Forward Deployed Engineering Lead

Rox is building the AI-native revenue operating system for modern go-to-market teams. Backed by Sequoia, GV, and General Catalyst, we work with ambitious companies to replace fragmented CRM workflows with intelligent, autonomous systems that actually drive outcomes.

We are a fast-moving Series A company (~75 people) operating at the intersection of data, AI, and real revenue execution. We care deeply about technical rigor, customer truth, and building systems that scale with clarity.

Forward Deployed Engineering (FDE) at Rox is where product, engineering, and customers converge.

FDEs embed directly into customer environments to solve high-impact problems: integrating Rox into complex GTM stacks, shaping real-world implementations, and translating customer needs back into product direction. This is not a support function and not traditional consulting — it’s applied engineering with ownership.

The FDE Lead role exists to scale this function: setting standards, leading a small but critical team, and ensuring Rox’s most strategic customers see real value fast.

This is a player-coach leadership role.

As FDE Lead, you will own the execution and evolution of the Forward Deployed Engineering function. You’ll lead a small team of FDEs while remaining hands-on with customers, especially in the highest-stakes engagements.

You’ll partner most closely with Sales and Engineering, ensuring customer implementations are technically sound, scalable, and aligned with Rox’s long-term product strategy. The patterns you establish — how projects are scoped, how technical decisions are made, how feedback flows — will define how FDE operates as Rox grows.

This role is ideal for someone with strong technical depth, experience leading complex client-facing projects, and a bias toward building durable systems rather than one-off solutions.

• 40% Functional Execution – hands-on technical work, architecture, integrations, and delivery

• 30% Client-Facing – leading customer engagements, technical discovery, and solution design

• 30% Team Leadership – mentoring FDEs, setting standards, and scaling the function
  

• Lead a growing team of Forward Deployed Engineers

• Set technical and execution standards for customer deployments

• Establish repeatable patterns for scoping, delivery, and handoff

• Coach and mentor FDEs on both technical depth and customer execution

• Act as technical lead on complex or high-stakes customer projects

• Partner with Sales on pre- and post-sale technical strategy

• Lead deep technical discovery to uncover real customer constraints

• Ensure customer implementations are scalable, secure, and maintainable

• Work closely with Engineering to influence roadmap and product decisions

• Translate customer learnings into clear, actionable feedback

• Align with Sales on deal strategy, feasibility, and delivery timelines

• Help ensure Rox’s technical promises are grounded in reality

• Identify where custom work should become product

• Reduce friction and toil through better tooling and patterns

• Raise the technical bar across customer deployments
  

• First 3 days: You’ve deeply internalized Rox’s product, architecture, and customer use cases

• First 3 weeks: You’re actively leading the FDE team and owning key customer engagements

• First 3 months: The FDE function is scaling cleanly — clearer standards, stronger execution, and better feedback loops into Product and Engineering

• Experience leading technical, client-facing teams (FDE, Solutions Engineering, Consulting, or similar)

• Strong hands-on engineering background (Python, React, SQL)

• Experience leading complex technical projects end-to-end

• Comfort operating across Sales, Engineering, and Product

• Ability to translate ambiguity into execution

• Strong communication skills with both technical and non-technical stakeholders

• Prior experience in consulting or forward-deployed engineering models

• Familiarity with Palantir-style or embedded engineering patterns

• Experience scaling early-stage technical teams

• Exposure to modern data stacks, analytics, or AI-driven systems
  

Rox is growing quickly, and customer execution is a core competitive advantage. This role exists to ensure that as we scale, our Forward Deployed Engineering function scales with clarity, rigor, and impact — not chaos.

If you’re excited about leading real engineers, solving real problems, and shaping how a critical function operates at a defining moment, this is a rare opportunity to do exactly that.