According to Business Insider, OpenAI is recruiting for a new Head of Preparedness, a role that pays a $555,000 base salary plus equity. CEO Sam Altman has publicly described the position as “stressful,” saying the hire will “jump into the deep end pretty much immediately.” The job posting, which doesn’t require a college degree, seeks someone with deep technical expertise in AI safety and security who can make high-stakes judgments. The role opened up after the previous head, Aleksander Madry, moved to a new position within the company in July 2024. Some experts, like University of Waterloo professor Maura Grossman, call it “close to an impossible job” because it involves balancing safety with Altman’s fast-paced product release schedule, which this year included Sora 2 and new AI models.
The impossible balancing act
Here’s the thing: this job is set up for an epic internal clash. The core mandate is preparedness and safety, but the company’s entire engine, driven by Altman, is built on breakneck speed and shipping products. So you’re literally being paid half a million dollars to be the person who regularly says, “No, Sam, we can’t do that yet.” Professor Maura Grossman’s analogy of “rolling a rock up a steep hill” is painfully accurate. And it’s not just theoretical. We’ve already seen this tension play out, with early safety team members, including a former head, resigning. This new hire isn’t just filling a vacancy on the Safety Systems team; they’re walking into a pre-defined culture war.
The profile of a corporate diplomat
So who would even take this? The academic background of the previous head, Aleksander Madry, makes sense for pure safety rigor. But as Toronto Metropolitan University’s Richard Lachman suggests, OpenAI probably now wants a “seasoned tech-industry executive.” Basically, they need a corporate diplomat. Someone who understands risk but also understands business growth, PR, and how to say “not yet” in a way that doesn’t halt progress. Lachman calls it someone who’s “on brand.” That’s a fancy way of saying they need a safety czar who can protect the company’s public image—especially after lawsuits and acknowledgments about ChatGPT and mental health—without being seen as the enemy of innovation internally. It’s a wild tightrope to walk.
Why the stakes are unusually high
This isn’t just another tech exec job. The stakes are genuinely different. OpenAI’s models are already woven into daily life for millions, and the potential risks scale with the capabilities. The company is already working on improving responses in sensitive mental health conversations. But the Head of Preparedness has to think about catastrophic risks far beyond that—think model autonomy, security breaches, or unforeseen harmful behaviors. Making “clear, high-stakes technical judgments under uncertainty,” as the job post says, is one thing when you’re optimizing ad clicks. It’s another when the product in question is a rapidly advancing AI. Can one person, even a well-paid one, realistically hold that line against commercial pressure? I’m skeptical.
A symbolic role more than a practical one?
Look, part of me wonders if this hire is as much about optics as it is about operational safety. Filling this role with a credible name lets OpenAI say, “See? We’re taking this seriously.” It reassures regulators, partners, and a nervous public. But the real test won’t be the hiring announcement; it’ll be the first time this new head and Sam Altman have a fundamental disagreement over a product launch. Will the safety apparatus have real veto power? Or is this ultimately a persuasive role, where the head can only advise and warn? The $555,000 salary is competitive, but it’s also a signal. It says they value the function. Now we have to wait and see if they’ll truly value the *function* of the function—which is, sometimes, to stop the show.
