Forward Deployed Engineer
Engineers embedded with customers or deployed on-site to solve domain-specific technical problems. Combines engineering skills with direct client interaction.
Skills
What companies are looking for in this role.
Integrating complex software systems with customer infrastructure and APIs
Working directly with customers to discover requirements, identify issues, and iterate on solutions
Building and deploying production-grade generative AI applications including RAG and multi-agent systems
Translating complex customer requirements into technical solutions
Designing and implementing end-to-end AI/ML data pipelines and workflows
Writing clean, maintainable production code following software development best practices
Deploying and optimizing machine learning models in cloud environments
Designing adapters and integration layers for unfamiliar systems and protocols
Evaluating and selecting third-party tools and technologies for specific use cases
Building and optimizing retrieval-augmented generation systems for production use
Operating across the full customer lifecycle from discovery and design to scaling and optimization
Developing domain-specific AI applications tailored to industry-specific workflows
Prototyping and deploying agentic AI systems at scale
Fine-tuning and optimizing language models for specific customer applications
Implementing human-in-the-loop systems and quality measurement frameworks
Operating with high ownership and accountability for end-to-end outcomes
Collaborating cross-functionally with product, engineering, and sales teams
Bridging technical teams with business and product stakeholders
Communicating complex technical concepts to non-technical customer audiences
Conducting technical discovery sessions and gathering customer insights
Managing stakeholder expectations and translating business objectives into technical roadmaps
Providing thought leadership and presenting technical work at industry conferences
Building and managing engineering teams focused on delivery excellence
Technology
The tools and technologies that define this role.
Open Jobs
145 open Forward Deployed Engineer jobs across 32 companies.
Other Engineering roles
General-purpose software engineering roles focused on building and maintaining software systems. Covers generalist SWE positions that don't clearly fall into frontend, backend, fullstack, or other specialized tracks.
Engineers focused on server-side systems, APIs, services, and data processing pipelines. Includes roles explicitly labeled as backend or server-side development.
Engineers specializing in user-facing interfaces, web applications, and client-side development. Includes UI/UX engineering and web development roles.
Engineers working across the entire application stack, handling both frontend and backend responsibilities.
Engineers building and maintaining internal platforms, cloud infrastructure, compute systems, and developer tooling.