About the team

GovAI was founded to help humanity navigate the transition to a world with advanced AI. To succeed with that mission, we need an excellent operations team supporting our programmes and our people. We are looking for someone to shape and lead that team.

Our researchers have provided knowledge and assistance to decision makers in government, industry, and civil society. Our alumni have gone on to policy roles in government; top AI labs, including Google DeepMind, OpenAI, and Anthropic; and think-tanks such as the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Center for Security and Emerging Technology, and the Tony Blair Institute. Our initial research agenda, published in 2018, helped define and shape the nascent field of AI governance. Our research developing the framework of “cooperative AI" led to the creation of a $15 million philanthropic foundation. We made significant early contributions to the ongoing public discussions over the security implications of AI.

Our researchers have published in leading journals and conferences, including Science and NeurIPS. We have published commentary in venues such as War on the Rocks, The Washington Post, and Lawfare. Our work has also been covered by publications such as The New York Times, MIT Technology Review, and the BBC.

Our staff are based across the United Kingdom, United States, and European Union.

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Why you might be interested in this role

• You'll help GovAI get more done at any given size.
  
  • The smoother our day-to-day operations run, the more time staff spend on the mission: more research published, more stakeholders advised, more people shepherded through our fellowships and other programs. Onboarding that just works, payroll that runs without a hitch, and quick, accurate answers to staff questions are what make that possible, and they'll be your work.‍

• ‍You'll see your work land.
  
  • You'll watch new staff move through onboarding you run, see requests resolved because of systems you keep tight, and get direct feedback from colleagues on what's working and what to improve.‍

• ‍You'll own the executional layer, and improve it.
  
  • Beyond running the fundamentals, you'll take on projects to make the systems better: improving how staff find and use our policies, tightening our ops tooling, and proposing changes from what you see day to day.

• You'll have a clear path to grow.
  
  • This role is a strong foundation for a people ops career. You'll see the function change as GovAI scales, which sets you up to work in organisations of very different sizes. With the build-out happening in flight, you can be on track toward a Specialist role by the end of your first year.

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Role description

You'll execute people operations from onboarding through ongoing staff support to offboarding, making sure staff have an excellent experience and that compliance requirements are met. You'll report to the People Ops Manager and work closely with the rest of the team.

A lot is in motion right now: we're scaling quickly, and we have staff in the US, UK, and other countries. As the first point of contact for everyday people ops questions, you'll keep the day-to-day running so the Manager can focus on improving the function, and you'll feed your own ideas for improvement back in.

Your responsibilities will include:

• Running onboarding and offboarding.
  
  • You'll execute onboarding for new staff, visiting researchers, and contractors, so they have what they need and know how to navigate GovAI. You'll handle offboarding so transitions are smooth.

• Running payroll, reimbursements, and routine workflows.
  
  • You'll support the running of UK payroll, process reimbursements on schedule, and keep other routine people ops work moving.

• Being the first point of contact for staff.
  
  • You'll answer questions about benefits, policies, and HR processes promptly and helpfully. Staff get an actual answer, not a policy quote, and when the answer is "no" you offer an explanation and an alternative where one exists.

• Keeping records and contracts in order.
  
  • You'll keep HR records accurate across our systems, and manage relationships and contracts with external providers and contractors.

• Improving the systems.
  
  • You'll spot pain points, propose solutions, and help build improvements, from documentation and templates to the tools the team relies on.

In your first year, we'd expect that you:

• Answer day-to-day requests accurately and within one to two business days, with genuine answers and alternatives rather than policy quotes.

• Run onboarding and offboarding on time, so new hires get into our systems, accounts, payroll, and benefits without staff-visible glitches, and onboarding feedback stays positive.

• Support clean monthly payroll across our UK and US entities and pre- and post-payroll checks.

• Develop expertise across our stack, become familiar with our policies, and escalate edge-cases to the Manager where appropriate

• Handle sensitive personnel, payroll, and salary information with discretion, keeping accurate records of changes and adjustments.

• Deliver at least two projects that improve our systems, for example tightening our ops ticketing or building a "Wellbeing Hub" that brings GovAI's wellbeing resources into one easy-to-use place.

• Get up to speed on our systems (Rippling, Justworks, Slack, Asana) and start suggesting how to get more out of them.

• Be on a clear development path, on track toward a Specialist role if that's what you want.

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Selection criteria

We're selecting candidates who:

• Are driven to reduce friction and enable GovAI to do more. You treat people operations as enabling, not gatekeeping, and your instinct is to make things lighter.

• Have strong attention to detail across all parts of people operations.

• Are energised by structured, executional work, and find satisfaction in getting things done consistently and well.

• Have reliable follow-through: things get done, on time, without chasing.

• Handle sensitive personnel, salary, and performance information with discretion and judgement.

• Communicate clearly and kindly with staff in writing and in person: helpful, info-dense, no jargon walls.

• Are comfortable picking up our HR systems and using tools to make the work faster. We don't expect prior familiarity with our specific stack.

• Have some familiarity with UK employment norms, or can come up to speed quickly. We don't expect deep expertise on day one and would consider exceptional candidates with only adjacent experience.

• Are excited to use their career to positively influence the lasting impact of AI, in line with our mission.

Some profiles that might be an especially good fit for this role include:

• Someone in an operations, people ops, or HR coordination role at a research organisation, nonprofit, or startup, who is strong on execution and detail.

• Someone early in their career looking to build a people ops specialism at a high-impact organisation.

• Someone from an adjacent high-coordination role (events, recruiting coordination, executive assistance, or office management) who is strong on execution and wants to specialise in people ops.

• Someone returning to work or changing fields who has a track record of running things reliably and is excited to go deep on people operations.

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Salary and location

This position is full-time. We have offices in London, UK, and Washington, DC, and we strongly prefer team members to be in-office, but are open to exceptional candidates who would need to work remotely. We are able to sponsor visas in the UK and the US and can support relocation.

The People Ops Associate will be compensated in line with our salary principles. The salary for this role will depend on the successful applicant's experience and location, but we expect the range to be between £66,000 ($88,000) and £77,000 ($103,000) if based in London. In rare cases where salary considerations would prevent a candidate from accepting an offer, there may also be some flexibility in compensation.

We also offer competitive benefits, including a 10% pension/401k contribution and private medical cover.

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How to apply and what to expect

Application process

The selection process has the following stages:

1. Written application
2. A paid remote work test
3. A short series of interviews and reference checks
4. Potentially, a one-day in-person work trial

Special circumstances

Please contact recruitment@governance.ai if you:

• Need a decision communicated by a particular date

• Require assistance with the application due to a disability

• Have questions about the application process

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Addressing complex AI governance challenges requires many different skillsets and perspectives. We welcome applicants from a wide range of backgrounds. If our mission excites you, we encourage you to apply, even if your experience doesn't align perfectly with every qualification listed. Your combination of experience and motivation might be exactly what we're looking for.

As part of our commitment to research security and compliance, GovAI may be required to conduct screening checks on shortlisted candidates. This may include sanctions and watchlist screening using publicly available information. Further details are set out in our Privacy Policy.