The opportunity
Hardware Procurement Operations enables OpenAI’s hardware and infrastructure businesses to execute supplier engagements and purchases at speed while maintaining financial discipline, clear ownership, and effective controls.
What you'll do
Drive assigned engagements from intake and agreement execution through: purchasing, ongoing obligations, amendments, renewals, final payments, and closeout.
Assess commercial and operational readiness, identify gaps in scope,: deliverables, acceptance criteria, and payment terms, and drive resolution with the appropriate partners.
Resolve commercial, financial, and operational dependencies, aligning owners: on required reviews and approvals. Represent procurement operations in deal planning and senior stakeholder escalations, presenting clear recommendations on commercial readiness, risks, and execution tradeoffs while respecting each function’s decision authority.
Maintain accurate obligation and purchasing records; coordinate payment: readiness, acceptance evidence, invoice exceptions, and reconciliation with business owners, Treasury, Accounting, and Accounts Payable.
Establish procurement operating standards and influence business, sourcing,: Legal, and Finance partners to adopt practices that improve supplier engagement quality, accelerate execution, and reduce risk. Build the processes, templates, playbooks, and upstream review cycles that make those standards actionable.
Design, implement, and manage workflow automation and AI agents, partnering: with technical teams where needed; own testing, adoption, monitoring, exception handling, and appropriate human review and approval controls.
What they're looking for
- Have independently managed complex procurement engagements through: post-signature execution and closeout, with experience in at least one infrastructure category such as land, leases, power, colocation, or fiber.
- Can distinguish well-structured supplier engagements from those that create: avoidable ambiguity or exposure, recommend practical improvements, and recognize when Legal or Accounting judgment is required.
- Understand contractual obligations, payment structures, and procurement: controls, and can translate them into clear execution plans.
- Can independently prioritize time-sensitive engagements, navigate ambiguity,: and resolve cross-functional dependencies, seeking guidance on complex or consequential decisions. Communicate risks and tradeoffs clearly and influence senior stakeholders without formal authority.
