Account Director, Retail

About the team

OpenAI’s mission is to build safe artificial general intelligence (AGI) which benefits all of humanity. This long-term undertaking brings the world’s best scientists, engineers, and business professionals into one lab together to accomplish this.

In pursuit of this mission, our Go To Market (GTM) team is responsible for helping customers learn how to leverage and deploy our highly capable AI products across their business. The team is made of Sales, Solutions, Support, Marketing, and Partnership professionals that work together to create valuable solutions that will help bring AI to as many users as possible.

About the role

As an Account Director focused on Retail, you will own executive-level relationships with leading retail organizations, including global brands, e-commerce platforms, and consumer goods companies. You’ll help these companies safely and effectively deploy OpenAI’s technology to transform customer experience, optimize supply chains, enhance merchandising strategies, and personalize consumer engagement.

This role blends market literacy, technical depth, business acumen, and relationship-driven enterprise sales. You will collaborate closely with researchers, engineers, and retail-focused solution strategists to design secure, compliant, and high-impact AI deployments.

This role is based in San Francisco. We use a hybrid work model of three days in the office per week and offer relocation assistance to new employees.

In this role, you’ll:

• Manage a focused portfolio of retail accounts, developing and executing on long-term strategic account plans

• Lead complex, multi-stakeholder sales cycles spanning merchandising, operations, marketing, and commercial functions

• Partner with solutions and research engineering to design pilots that demonstrate measurable business and customer impact

• Collaborate with compliance, privacy, and security teams to ensure responsible deployment of AI in regulated environments

• Own a revenue and consumption target; manage forecasts and pipeline reporting

• Monitor industry and regulatory trends (e. FTC, consumer protection, etc.) to guide customer and product strategy

• Represent OpenAI at industry conferences and thought-leadership events (e.g., NRF, Shoptalk)

• Partner cross-functionally with marketing, partnerships, and communications to build the Retail go-to-market motion

We’re seeking someone with experience including:

• 14+ years selling complex enterprise software or platform-as-a-service solutions

• 4+ years selling to retail or consumer goods customers

• Experience managing C-suite relationships across merchandising, IT, marketing, and commercial teams

• Strong understanding of retail and consumer goods workflows (e.g., inventory management, customer analytics, e-commerce operations, marketing campaigns)

• Familiarity with data privacy, compliance (PCI DSS, GDPR), and security considerations in retail

• Demonstrated ability to design and execute complex deal and partnership strategies

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Are customer-centric and can translate complex market and business needs into transformative AI solutions

• Are passionate about advancing consumer experiences through the safe and ethical use of AI

• Are a builder who enjoys designing scalable systems and repeatable sales motions from the ground up

• Are a strategist who anticipates industry shifts and guides enterprise customers through them

• Are energized by ambiguity and motivated to create structure and clarity across complex, cross-functional engagements

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and