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OpenAI's Site Readiness & Development team is seeking an Economic Development Lead to drive upstream site evaluation and deal formation for the company's AI infrastructure expansion. This role owns the early-stage engagement strategy across a national pipeline of potential sites, beginning work before projects become public and shaping incentive structures, stakeholder relationships, community-benefit commitments, and approval pathways.
Key responsibilities include owning incentive strategy and negotiations with local and state economic-development partners; developing community-benefit commitments tied to project agreements; identifying political, commercial, and approval risks early in the evaluation process; and coordinating across internal functions including Site Selection, Land, Power, Legal, Finance, and Community Engagement. The Economic Development Lead serves as the upstream owner during site evaluation and deal formation, then transitions local relationships and commitments to a dedicated Community Engagement Lead as projects move toward public announcement, while continuing to support agreement-linked commitments and incentive execution.
The ideal candidate brings 8+ years of experience in economic development, public-private partnerships, infrastructure development, government affairs, or related fields. You should have demonstrated success structuring and negotiating incentive packages for large infrastructure, energy, technology, or real estate projects. Strong relationships and judgment across local, state, and regional economic-development stakeholders are essential, as is the ability to connect incentives, community benefits, legal commitments, project economics, and approval risk into coherent strategies. Excellent cross-functional coordination, negotiation, and executive-communication skills are required.
