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Forward Deployed Engineer (FDE), Legal-SF

OpenAI· Forward Deployed Engineering
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Hybrid (New York City)$185k - $300k + equityFull-timePosted 1mo ago

About the role

Forward Deployed Engineer to build and deploy AI systems for legal work, embedding with customers to identify first use cases, prototype solutions, and drive production adoption at OpenAI.

Responsibilities

  • Embed with law firms and legal teams to understand their workflows, identify high-value opportunities, and select the right initial use cases to prove value.
  • Build full-stack systems that deliver customer value and sharpen how we learn
  • Embed closely with customer teams, understand their needs, and guide adoption of what you build
  • Make trade-offs between scope, speed, and quality; adjust plans to protect delivery
  • Contribute directly in the code when progress or clarity depends on it
  • Codify working patterns into tools, playbooks, or building blocks that others can use
  • Share field feedback that helps Research and Product understand where the models succeed and where they can improve

Qualifications

  • Bring 5+ years of software engineering, ML engineering, or technical deployment experience with customer-facing ownership in financial services or adjacent regulated industries.
  • Have experience with legal technology, legal services, compliance-heavy workflows, or professional services; this is helpful but not required.
  • Have owned complex AI or data-driven systems end-to-end, from scoping through production adoption, in environments where errors carry real financial or regulatory consequences.
  • Write and review production-grade code across backend and frontend systems using Python, JavaScript, or comparable stacks.
  • Have deployed systems powered by LLMs or generative models and understand how model behavior, evaluation, and guardrails affect user trust and business outcomes.
  • Communicate clearly across engineering, product, risk, compliance, and executive stakeholders, translating technical trade-offs into decision quality and risk posture.
  • Apply systems thinking with high execution standards, turning incidents, escalations, and failures into improved operating standards and repeatable deployment patterns.
  • Stay calm and decisive when delivery is urgent, ambiguous, and high-stakes.

Skills

Required:Software engineeringML engineering / AI deploymentFull-stack development

Benefits

  • Medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family, with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts
  • Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses (parking and transit)
  • 401(k) retirement plan with employer match
  • Paid parental leave (up to 24 weeks for birth parents and 20 weeks for non-birthing parents), plus paid medical and caregiver leave (up to 8 weeks)
  • Paid time off: flexible PTO for exempt employees and up to 15 days annually for non-exempt employees
  • 13+ paid company holidays, and multiple paid coordinated company office closures throughout the year for focus and recharge, plus paid sick or safe time
  • Mental health and wellness support
  • Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage
  • Annual learning and development stipend
  • Daily meals in our offices, and meal delivery credits as eligible
  • Relocation support for eligible employees
  • Additional taxable fringe benefits, such as charitable donation matching and wellness stipends
Last updated Sep 3, 2026. Interested? Apply on the company site.

About OpenAI

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