Strategic Sourcing - HD/Research Services

About the Role

We are hiring a Human Data & Research Services Strategic Sourcing Manager (Operations & Analytics) to support day-to-day sourcing execution and operational excellence across the category.

Human Data is the large-scale collection and curation of high-quality human-generated inputs—such as annotations, evaluations, and research data—that are essential to training, validating, and improving OpenAI’s models, ensuring they are accurate, safe, and aligned with real-world use cases.

This role is intentionally operational and analytically focused, designed to complement senior strategic leadership driving large, complex, and novel engagements. You will own and execute early to mid-tier supplier engagements, manage sourcing workflows end-to-end, and ensure clean execution across procurement systems and stakeholder touchpoints.

You will be a critical force multiplier — ensuring that deals move quickly, data is accurate, risks are surfaced early, and tooling is used effectively to support scale.

In this role, you will:

Sourcing & Deal Execution

• Own and execute end-to-end sourcing activities for Human Data and Research Services suppliers.

• Support new supplier onboarding, renewals, amendments, and scoped expansions in partnership with senior sourcing leadership.

• Draft, review, and operationalize SOWs, pricing exhibits, and commercial terms in coordination with Legal and Finance.

• Ensure supplier engagements align with category strategy, commercial guardrails, and internal policies.

Operational Excellence

• Act as a primary operator across procurement and contracting tools including Zip, Ironclad, and Slack.

• Manage intake requests, approvals, contract routing, and documentation hygiene with a high degree of accuracy.

• Track deal status, approvals, spend thresholds, and execution risks across a live portfolio of suppliers.

• Maintain clean records and reporting to support audits, leadership updates, and forecasting, and compliance.

Analytics & Insights

• Analyze supplier spend, usage trends, deal velocity, and operational bottlenecks.

• Produce clear summaries and insights for senior stakeholders to inform prioritization and decision-making.

• Identify opportunities to standardize, streamline, or improve sourcing workflows across the category.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Partner closely with Human Data Ops, Research teams, Finance, Legal, Privacy, and Security to unblock deals.

• Serve as a trusted point of contact for internal stakeholders navigating procurement and contracting processes.

• Communicate clearly and concisely via Slack and written updates to keep workstreams moving.

Required Skills & Experience

• 7+ years of experience in strategic sourcing, procurement, operations, or vendor management.

• Demonstrated experience managing multiple concurrent supplier engagements with strong attention to detail.

• High operational fluency with tools such as Zip (or equivalent intake tools), Ironclad (or CLM systems), and Slack.

• Strong analytical skills — comfortable working with spend data, contract terms, and operational metrics.

• Ability to execute independently while partnering effectively with senior stakeholders.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

Nice to Have

• Experience supporting Human Data, Research, AI/ML, or technical services categories.

• Proficient inFamiliarity with SOW-based services, usage-based pricing, or research-driven vendor models.

• Prior experience operating in fast-scaling or ambiguous environments.

• Comfort working alongside senior leadership on sensitive or high-impact initiatives.

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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