Forward Deployed Software Engineer - Gov

About the team

The OpenAI for Government team is a dynamic, mission-driven group leveraging frontier AI to transform how governments achieve their missions. Our team works to empower public servants with secure, compliant AI tools (e.g., ChatGPT Enterprise, ChatGPT Gov) and mission-aligned deployments that meet government technical requirements with strong reliability and safety.

About the role

Forward Deployed Software Engineers (FDSEs) lead complex deployments of frontier models in production. You will embed with our most strategic government and public sector customers—where model performance matters, delivery is urgent, and ambiguity is the default. You’ll map their problems, structure delivery, and ship fast. This includes scoping, sequencing, and building full-stack solutions that create measurable value, while driving clarity across internal and external teams.

You will work directly with defense, intelligence, and federal stakeholders as their technical thought partner, guiding adoption, maximizing mission impact, and ensuring successful deployments at scale. Along the way, you’ll identify reusable patterns, codify best practices, and share field signal that influences OpenAI’s roadmap.

This role is based in Washington DC, Seattle or San Francisco. We use a hybrid work model of 3 days in the office per week. We offer relocation assistance. Travel up to 50% is required, including on-site work with customers.

In this role you will

• Own technical delivery across multiple government deployments, from first prototype to stable production.

• Deeply embed with public sector customers to design and build novel applications powered by OpenAI models.

• Enable successful deployments across customer environments by delivering observable systems spanning infrastructure through applications.

• Prototype and build full-stack systems using Python, JavaScript, or comparable stacks that deliver real mission impact.

• Proactively guide customers on maximizing business and operational value from their applications.

• Forge and manage relationships with customer leadership and stakeholders, ensuring successful deployment and scale.

• Scope work, sequence delivery, and remove blockers early—making trade-offs between scope, speed, and quality.

• Contribute directly in the code when clarity or momentum depends on it.

• Codify working patterns into tools, playbooks, or building blocks others can use.

• Share field feedback with Research and Product to influence model and product development.

• Keep teams moving through clarity, judgment, and consistent follow-through.

You might thrive in this role if you

• Bring 5+ years of engineering or technical deployment experience, ideally in customer-facing or government environments.

• Active TS/SCI clearance or equivalent

• Have scoped and delivered complex systems in fast-moving or ambiguous contexts.

• Write and review production-grade code across frontend and backend, using Python, JavaScript, or similar stacks.

• Are familiar with cloud deployment models (Azure, AWS), Kubernetes, Terraform, and related infrastructure.

• Have experience building or deploying systems powered by LLMs or generative models, and understand how model behavior affects product experience.

• Simplify complexity, make fast, sound decisions under pressure, and communicate clearly across technical and non-technical audiences.

• Spot risks early, adjust without slowing down, and model calm judgment when stakes are high.

• Are humble, collaborative, and eager to help others with empathy.

• Operate with high horsepower, thrive in dynamic environments, and can ruthlessly prioritize across multiple projects.

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.

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.

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