Senior Forward Deployed Engineer

Cloudflare•San Francisco, CA

1d•$194,000 - $266,000•Onsite

About The Position

Cloudflare’s Senior Forward Deployed Engineers (FDEs) operate at the intersection of product engineering and customer impact. As an FDE, you will be embedded within one of Cloudflare’s most strategic global customers, working side-by-side with their engineering teams to build and deploy solutions using Cloudflare’s platform. Unlike traditional Solutions Architects or consultants, you will write production code, shape technical architecture, and directly influence how Cloudflare products are used at massive scale. You will operate as a technical extension of both organizations - helping the customer ship faster while surfacing real-world product insights back to Cloudflare engineering.

Requirements

7+ years of professional software engineering experience.
Proven track record of delivering production-grade systems.
Experience owning mission-critical services with real-world users.
Understanding of on-call rotations, incident response, and architectural rigor for high uptime.
Currently active in development with a "ship-first" mentality and high velocity.
High velocity, staying current with modern frameworks, languages, and deployment patterns.
Broad technical fluency across the entire stack—from frontend performance and backend logic to database optimization and distributed infrastructure.
Integrated AI-augmented workflows (e.g., Windsurf, OpenCode) into your daily development cycle.
Ability to decompose complex business requirements into scalable, resilient technical architectures.
Deep experience with at least one major cloud provider (AWS, GCP, or Azure), including an understanding of serverless, networking, and security primitives.
Self-starter who thrives in "zero-to-one" environments.
Comfortable engaging in high-stakes technical and strategic discussions with VP-level stakeholders.
Ability to translate complex engineering trade-offs into business impact.

Nice To Haves

Direct experience building on Cloudflare Workers, or the broader Cloudflare Developer Platform.
Previous experience at a fast-paced startup or in a customer-facing engineering role where you operated directly within a partner’s codebase.
A visible public profile, including open-source contributions, technical blogging, or speaking engagements at industry conferences.

Responsibilities

Deep Technical Embedding: Serve as the dedicated, long-term technical partner within a strategic customer’s engineering organization, operating as a trusted extension of their team.
Production-Level Engineering: Design, build, and deploy production-ready code and configurations directly into customer infrastructure using the Cloudflare platform.
Technical Accountability: Own the account's technical success across the entire Cloudflare portfolio. Serve as the primary technical point of contact, with other Cloudflare technical resources taking direction from your technical strategy for the account.
Operational Integration: Participate in customer engineering rituals, including daily standups, design reviews, and real-time incident response.
Platform Advocacy & Adoption: Identify opportunities to accelerate the adoption of Cloudflare services, unlocking new capabilities across the customer’s tech stack.
Platform Breadth & Depth: Deep technical competence in building production applications on a modern stack, combined with the willingness and ability to go deep on all Cloudflare product areas. From Workers to security, networking, and observability.
Feedback Loop & Product Influence: Surface real-world edge cases and product gaps directly to Cloudflare’s Product and Engineering teams to influence the developer platform roadmap.
Strategic Relationship Management: Establish and maintain trusted technical relationships with senior leadership (Staff+ engineers, Directors, and VPs).
On-Site Presence: Maintain a regular on-site presence at customer locations to foster deep collaboration and cultural alignment.

Benefits

Medical/Rx Insurance
Dental Insurance
Vision Insurance
Flexible Spending Accounts
Commuter Spending Accounts
Fertility & Family Forming Benefits
On-demand mental health support and Employee Assistance Program
Global Travel Medical Insurance
Short and Long Term Disability Insurance
Life & Accident Insurance
401(k) Retirement Savings Plan
Employee Stock Participation Plan
Flexible paid time off covering vacation and sick leave
Leave programs, including parental, pregnancy health, medical, and bereavement leave