Account Director, Federal Partnerships (Defense)

The role

You will own a portfolio of emerging defense technology accounts and lead account and deal strategy. You will work with technical teams to turn customer needs into deployed capabilities.

What you will do

• Lead account strategy and commercial execution for emerging defense technology portfolio.
• Support the broader partnerships team on larger strategic relationships.
• Work with solutions and engineering teams to move customers from AI evaluation to deployment.
• Maintain accurate pipeline, consumption forecasts, and clear next steps.
• Build trusted executive and technical relationships.
• Anticipate customer needs and bring insights into product and partnership decisions.
• Coordinate across OpenAI to advance deals and deliver on customer commitments.

Required qualifications

• 8+ years of combined relevant experience across government, military service, defense technology, or PaaS/SaaS businesses.
• At least 2 years in private-sector, customer-facing roles.
• Proven private-sector results with clear examples of business or customer outcomes.
• Strong business acumen and strategic judgment.
• Ability to take initiative, set priorities, and deliver results amid ambiguity.
• Polished, clear communication and experience working with senior executives.
• Hands-on experience applying AI tools to practical problems.
• Strong understanding of APIs and workflow integration.
• Ability to engage engineering teams credibly.
• Initiative, urgency, and coachability.

Nice to have

• Military service and/or defense technology experience are valued.

Benefits

• Relocation assistance

About the company

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity.