Forward Deployed Engineer

Job Description

Experience: Mid Level

Salary: $185,000 - $300,000 per year

Job Details

As a Forward Deployed Engineer, you'll work directly with the founding team and some of the company's largest customers to understand complex problems, develop technical solutions, and rapidly improve the product.

You'll sit at the intersection of software engineering, product, and the customer.

What You'll Do

• Work directly with customers to uncover technical and product pain points.
• Translate ambiguous customer problems into concrete technical solutions.
• Write production code and rapidly ship improvements into the product.
• Lead deployments of new products and capabilities with key customers.
• Build systems and internal tooling that allow successful solutions to scale across the customer base.
• Serve as the technical bridge between customers and Product/Engineering.
• Turn field learnings into both immediate improvements and longer-term product initiatives.
• Deliver a premium, white-glove technical experience while maintaining an extremely high engineering standard.

What We're Looking For

• 2+ years of high-caliber professional experience across software engineering, forward deployed engineering, technical solutions, consulting, or another highly analytical environment.
• Strong hands-on coding ability. Current technologies include Python, TypeScript, Node, and React, although exceptional engineers who can learn new technologies quickly are encouraged.
• Experience working directly with customers or other external stakeholders.
• Strong technical problem-solving ability and comfort operating with ambiguity.
• High agency and high output: you naturally identify problems, propose solutions, and execute without waiting for detailed instructions.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Strong product instincts and genuine customer empathy.
• Ability to simplify complicated technical concepts for both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Comfortable operating in a lean, fast-moving startup where responsibilities extend beyond a traditional job description.
• Proud of your craft and passionate about building products that work exceptionally well.

Strong Plus

• Previous Forward Deployed Engineer experience.
• Cybersecurity or enterprise security experience.
• Experience building customer-facing integrations or technical deployments.
• Background at a high-growth or highly technical startup.
• Experience working closely with enterprise customers, security teams, CTOs, CISOs, or technical executives.
• Experience building AI-powered products or working with modern AI development tools.

Compensation & Benefits

• Highly competitive base salary
• Meaningful equity
• Medical, dental, and vision coverage
• 401(k)
• Commuting support
• Meals provided in the office
• Additional wellness benefits
• Relocation support

This is an onsite role in San Francisco, 5 days per week.

A bit about us

Location: San Francisco, CA

Work Model: Onsite, 5 days/week

Employment Type: Full-Time

Compensation: Highly competitive + equity. Very flexible for exceptional candidates.

We're partnering with a rapidly growing, early-stage AI cybersecurity company in San Francisco building a new category of detection and response technology.

The company has experienced exceptional early traction and is now entering its next stage of growth and scale.

The engineering bar is extremely high. The founding and early team comes from some of the most respected companies across cybersecurity, defense technology, quantitative finance, and high-growth startups. The team includes former founders, senior engineering leaders, and highly technical operators who have built and scaled complex systems before.

This is a lean environment where talented people are given significant ownership and expected to move quickly.

Why join us?

• Exceptional team: Work alongside an unusually high-caliber group of engineers, founders, and technical operators.
• Real traction: Join an early-stage company that already has meaningful revenue, thousands of customers, and millions of protected users.
• True ownership: You won't simply implement requirements. You'll identify problems, propose solutions, build them, and see the impact directly with customers.
• Technical + customer exposure: This is a true FDE role combining hands-on engineering with direct ownership of important customer relationships.
• Move incredibly fast: Customer feedback can become shipped product improvements in hours rather than weeks.
• Influence the product: What you learn in the field will directly shape product and engineering priorities.
• High engineering bar: Join an environment that values technical excellence, speed, craftsmanship, and high agency.
• Compensation flexibility: The company is willing to pay top dollar for exceptional engineers and is intentionally flexible for the right person.

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