Member of Technical Staff, Research

NOTE: If you previously applied to one of our Research Engineer/Scientist, Machine Learning Research Engineer/Scientist, or Research Stream Lead roles, you do not need to apply again. We are merging all inbound applications for researcher roles into this one.

About METR

We are a nonprofit research organization that develops scientific methods to assess AI capabilities, risks and mitigations, with a specific focus on threats related to autonomy, AI R&D automation, and alignment.

We believe it is robustly good for civilization to have a clearer understanding of what dangers AI systems pose, and we are extremely excited to find ambitious, excellent people to join our team and tackle one of the most important challenges of our time.

*We evaluate candidates primarily through work tests. We usually do an in-person trial as well but can be flexible about this. *

What We're Looking For

METR currently has 3 primary research streams:

• Capabilities: Accurately measuring frontier model performance on threat-relevant tasks (autonomy, AI R&D automation, etc.) and predicting future capabilities. We develop and maintain benchmarks, diverse evidence-gathering methods, and metrics to track capability trends and anticipate the thresholds that matter most for safety.

• Monitorability: Understanding how well frontier models can take subversive or unwanted actions despite various monitoring or control protocols. We build the research infrastructure – novel metrics, control evaluations, elicitation methods – needed to improve the world's understanding of how effectively current and future models can circumvent oversight.

• Alignment/Propensity: Determining whether or not a model that is capable of causing catastrophic harm (in its actual deployment setting) would be likely to actually do so in a given high-stakes deployment setting. We aim to develop the science of propensity evaluations and examine when we might expect high-stakes catastrophic misalignment.

The Capabilities and Monitorability streams are both hiring Research ICs (individual contributors), while the Alignment/Propensity stream is hiring for a Research Stream Lead, followed by Research ICs down the line. The stream you end up joining will be based on a combination of working fit and interest.

For our Research IC roles, we are looking for a combination of skills across “research science”, “research execution” and software engineering. You may not have all of these skills (for example, we don’t expect software engineering to be a large part of the role for narrowly focused researchers). For the Research Stream Lead role, we are additionally looking for research management skills.

NOTE: If you previously applied to one of our Research Engineer/Scientist, Machine Learning Research Engineer/Scientist, or Research Stream Lead roles, you do not need to apply again. We are merging all inbound applications for researcher roles into this one.

About METR

We are a nonprofit research organization that develops scientific methods to assess AI capabilities, risks and mitigations, with a specific focus on threats related to autonomy, AI R&D automation, and alignment.

We believe it is robustly good for civilization to have a clearer understanding of what dangers AI systems pose, and we are extremely excited to find ambitious, excellent people to join our team and tackle one of the most important challenges of our time.

*We evaluate candidates primarily through work tests. We usually do an in-person trial as well but can be flexible about this. *

What We're Looking For

METR currently has 3 primary research streams:

• Capabilities: Accurately measuring frontier model performance on threat-relevant tasks (autonomy, AI R&D automation, etc.) and predicting future capabilities. We develop and maintain benchmarks, diverse evidence-gathering methods, and metrics to track capability trends and anticipate the thresholds that matter most for safety.

• Monitorability: Understanding how well frontier models can take subversive or unwanted actions despite various monitoring or control protocols. We build the research infrastructure – novel metrics, control evaluations, elicitation methods – needed to improve the world's understanding of how effectively current and future models can circumvent oversight.

• Alignment/Propensity: Determining whether or not a model that is capable of causing catastrophic harm (in its actual deployment setting) would be likely to actually do so in a given high-stakes deployment setting. We aim to develop the science of propensity evaluations and examine when we might expect high-stakes catastrophic misalignment.

The Capabilities and Monitorability streams are both hiring Research ICs (individual contributors), while the Alignment/Propensity stream is hiring for a Research Stream Lead, followed by Research ICs down the line. The stream you end up joining will be based on a combination of working fit and interest.

For our Research IC roles, we are looking for a combination of skills across “research science”, “research execution” and software engineering. You may not have all of these skills (for example, we don’t expect software engineering to be a large part of the role for narrowly focused researchers). For the Research Stream Lead role, we are additionally looking for research management skills.

Requirements

Our Culture

METR is a mission-driven organization. We believe our work can meaningfully shape humanity's future for the better, and we want to be the best people in the world doing this work. We have a tight-knit, collaborative research culture rooted in truth-seeking and integrity. We're fiercely committed to producing high-quality, trustworthy science. We're honest and transparent about our results, especially when they may go against the grain. We've earned trust as reliable partners who handle confidential information with care. We maintain a low-ego, drama-free environment focused on what matters.

Hybrid Requirements: Our technical team members are in our office in Berkeley 3-5 days/week. Please let us know in your application if this is a constraint. If you lack US work authorization and would like to work in-person (strongly preferred), we can likely sponsor a cap-exempt H-1B visa for this role.

We encourage you to apply even if your background may not seem like the perfect fit! We would rather review a larger pool of applications than risk missing out on a promising candidate for the position.

We are committed to diversity and equal opportunity in all aspects of our hiring process. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We welcome and encourage all qualified candidates to apply for our open positions.