OpenAI’s chief futurist, Joshua Achiam, notified colleagues on Tuesday that he is leaving the company later this month, according to WIRED. Achiam, who previously led the “mission alignment team” tasked with upholding OpenAI’s nonprofit mission, told staff that his departure was not motivated by any specific reason but was something he had been considering for a while.
“The world is in on the secret now and it feels possible to work on the mission from outside the walls of a frontier lab,” Achiam said in a note to staff obtained by WIRED. “I believe we can get to a world of peace, unprecedented prosperity, and unimaginable possibilities, social and scientific. Whatever I do next, I will continue to work with you on making this vision real.”
Achiam’s Role and Departure
Achiam’s role as chief futurist sat at the intersection of OpenAI’s AI safety and policy teams, involving the study of potential harms and benefits from AI. He worked with senior leaders, including Global Affairs Chief Chris Lehane, to advocate for government regulations aligned with OpenAI’s mission: ensuring AGI benefits all of humanity. OpenAI has not yet announced if anyone will fill the position.
Since joining OpenAI as an intern in 2017, Achiam became a research scientist focused on AI safety. He was known internally as a stalwart defender of the company’s safety-focused mission, but was also controversial for occasional criticisms of the broader AI safety community.
Earlier this year, he testified in federal court that he interrupted Elon Musk’s parting speech when Musk left OpenAI in 2018, remarking that Musk’s plan to develop AGI at Tesla could come at the expense of safety. According to WIRED, Musk responded by calling Achiam a “jackass,” a moment that Dario Amodei (now CEO of Anthropic) and David Luan (who became head of Amazon’s AGI lab) commemorated by gifting Achiam a statue of a golden donkey’s rear-end inscribed with “Never stop being a jackass for safety.”
Reorganization and Safety Leadership Exodus
OpenAI has reorganized its safety, product, and research teams numerous times since ChatGPT launched in 2022, after which the company grew rapidly from a small research lab into a massive tech company. In 2024, OpenAI announced the formation of a “mission alignment team” led by Achiam, but disbanded the group in February and assigned him the new role of chief futurist.
In the last year, OpenAI worked to bridge the gap between its AI research and policy teams to develop rules and standards anticipating where its technology is headed. Researchers including Boaz Barak, Noam Brown, and Adrien Ecoffet say they have become more involved in policy work under this closer collaboration.
Former White House AI adviser Dean Ball started at OpenAI this week as the company's head of strategic futures and will briefly overlap with Achiam. Ball is also expected to work with researchers and policy leaders.
Achiam is the latest safety-focused leader to depart, joining a growing list of exits as the company prepares to go public. Key departures include:
| Name | Previous Role | Destination |
|---|---|---|
| Jan Leike | Co-led Superalignment team | Joined Anthropic in 2024 |
| Miles Brundage | Head of policy research | Founded nonprofit advocating for strong safety standards |
| Steven Adler | Led research on dangerous AI capabilities | Co-founded nonprofit with Brundage |
| Andrea Vallone | Led research on ChatGPT mental health responses | Joined Anthropic end of 2025 |
These departures underscore the ongoing personnel shifts at OpenAI as the company balances its safety mission with commercial growth and an impending public offering.
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