Forward Deployed Engineer

Recruiting From Scratch•San Francisco, NY

1d•$170,000 - $260,000•Onsite

About The Position

As a Forward Deployed Engineer , you will work directly with customers to understand their most pressing challenges and design solutions that integrate client data with our platform’s conversational intelligence. You’ll apply your technical expertise, creativity, and problem-solving mindset to help organizations leverage their data for real-world impact. This role is similar to that of a startup CTO: you’ll work solo or in small teams on end-to-end delivery of high-stakes projects. You’ll move between deep customer discovery, architecture design, large-scale data wrangling, rapid coding, and bringing insights back to the team to shape our broader product strategy. You will be at the forefront of expanding this company’s footprint into new markets, creating tools that transform industries untouched by modern AI software.

Requirements

Strong software engineering skills with fluency in languages like JavaScript, C++, Python, Rust, or similar
Experience working in high-accountability, customer-facing roles—ideally at startups or fast-paced environments
Strong familiarity with cloud infrastructure, data storage and processing systems, and modern engineering best practices
Outstanding written and verbal communication skills; comfortable presenting solutions to both technical and non-technical stakeholders
Eager and able to travel up to 50% to client sites as needed
Obsessive about solving customer problems and working closely with real-world users in the field
Thrives in a high-intensity, in-person team culture focused on rapid iteration, high standards, and building for impact

Nice To Haves

Experience building or deploying AI products in the real world
Background working in offline industries (logistics, retail, field services) or with operations-heavy customers
Strong product intuition and interest in entrepreneurship or future leadership roles
Familiarity with tools and technologies such as Node.js, Turborepo, Lodash, Zod, Terraform, and GitHub Actions

Responsibilities

Work directly with customers to understand their most pressing challenges
Design solutions that integrate client data with our platform’s conversational intelligence
Apply technical expertise, creativity, and problem-solving mindset to help organizations leverage their data for real-world impact
Work solo or in small teams on end-to-end delivery of high-stakes projects
Move between deep customer discovery, architecture design, large-scale data wrangling, rapid coding, and bringing insights back to the team to shape our broader product strategy
Expand this company’s footprint into new markets, creating tools that transform industries untouched by modern AI software