OpenAI has a dedicated email address where you can send complaints directly to CEO Sam Altman and the management team.
A former employee revealed that OpenAI, known for ChatGPT, has an internal email address called 'friction' that employees can use to report work-related problems directly to management, including CEO Sam Altman and President Greg Brockmann, and request quick resolutions.
The magic email address Sam Altman and OpenAI employees use to instantly kill workplace friction | Fortune
Special OpenAI email is apparently a direct line to Sam Altman | Mashable
https://mashable.com/tech/openai-email-address-is-direct-line-to-sam-altman
According to a former OpenAI employee who spoke to Fortune, 'friction' had existed within OpenAI for some time, but it only began to gain traction in the fall of 2025 when Fiji Simo joined as CEO of the Applications division. Simo spent the first three months of his tenure conducting a 'hearing tour' to understand the company's problems and potential solutions. As a result, concerns about 'acting quickly' as the company grew became a topic of discussion.
Simo told Fortune, 'Companies rarely become bureaucratic overnight. It's caused by a buildup of unnecessary meetings, extra approvals, and small frustrations. Each of these only improves work efficiency by 1-2%, so they're easy to overlook, but these frictions accumulate.' So Simo tightened the process for email addresses, calling it 'friction.'
Mr. Simo entrusted Irina Kofman, Vice President of Strategic Initiatives and Operations, with thoroughly monitoring and resolving issues in the 'friction' inbox. He also initiated monthly company-wide Slack updates to track progress.
One specific example is a complaint about the parking lot being overcrowded, prompting OpenAI to test a program that prioritizes parking spaces for long-distance commuters. Additionally, employees have called for a better process for reliably and scalably awarding API credits, and management has reportedly worked to resolve this issue. While Mr. Simo left OpenAI in early July 2026, former employees have revealed that the 'friction' process continues.
A former employee described the 'friction' process as follows: 'This process helps the team keep moving forward and resolve problems before they escalate. Literally anyone can complain directly to Sam about the silliness of the big company, and Sam can take action on it. If you want to ruthlessly eliminate bureaucracy, you have to do it ruthlessly.'
On the other hand, a former employee who previously served as a team leader at OpenAI points out that “friction” emails often disrupted work and created inefficiencies. The former employee stated, “The person reporting the problem may think it’s the most important thing, but for a team like mine, which is constantly struggling with finances, lacking resources, and burdened with excessive workloads, it was the most disruptive thing.”
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