Senior / Staff Forward Deployment Engineer

About the role

You are part builder, part problem-solver, and part trusted advisor: writing production code one day, mapping a messy real-world workflow the next, and advising senior stakeholders on strategy by the end of the week. This is a high-impact role for an experienced engineer who has done the work before, thrives in ambiguity, and operates with little oversight.

Embed with internal teams and external customers to understand their workflows, pain points, and goals — then design and deploy solutions that fit. Build production-quality code, integrations, and automations across AI/GenAI, data, and software platforms to solve concrete business problems. Prototype rapid prototypes and proofs-of-concept, iterate based on direct user feedback, and move them into reliable, scalable production. Integrate data pipelines, APIs, and third-party systems, handling the real-world messiness of enterprise environments.

Partner with end users and stakeholders — running demos, gathering requirements, troubleshooting live, and translating technical concepts into business value. Feed recurring pain points and friction back to product and engineering teams to influence the core roadmap. Monitor and improve solutions for reliability, performance, and adoption after launch — you own outcomes, not just deliverables. Establish the playbooks, standards, and tooling for the FDE function, and mentor junior engineers as the team grows.

Responsibilities

• Build and ship production-quality code, integrations, and automations across AI/GenAI, data, and software platforms.
• Prototype rapid proofs-of-concept, iterate based on user feedback, and transition them into scalable production.
• Integrate data pipelines, APIs, and third-party systems in enterprise environments.
• Partner with end users and stakeholders through demos, requirements gathering, live troubleshooting, and translating technical concepts into business value.
• Feed recurring pain points back to product and engineering teams to influence the core roadmap.
• Monitor and improve solutions for reliability, performance, and adoption post-launch.
• Establish playbooks, standards, and tooling for the Forward Deployment Engineering function.
• Mentor junior engineers as the team grows.

Requirements

• 8+ years building and shipping software in production, including significant time owning complex, ambiguous projects end-to-end with minimal supervision.
• Deep, hands-on programming expertise (e.g., Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, Java, or Go).
• Strong system design judgment and fluency working across the full stack and with APIs.
• Proven experience with data tools (SQL, pipelines, warehouses such as Snowflake/Databricks) and/or AI/GenAI tooling (LLMs, RAG, agentic workflows).
• Customer-facing or forward-deployed work experience — you've shipped solutions directly with end users, navigated enterprise complexity, and earned the trust of senior stakeholders.
• Leadership experience — you've led projects, set technical direction, and raised the bar for those around you, formally or informally.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication; ability to translate fluidly between deep technical detail and executive-level business value.
• Bias for action: you ship, learn, and iterate quickly at a high quality bar, and bring order to ambiguous, fast-moving situations.

Nice to Have

• Experience deploying AI/ML or LLM-based solutions in an enterprise setting.
• Cloud experience (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and familiarity with CI/CD and containerization.
• Experience as a founding or early member of a new team or function.
• Telecommunications or large-scale enterprise data domain knowledge.

Pay

Compensation range: $109,000–$164,000 (Hybrid role based in Bellevue, Washington).

Benefits

• Full-time, regular employees accrue a minimum of 10 days of paid vacation per year, receive 6 days of paid sick leave (pro-rated for new hires), 10 paid holidays, and are eligible for paid bereavement leave and jury duty.
• Eligibility to participate in the Company’s 401(k) Retirement Plan with employer matching.
• Medical, dental, and vision insurance for employees and dependents residing in the US, plus Company-paid basic life insurance, accidental death and disability insurance, and short- and long-term disability benefits for employees.
• Option to purchase additional voluntary short-term disability benefits.
• Eligibility to participate in a Health Savings Account (HSA) and Flexible Spending Account (FSA) for healthcare, dependent child care, and/or commuting expenses as allowable under IRS guidelines.
• Part-time employees receive 6 days of paid sick leave per year (pro-rated for new hires) and are eligible to participate in the Company’s 401(k) Retirement Plan with employer matching.
• Full-time temporary employees receive 6 days of paid sick leave per year (pro-rated for new hires) and are eligible for medical, dental, and vision insurance, as well as 401(k) participation with employer matching.
• All US employees working in states or localities with more generous paid sick leave benefits will receive those benefits.