Deployment Architect / Forward Deployed Engineer

Champ AI • San Francisco, CA

1d • Hybrid

About The Position

Champ AI is building AI agents to help businesses scale operations faster, cheaper, and better, aiming to eliminate the need for Business Process Outsourcing (BPO). The company focuses on automating tasks like document processing, phone calls, and web portal-based processes that have traditionally been handled by large offshore teams. Their agents, including browser, document, and voice agents, are currently performing these tasks. The founding team has prior experience scaling companies from early stages to IPO, bringing expertise in building systems at scale and understanding the challenges businesses face with operational complexity. The market for these solutions is vast, spanning industries like healthcare, logistics, payroll, claims, revenue cycle, and freight operations, where the current standard is manual labor. Champ AI is at an inflection point with existing revenue, paying customers, and significant deals, with a functional product and a recognized market category. The immediate need is for a professional who can efficiently move interested prospects through the pilot phase and convert them into paying customers, thereby driving company growth and providing valuable product feedback.

Requirements

• 1-2 years of experience in a customer-facing, deal-carrying technical role (e.g., Forward Deployed Engineer, Deployment Strategist, Solutions Architect, Solutions Engineer, Applied AI).
• Experience carrying pilots or deals from first call to production at a technical startup.
• Experience in solution engineering, including scoping POCs, setting them up in customer environments, real-time debugging, and delivering production results.
• Technical range: ability to read code, write Python scripts, debug LLM prompts, sketch integrations, and engage with skeptical engineers.
• Deal instinct: ability to identify the next step, risks, and timelines for open deals without being prompted.
• Client dynamics fluency: ability to identify decision-makers, egos, and potential blockers.
• Urgency as a default: fast response times, same-day follow-ups, and compressing cycles.
• Systems thinking under ambiguity: ability to scope messy workflows into pilots and identify what to cut.
• Clear writing skills for follow-ups, mutual action plans, pilot reports, and internal debriefs.

Nice To Haves

• Ex-founders with experience building and selling products.
• Alumni of AI-native companies (e.g., OpenAI, Anthropic, Scale, Glean, Harvey, Sierra, Decagon, Hebbia, Cresta, Writer, Cognition).
• Experience selling or deploying AI/agent products into operations teams.
• Experience in customer-facing roles at early-stage companies with no established playbook.
• Experience with enterprise procurement and security reviews.
• Understanding of Go-to-Market (GTM) strategies, pricing, and positioning.

Responsibilities

• Own the entire process from the first customer call to a signed contract and live production deployment.
• Collaborate closely with operations leaders at customer organizations.
• Set up working agents against customer data within days.
• Translate customer pain points into scoped workflows that can be automated.
• Shadow real operators to understand their work and tools.
• Develop working demos, Proof of Concepts (POCs), and pilot plans.
• Configure prompts, tools, evaluations, and guardrails for customer-specific needs.
• Manage pilot success plans, including defining metrics, success criteria, and sign-off timelines.
• Drive deals forward with a sense of urgency, identifying key stakeholders (champion, economic buyer, blocker).
• Manage pricing conversations, security reviews, procurement processes, and contract redlines.
• Provide high-signal, structured feedback to the engineering team on product improvements and hardening.
• Build reusable assets such as demo environments, pilot templates, and onboarding flows.
• Act as the primary point of contact for customer evaluators, building trust and credibility.
• Identify opportunities for expansion within existing accounts (multi-team and multi-workflow).

Benefits

• Meaningful influence on GTM, pricing, product direction, and hiring.
• Direct, high-bandwidth exposure to customers.
• Opportunity to learn all aspects of building a company: product, sales, pricing, onboarding, expansion.
• Preparation for starting one's own company by learning how enterprises buy and how to build trust.

What This Job Offers

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