Manager (Technical Governance Team)

Machine Intelligence Research Institute • Berkeley, CA

1d • $120 - $230 • Onsite

About The Position

We are looking to build a dynamic and versatile team that can quickly produce a large range of research outputs for the technical governance space. Please feel free to fill out this form, or contact us at [email protected]. We focus on researching and designing technical aspects of regulations and policy that could lead to safe AI. The team works on: Inputs into regulations, requests for comments by policy bodies (e.g. NIST/US AISI, EU, UN) Technical research to improve international coordination Limitations of current AI safety proposals and policies Communicating with and consulting for policymakers and governance organizations Our previous publications are available on our website if you would like to read them. See our research agenda for the kinds of future projects we are excited about. We are primarily hiring for researchers but also interested in hiring a manager for the team. In this role, you would manage a team working on the above areas, and have the opportunity to work on these areas directly. See here for the technical governance researcher job ad. This role could involve the following, but we are open to candidates who want to focus on a subset of these responsibilities. In the above work, maintain particular focus on what is needed for solutions to scale to smarter-than-human intelligence and conduct research on which new challenges may emerge at that stage Most of the day-to-day work of the team is a combination of reading, writing, and meetings. Some example activities could include: Threat modeling, working out how AI systems could cause large-scale harm, and hopefully what actions could be taken to prevent this Responding to a US government agency’s Request for Comment Learning about risk management practices in other industries, and applying these to AI Designing and implementing evaluations of AI models, for example to demonstrate failure modes with current policy Preparing and presenting informative briefings to policymakers, such as explaining the basics and current state of AI evaluations Reading a government or AI developer’s AI policy document, and writing a report on its limitations Designing new AI policies and standards which address the limitations of current approaches

Requirements

• Strong background in AI Safety
• Previous experience or familiarity working in (or as) one or more of: Compute governance, Technical knowledge of AI hardware / chips manufacturing and related governance proposals, Policy (including AI policy), Strong AI Safety generalist
• Agency
• Conscientiousness
• Comfort learning on the job
• Generative thinking
• Communication (Internal)
• Communication (External)
• Are broadly aligned with MIRI's values and willing to work toward MIRI’s goals (i.e., the world needs to build an Off Switch for AI ), and the Technical Governance Team’s research directions (e.g., those described in our research agenda )
• Are passionate about MIRI’s mission and excited to support our work in reducing existential risks from AI

Nice To Haves

• Research or engineering focused on frontier AI models or the AI tech stack

Responsibilities

• External stakeholder management, e.g., build and maintain relationships with policy makers and AI company employees (the target audience for much of our work)
• Internal stakeholder management, e.g., interface with the rest of MIRI and ensure our work is consistent with broader MIRI goals, pre-publication review of the team’s outputs
• Project management, e.g., track existing projects, motivate good work toward deadlines
• People management, e.g., run future hiring rounds, fellowships
• Research contributions, e.g., contributing to object level work

Benefits

• Health insurance (the best available plans from Kaiser and Blue Shield) as well as dental and vision coverage.
• “No vacation policy” – staff are encouraged to take vacation when they want/need to in coordination with their manager.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager
• Education Level: No Education Listed