Lenny's Podcast

Inside OpenAI | Logan Kilpatrick (head of developer relations)

Logan Kilpatrick leads developer relations at OpenAI, supporting developers building with the OpenAI API and ChatGPT. He is also on the board of directors at NumFOCUS, the nonprofit organization that supports open source projects like Jupyter, Pandas, NumPy, and more. Before OpenAI, Logan was a machine-learning engineer at Apple and advised NASA on open source policy. In our conversation, we discuss: • OpenAI’s fast-paced and innovative work environment • The value of high agency and high urgency in your employees • Tips for writing better ChatGPT prompts • How the GPT Store is doing • OpenAI’s planning process and decision-making criteria • Where OpenAI is heading in the next few years • Insight into OpenAI’s B2B offerings • Why Logan “measures in hundreds” — Brought to you by: • Hex—Helping teams ask and answer data questions by working together: https://www.hex.tech/lenny • Whimsical—The iterative product workspace: https://whimsical.com/lenny • Arcade Software—Create effortlessly beautiful demos in minutes: https://arcade.software/lenny Find the transcript and references at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/inside-openai-logan-kilpatrick-head Where to find Logan Kilpatrick: • X: https://twitter.com/OfficialLoganK • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/logankilpatrick/ • Website: https://logank.ai/ Where to find Lenny: • Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com • X: https://twitter.com/lennysan • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/ In this episode, we cover: (00:00) Logan’s background (03:49) The impact of recent events on OpenAI’s team and culture (08:20) Exciting developments in AI interfaces (09:52) Using OpenAI tools to make companies more efficient (13:04) Examples of using AI effectively (18:35) Prompt engineering (22:12) How to write better prompts (26:05) The launch of GPTs and the OpenAI Store (32:10) The importance of high agency and urgency (34:35) OpenAI’s ability to move fast and ship high-quality products (35:56) OpenAI’s planning process and decision-making criteria (40:22) The importance of real-time communication (42:33) OpenAI’s team and growth (44:47) Future developments at OpenAI (47:42) GPT-5 and building toward the future (50:38) OpenAI’s enterprise offering and the value of sharing custom applications (52:30) New updates and features from OpenAI (55:09) How to leverage OpenAI’s technology in products (58:26) Encouragement for building with AI (59:30) Lightning round Referenced: • OpenAI: https://openai.com/ • Sam Altman on X: https://twitter.com/sama • Greg Brockman on X: https://twitter.com/gdb • tldraw: https://www.tldraw.com/ • Harvey: https://www.harvey.ai/ • Boost Your Productivity with Generative AI: https://hbr.org/2023/06/boost-your-productivity-with-generative-ai • Research: quantifying GitHub Copilot’s impact on developer productivity and happiness: https://github.blog/2022-09-07-research-quantifying-github-copilots-impact-on-developer-productivity-and-happiness/ • Lesson learnt from the DPD AI Chatbot swearing blunder: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/lesson-learnt-from-dpd-ai-chatbot-swearing-blunder-kitty-sz57e/ • Dennis Yang on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dennisyang/ • Tim Ferriss’s blog: https://tim.blog/ • Tyler Cowen on X: https://twitter.com/tylercowen • Tom Cruise on X: https://twitter.com/TomCruise • Canva: https://www.canva.com/ • Zapier: https://zapier.com/ • Siqi Chen on X: https://twitter.com/blader • Runway: https://runway.com/ • Universal Primer: https://chat.openai.com/g/g-GbLbctpPz-universal-primer • “I didn’t expect ChatGPT to get so good” | Unconfuse Me with Bill Gates: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-Ymdc6EdKw • Microsoft Azure: https://azure.microsoft.com/ • Lennybot: https://www.lennybot.com/ • Visual Electric: https://visualelectric.com/ • DALL-E: https://openai.com/research/dall-e • The One World Schoolhouse: https://www.amazon.com/One-World-Schoolhouse-Education-Reimagined/dp/1455508373/ref=sr_1_1 • Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams: https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Sleep-Unlocking-Dreams/dp/1501144324 • Gran Turismo: https://www.netflix.com/title/81672085 • Gran Turismo video game: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/gran-turismo/ • Manta sleep mask: https://mantasleep.com/products/manta-sleep-mask • WAOAW sleep mask: https://www.amazon.com/WAOAW-Sleep-Sleeping-Blocking-Blindfold/dp/B09712FSLY Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.

Logan KilpatrickguestLenny Rachitskyhost

Feb 7, 20241h 8mWatch on YouTube ↗

WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT

Inside OpenAI: Culture, GPTs, and the Future of AI Products

Logan Kilpatrick, head of developer relations at OpenAI, discusses OpenAI’s internal culture, how they ship products quickly, and what they look for in new hires. He explains how developers and companies are using ChatGPT, GPTs, and the API today, and where he sees the biggest opportunities for new products. The conversation dives into prompt engineering best practices, new multimodal and agent-like interfaces, and where OpenAI will focus versus where startups should build. Logan also reflects on the Sam Altman board crisis, why it ultimately strengthened the company, and how OpenAI thinks about planning, metrics, and the path toward AGI.

IDEAS WORTH REMEMBERING

5 ideas

Hire for high agency and urgency to move exceptionally fast.

OpenAI’s speed comes less from process and more from people who see a problem, don’t wait for consensus, and immediately start building solutions based on customer feedback.

Build on specific, vertical use cases rather than generic AI assistants.

OpenAI intends to own the broad, general-purpose assistant space (e.g., ChatGPT, GPTs) but does not plan to build highly verticalized products like legal AI (Harvey) or AI sales agents—those are prime areas for startups.

Context is the single biggest lever in prompt engineering.

Models default to generic answers because they have no prior about you or your goal; providing detailed context, links, and constraints dramatically improves output quality, especially for nuanced tasks.

Use GPTs to encode company- or role-specific workflows and knowledge.

Organizations are already building internal GPTs for ad generation, experiment analysis, planning, and OKRs, turning generic ChatGPT into tailored, domain-aware tools that reduce load on marketers, data scientists, and managers.

Think beyond chat—new AI interfaces will be a major advantage.

Infinite canvases, dedicated creative tools, hardware devices (like Rabbit R1), and embedded agent experiences will outperform plain chat UIs for many workflows, giving product teams a powerful differentiation axis.

WORDS WORTH SAVING

5 quotes

Finding people who are high agency and work with urgency is like one of the most important things.

— Logan Kilpatrick

Context is all you need. Context is the only thing that matters.

— Logan Kilpatrick

If you're going to try to build the next general assistant to compete with ChatGPT, it has to be so radically different.

— Logan Kilpatrick

It's not AI that's going to replace humans, it's humans using AI tools who are going to be more competitive.

— Logan Kilpatrick

GPT-5 is surely going to be extremely useful… but fundamentally, the same problems that exist in the world are still going to be the same problems.

— Logan Kilpatrick

OpenAI’s internal culture, response to the board crisis, and hiring philosophyHow companies and individuals are using ChatGPT, GPTs, and the OpenAI APIPrompt engineering: what it is and how to do it betterGPTs, the GPT Store, and the emerging agent ecosystemPlanning, prioritization, and how OpenAI ships quickly without heavy processThe evolution toward multimodal interfaces and new AI UX paradigmsFuture directions: GPT-5, embeddings, enterprise offerings, and startup opportunities

High quality AI-generated summary created from speaker-labeled transcript.

Get more out of YouTube videos.

High quality summaries for YouTube videos. Accurate transcripts to search & find moments. Powered by ChatGPT & Claude AI.