Director of Accounting Operations

About the Team

OpenAI Finance is responsible for ensuring the organization is set up for success in pursuit of its mission to ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity.

About the Role

We are seeking a strategic, hands-on Director of Accounting Operations to lead and scale our core accounting processes as we continue our rapid growth. This role will oversee day-to-day accounting operations, ensure strong internal controls, and drive process excellence across the organization. You will partner cross-functionally with Strategic Finance, Tax, Legal, and Finance Systems teams to ensure accurate, timely, and compliant financial reporting while continuously improving efficiency.

You will report to the Assistant Controller and manage a high velocity, high growth GL team. You will be a key player in driving the financial success of the organization by building and sustaining a world-class finance team.

This role is based in San Francisco, CA. We use a hybrid work model of 3 days in the office per week and offer relocation assistance to new employees.

In this role, you will:

• Lead global accounting operations across GL, payroll accounting, leases, equity, fixed assets, and intercompany consolidation.

• Oversee monthly, quarterly, and annual close in compliance with U.S. GAAP, while driving process excellence and efficiency.

• Design and implement internal controls, compliance frameworks, and master data governance.

• Build and maintain scalable accounting processes to support new and existing research and product initiatives, partnering cross-functionally to manage risk.

• Identify opportunities to automate manual processes, including leveraging AI and system enhancements to streamline accounting and reporting.

• Manage key relationships with auditors, outsourced accountants, and strategic partners.

• Mentor and develop a high-performing, high growth team, fostering career growth and team engagement.

You might thrive in this role if you have:

• 15+ years of progressive experience in senior accounting leadership roles at some combination of public companies, late-stage startups, and / or public accounting firms.

• End‑to‑end experience managing core operations (GL, payroll, leases, equity, fixed assets, intercompany) and close cycles (monthly, quarterly, annual).

• A strong ability to design and scale internal controls, compliance, and master data governance while driving automation (including AI) to eliminate manual work.

• Exceptional project management skills to prioritize and deliver on multiple high-impact initiatives on concurrent timelines.

• A track record of mentoring and developing high-performing teams while building scalable accounting organizations.

• Exemplary interpersonal, verbal, and written communication skills as demonstrated by the ability to simplify complex concepts across multiple audiences.

• At least a Bachelor’s degree with a CPA/CA and a deep understanding of U.S. GAAP and financial reporting requirements for various types of legal entities.

• Experience with Oracle Fusion or comparable ERP platforms, with the ability to optimize system configurations and integrations (strongly preferred).

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.

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with applicable law, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act. 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.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities, and requests can be made via this link.

OpenAI Global Applicant Privacy Policy

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.