OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced a new senior leadership role at the company recently, inviting applications for a Head of Preparedness with a base pay of $5,55,000 (around Rs 4.94 crore), along with equity. Sharing the details on X, formerly known as Twitter, Altman noted that the role comes with significant pressure, as it involves anticipating risks tied to fast-evolving artificial intelligence (AI) and putting safeguards in place to prevent misuse.
Altman wrote in his post, “We are hiring a Head of Preparedness. This is a critical role at an important time; models are improving quickly and are now capable of many great things, but they are also starting to present some real challenges. The potential impact of models on mental health was something we saw a preview of in 2025; we are just now seeing models get so good at computer security they are beginning to find critical vulnerabilities.”
We are hiring a Head of Preparedness. This is a critical role at an important time; models are improving quickly and are now capable of many great things, but they are also starting to present some real challenges. The potential impact of models on mental health was something we…
— Sam Altman (@sama) December 27, 2025
“Cybersecurity Defenders”
“We have a strong foundation of measuring growing capabilities, but we are entering a world where we need more nuanced understanding and measurement of how those capabilities could be abused, and how we can limit those downsides both in our products and in the world, in a way that lets us all enjoy the tremendous benefits. These questions are hard and there is little precedent; a lot of ideas that sound good have some real edge cases,” he added in his post.
He further said that the position will need the candidate to be expert in the cybersecurity. He said, “If you want to help the world figure out how to enable cybersecurity defenders with cutting edge capabilities while ensuring attackers can’t use them for harm, ideally by making all systems more secure, and similarly for how we release biological capabilities and even gain confidence in the safety of running systems that can self-improve, please consider applying.”
“This will be a stressful job and you’ll jump into the deep end pretty much immediately,” he concluded.
