Greg Brockman: How to Stay Valuable as AI Gets Smarter

Greg Brockman: How to Stay Valuable as AI Gets Smarter

From The Knowledge Project by Shane Parrish

April 22, 2026 · 1h 13m

About this episode

Greg Brockman discusses the future of AI and the events surrounding Sam Altman's firing from OpenAI.

In 2023, OpenAI’s board fired Sam Altman and told Greg Brockman he would remain at the company. He quit that day. In this conversation with Shane Parrish, OpenAI’s co-founder recounts the crisis: the board call, the plan to start another company, and the outpouring of employee support. He also reflects on his relationship with Ilya Sutskever and what the experience taught him about leadership, loyalty, and difficult decisions. Greg takes us back to OpenAI’s beginnings, including the Napa gathering that helped shape its technical direction. He explains why the pursuit of artificial general intelligence (AGI) demanded more computing power—and why he believed nonprofit fundraising alone couldn’t support that ambition. Looking ahead, we explore the global AI race, how AI is changing software development, and why access to computing power could shape who benefits. Greg shares his vision for AI agents, what they could mean for your job, and why he believes initiative, ideas, and the ability to direct AI will become increasingly valuable. ----- Timestamps: 00:00:00 Introduction 00:00:49 Meeting Sam Altman and Starting OpenAI 00:02:40 Building the Founding Team 00:04:25 DeepMind's Lead…

People in this episode

Host: Shane Parrish

Guest: Greg Brockman

Topics covered

  • AI race
  • future of AGI
  • OpenAI history
  • Sam Altman
  • nonprofit structure
  • job impact of AI

Keywords

  • OpenAI
  • AGI
  • AI race
  • Sam Altman
  • Greg Brockman
  • DeepMind
  • nonprofit
  • Dota 2
  • Ilya Sutskever

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: OpenAI, DeepMind

Products: Dota 2

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