Deployment Lead, Financial Services - New York City

Details

OpenAI’s Forward Deployed Engineering team partners with customers to turn research breakthroughs into production systems, operating at the intersection of customer delivery and core platform development.

The role focuses on defining how complex systems are delivered to Financial Services customers, including banks, asset managers, and private capital investors. The Deployment Lead translates business outcomes into technical plans, coordinates execution across Forward Deployed Engineers, Researchers, Customer Engineers, Product, Research, and customer teams, and drives deployments from initial prototypes through MVP and scale.

The role is based in New York City and follows a hybrid work model requiring three days per week in the office. Travel of up to 50% is required, including frequent onsite customer engagement.

Responsibilities

• Own technical delivery plans for multiple interdependent workstreams, translating business objectives into roadmaps with milestones, dependencies, and acceptance criteria.
• Run day-to-day engineering execution across OpenAI and customer teams, removing blockers, sequencing work, and making scope and priority trade-offs.
• Embed with customer teams to deliver production deployments and drive adoption.
• Map customer workflows, shape tools and integrations, translate requirements into delivery plans, and lead onboarding, adoption, and change management.
• Partner with Product and Research to ensure platform components and research workstreams support deployment goals.
• Codify solution patterns and evaluations, extract reusable patterns, and package field insights to improve products and models.
• Own value cases and return on investment by setting impact hypotheses, baselines, and key performance indicators; conduct pre- and post-deployment measurement and report to executive sponsors.
• Shape OpenAI’s engagement model for Financial Services customers.
• Track progress, manage dependencies, make sequencing decisions, and drive deployments from prototypes through minimum viable products and scaled systems.
• Share field insights with Product and Research to guide roadmaps and priorities.

Requirements

• 7+ years of customer-facing technical delivery leadership experience.
• Expertise in the Financial Services industry.
• A track record of leading large, complex, high-stakes customer engagements requiring close coordination and rapid decision-making, ideally involving AI.
• Ability to operate effectively in high-ambiguity environments and simplify complex, dynamic work.
• Ability to move between system-level understanding and execution-level detail, including analyzing customer workflows and data, mapping constraints, sketching architectures, and moving ambiguous problems to shipped systems.
• Strategic thinking and pattern recognition, with the ability to connect customer needs to scalable, reusable solutions.
• Strong technical fluency and sequencing judgment, including the ability to discuss technical details, pressure-test architectures, and make trade-offs.
• Experience shipping AI and large language model systems, with an understanding of solution patterns, integration fundamentals, and production pitfalls.
• Strong communication and executive presence, including the ability to explain complex technical trade-offs to business leaders and translate strategy into technical execution.
• Willingness to work onsite with customers, often 25–50% and sometimes more.

Benefits

• Base salary of $230,000–$294,000 per year.
• Equity and performance-related bonuses may be available.
• Medical, dental, and vision insurance, with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts.
• Flexible spending and commuter accounts.
• 401(k) retirement plan with employer match.
• Paid parental, medical, caregiver, sick, and safe leave.
• Paid time off and company holidays.
• Mental health and wellness support.
• Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage.
• Annual learning and development stipend.
• Office meals and eligible meal delivery credits.
• Relocation support for eligible employees.
• Additional benefits may include charitable donation matching and wellness stipends.