Partnerships Operations Lead, OAI for Government

About the team OpenAI’s mission is to ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity. OpenAI for Government helps public-sector institutions use advanced AI responsibly to improve services and advance critical missions. The Partnerships team builds the external ecosystem and internal operating mechanisms required to deliver that work at scale. Role Summary We are seeking a Partnerships Operations Lead to build and run the operating foundation for OpenAI for Government’s Partnerships team. This person will serve as the operational connective tissue across the partner team, working closely with Account Directors, Solutions Architects, Revenue Operations, Deal Desk, and other cross-functional stakeholders to move opportunities from initial engagement through agreement and execution. They will help ensure a smooth handoff to Technical Success across accounts by establishing clear readiness criteria, capturing the right commercial and customer context, and aligning teams on partner roles, commitments, dependencies, and success outcomes. The ideal candidate is a true utility player who combines the relationship instincts of a growth oriented builder with the rigor of an exceptional business operator. They thrive in ambiguity, create processes that do not yet exist, and move fluidly between deal execution, workflow design, analysis, and cross-functional coordination. Key Responsibilities • Own the end-to-end operating cadence for partner-sourced and partner-influenced opportunities, from intake and qualification through approvals, contracting, launch, and expansion. • Build and continuously improve operating processes, standard procedures, stage gates, decision rights, and service expectations that make partner execution faster and more predictable. • Operationalize new and existing government partner motions—including cloud providers, resellers, and sell-through models—by translating requirements that differ from standard commercial motions into clear workflows, enablement, decision rights, and cross-functional handoffs. • Coordinate deal execution across Account Directors, Revenue Operations, Deal Desk, Legal, Finance, Security and Compliance, Product, Technical Success, and partner teams, ensuring every action has a clear owner and timeline. • Establish a consistent handoff from commercial teams to Technical Success by standardizing readiness criteria, account context, use cases, partner responsibilities, commitments, dependencies, and success plans. • Unblock complex deals by surfacing issues early, driving approvals and escalations, managing exceptions, and closing gaps between functions. • Maintain the operational source of truth for contract milestones, partner launches, handoff readiness, dependencies, and risks, with a high bar for process and data quality; coordinate with Revenue Operations to ensure partner context is reflected in pipeline and CRM data. • Own the government-partner operating cadences for deal execution, launch tracking, and business reviews; coordinate with Revenue Operations on pipeline and forecasting inputs and turn the resulting data into concise insights and actions. • Identify and implement workflow, tooling, and automation improvements that reduce cycle time, eliminate recurring friction, and enable the partner team to scale. Qualifications • 7+ years of experience in operations, Revenue Operations, Sales Operations, Deal Desk, go-to-market business operations, or complex program management. • A track record of building operating processes and cross-functional workflows from the ground up in a fast-moving organization. • Experience supporting the end-to-end deal lifecycle in enterprise technology, public sector, or another complex and regulated environment. • Exceptional program-management skills, with the ability to coordinate multiple high-priority workstreams, stakeholders, decisions, and deadlines. • Strong systems and data orientation, including experience with CRM, reporting, workflow, and collaboration tools. • Ability to move between detailed execution and systems-level problem solving without losing speed, accuracy, or accountability. • Excellent written and verbal communication, sound judgment, and the ability to influence cross-functional teams without relying on formal authority. Nice to Have • Experience operating partner, alliance, channel, or co-sell programs in enterprise technology, cloud, or AI. • Familiarity with public-sector procurement, government contracting, and customer implementation or Technical Success handoffs. You might thrive in this role if you: • Are a true utility player. You are comfortable moving between process design, deal problem-solving, analysis, documentation, and hands-on coordination. • Are a builder. You see ambiguity as an invitation to create clear, durable systems that help teams operate better. • Are deal-oriented. You understand what makes complex opportunities move, anticipate bottlenecks, and bring urgency to the critical path. • Are a cross-functional connector. You translate clearly among commercial, operational, legal, financial, and technical stakeholders and keep teams aligned. • Are a systems thinker. You look for root causes, remove recurring friction, and use data and automation to improve how work gets done. • Take ownership with low ego. You are calm under pressure, highly reliable, and willing to do whatever is needed to help the team and its customers succeed. 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. 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