence to isolate problems and restore service. - Have strong hands-on Terraform and infrastructure-as-code experience, including reusable modules, state management, resource imports, plan review, and automated validation and deployment. Write maintainable code and use APIs to extend automation across applications. - Have independently owned complex systems improvements within a team while supporting operational responsibilities. Can prioritize incidents and end-user escalations, communicate clearly, and maintain service continuity. - Understand GCP fundamentals relevant to enterprise applications, including OAuth clients, service accounts, IAM, secrets, and audit logging, and can explain tradeoffs to engineering and security specialists. Additional experience that is helpful: - Jira Service Management or Atlassian workflow engineering, automation, and integrations. - ChatGPT Enterprise administration, administrative APIs or Terraform providers, or operational experience with platforms such as Notion and Linear. - Implementing and testing collaboration controls, producing audit evidence, and improving platform configuration or monitoring at scale. ## 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](https://cdn.openai.com/policies/eeo-policy-statement.pdf). 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. To notify OpenAI that you believe this job posting is non-compliant, please submit a report through [this form](https://form.asana.com/?d=57018692298241&k=5MqR40fZd7jlxVUh5J-UeA). No response will be provided to inquiries unrelated to job posting compliance. We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities, and requests can be made via this [link](https://form.asana.com/?k=bQ7w9h3iexRlicUdWRiwvg&d=57018692298241). [OpenAI Global Applicant Privacy Policy](https://cdn.openai.com/policies/global-employee-and-contractor-privacy-policy.pdf) 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. ## About OpenAI ## Company Overview - **One-liner**: OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company with a mission to ensure that artificial general intelligence (AGI) benefits all of humanity. - **Entity Type**: Private – structured as a nonprofit parent (OpenAI Foundation) governing a for-profit public benefit corporation (OpenAI Group). The company has confidentially submitted a draft S-1 registration statement to the SEC, signaling a potential future IPO. - **Headquarters**: San Francisco, California, USA - **Founded**: 2015 - **Founders**: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, Ilya Sutskever, John Schulman, Wojciech Zaremba, and others ## Core Business - **Primary industry**: Artificial intelligence research and deployment - **Target customers**: B2B (enterprises via API and platform), B2C (ChatGPT users), and developers (API, open-source models) - **Mission**: To ensure that artificial general intelligence (AGI) – AI systems that are generally smarter than humans – benefits all of humanity. ## Products & Services - **[ChatGPT](https://openai.com/chatgpt)**: Conversational AI assistant available via web and mobile, used by consumers and integrated into enterprise workflows. - **[GPT-4 API](https://openai.com/product)**: Large language model accessed via API for developers to build AI-powered applications (text generation, summarization, code assistance, etc.). - **[DALL-E](https://openai.com/dall-e-3)**: Image generation model that creates images from natural language descriptions. - **[Whisper](https://openai.com/research/whisper)**: Open-source speech recognition system. - **[OpenAI Agents](https://openai.com/)**: Emerging product category focused on autonomous AI agents that can perform tasks on behalf of users (announced June 2026). ## Market Standing - **Valuation**: Not publicly disclosed in the provided sources. Widely reported in the press at ~$300 billion as of early 2026 (post-funding round), but this figure is not confirmed by OpenAI’s official materials. - **Key Metric**: Total funding exceeds $13 billion from Microsoft and other investors. The company has also confidentially filed a draft S-1 with the SEC (see [openai.com](https://openai.com/) – “Confidential submission of draft S-1”). - **Notable Investors/Partners**: Microsoft (strategic partner and largest investor), with additional participation from Thrive Capital, Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, and others. - **Growth Signals**: Active hiring with 721 open roles posted; expansion into agent-based products; confidential IPO filing; continued deployment of frontier models. ## Competitive Advantages - **First-mover & brand recognition**: ChatGPT became the fastest-growing consumer app in history, establishing OpenAI as the household name in generative AI. - **Research leadership**: Consistently publishes cutting-edge research (GPT-4, DALL-E 3, Whisper, etc.) and attracts top AI talent. - **Compute & infrastructure**: Exclusive partnership with Microsoft provides massive cloud computing resources (Azure) for training and inference. - **Unique governance structure**: The nonprofit parent ensures mission alignment (AGI benefiting humanity) while the for-profit arm can raise capital and scale products. ## Strategic Focus - **Safe AGI development**: Continued emphasis on safety research, alignment, and responsible deployment (e.g., safety systems, model provenance). - **Enterprise expansion**: Growing ChatGPT Enterprise and API offerings for businesses. - **Agentic AI**: Building autonomous agents that can “transform work” (announced June 2026). - **IPO preparation**: Confidential S-1 filing indicates intent to go public, which will require increased financial transparency and governance maturity. ## Why Work Here - **Culture & values**: OpenAI’s stated values include “Humanity first,” “Act with humility,” “Feel the AGI,” and “Ship joy.” Operating principles emphasize agency, creativity, rapid iteration, and intense focus. - **Benefits**: Competitive health insurance, mental healthcare support, 24-week paid birth-parent leave (plus 20 weeks for other parents), generous PTO, annual learning & development stipend, daily meals (breakfast, lunch, dinner), and a domestic conference budget. - **Work environment**: Hybrid/office-based (San Francisco headquarters). The company offers a residency program for researchers and engineers transitioning into AI. - **Impact**: Employees work directly on frontier AI models that shape the industry and society. The mission-driven nature attracts talent passionate about AGI’s societal implications. ## Sources 1. [OpenAI About Page](https://openai.com/about/) 2. [OpenAI Careers Page](https://openai.com/careers/) 3. [OpenAI Job Search](https://openai.com/careers/search) 4. [OpenAI Homepage](https://openai.com/) ## Other roles at OpenAI - [Employer Brand, Communications & Social](https://feeny.ai/job/employer-brand-communications-social-openai-san-francisco-9ra8f1vwqrdp) — San Francisco, CA - [Software Engineer, Infranomics](https://feeny.ai/job/software-engineer-infranomics-openai-san-francisco-sw7fe8ahcx2y) — San Francisco, CA - [Software Engineer, Traffic Infrastructure](https://feeny.ai/job/software-engineer-traffic-infrastructure-openai-san-francisco-kytkdv7hy0vk) — San Francisco, CA - [Network Infrastructure Engineer, Global Network Infra (WAN)](https://feeny.ai/job/network-infrastructure-engineer-global-network-infra-wan-openai-san-francisco-40vms6h89j8k) — San Francisco, CA - [Software Engineer, IP Infrastructure](https://feeny.ai/job/software-engineer-ip-infrastructure-openai-san-francisco-ve9f669v17x5) — San Francisco, CA - [Product Content Creator](https://feeny.ai/job/product-content-creator-openai-san-francisco-6ecefy7eskee) — San Francisco, CA - [Europe Trade Compliance Lead](https://feeny.ai/job/europe-trade-compliance-lead-openai-dublin-vtsjxgt8337v) — Dublin, Ireland - [Incident Commander, Detection & Response - APAC](https://feeny.ai/job/incident-commander-detection-response-apac-openai-australia-xxjjg15j1fx3) — Australia - [BIM Designer & Coordinator](https://feeny.ai/job/bim-designer-coordinator-openai-san-francisco-18mgq3tfmxzs) — San Francisco, CA - [Engineering Manager, Guardian](https://feeny.ai/job/engineering-manager-guardian-openai-london-384fs9y61gad) — London, United Kingdom