Research Lead - Pre-training Safety

For our client, we are seeking a Research Lead - Pre-training Safety to join the team of a leader in the Education, Government & Non-Profit space. This role will guide a focused research agenda aimed at reducing risks from advanced AI systems, with particular attention to pre-training safety and model evaluation. You will lead ambitious, technically rigorous projects, help shape the organization’s research direction, and contribute to a culture of strong scientific judgment and collaboration.

The position also involves mentoring researchers, building connections between cutting-edge research and practical application, and helping grow a high-impact technical team.

Location:

Remote

Compensation: $290,000 – $450,000 annually

• Articulate a research agenda to mitigate risks from AI systems
• Grow and lead a technical team to pursue the research agenda
• Lead novel research projects with ambiguous progress markers
• Share research findings through publications and presentations
• Mentor junior team members in research and engineering skills
• Contribute to the organization’s intellectual environment and research culture
• Build a research field and connect it to real-world applications

• Strong research track record in AI or a technical field, such as computer science, math, or physics
• Deep experience with language-model pretraining and dataset construction
• Experience building large-scale pipelines for training corpora
• Strong experimental judgment for safety and model evaluations
• Ability to build and debug research systems directly
• Clear research agenda or strong track record with potential to develop one
• Experience leading teams or mentoring early-career researchers

• Remote and in-person work options
• Visa sponsorship for in-person employees
• Catered meals at office locations
• Work-related travel and equipment expenses covered
• Opportunity for a paid work trial during the application process

Our client is an equal opportunity employer. We encourage you to apply even if you don’t meet every qualification—your background could be exactly what this team needs.