Handshake

AI

SeniorForwardDeployedEngineer

$225–250k San Francisco, California, United States FULL TIME
Market Sentiment
HIGH DEMAND

Neural analysis suggests this role is
optimal for Senior candidates.

The Brief

“Senior Forward Deployed Engineer at Handshake. Skills: technical leadership, customer engagement, architecture, deployment, scaling solutions. Serve as a technical leader at the intersection of our engineering organization and our most strategic customers. Own the end-to-end lifecycle of high-impact deployments”

What You'll Achieve.

directly improve customer workflows and model performance; enable the team to scale deployments efficiently

Industry & Context.

AI
Problems you'll solve

translate ambiguous requirements into actionable engineering plans; architecting, building, and scaling solutions; performance optimization; scaling of full-stack applications

Eligibility Requirements

5 days/week in-office

What They're Looking For.

Must Have

5+ years of professional software engineering experience, meaningful time spent in customer-facing, solutions-oriented, or forward-deployed roles, proficiency with ReactJS and TypeScript, high bar for code quality, usability, and accessibility, Deep understanding of relational databases (e. g. , PostgreSQL), data modeling, system design, Experience with cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP), deployment pipelines, production operations at scale, Demonstrated ability to lead technical projects end-to-end in ambiguous environments with shifting requirements, Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, ability to build trust with both technical and non-technical audiences, Track record of mentoring engineers and raising the bar on engineering practices within a team

Nice to Have

Experience architecting and delivering production systems for LLMs or other AI-powered products in real-world, customer-facing environments, Background in building or contributing to component libraries, design systems, or reusable deployment frameworks, Proven experience with performance optimization and scaling of full-stack applications under real-world constraints and high-traffic conditions, Prior experience in a forward-deployed, solutions engineering, or technical consulting role at a high-growth company

What You'll Do.

Serve as a technical leader at the intersection of our engineering organization and our most strategic customers

Own the end-to-end lifecycle of high-impact deployments

Scoping complex technical requirements

and scaling solutions that directly improve customer workflows and model performance

Operate across the stack in highly ambiguous

fast-changing environments

Partner with AI labs and cross-functional stakeholders to deeply understand technical challenges

Translate ambiguous requirements into actionable engineering plans

Drive alignment across teams

and delivery of tailored

production-grade solutions for complex

high-impact customer needs

Mentor and uplevel other engineers through code reviews

architectural guidance

and establishing best practices for forward-deployed work

Make key architectural decisions around reliability

Set the technical direction for repeatable deployment patterns

and iterate on tools in response to real-time feedback

Create and maintain technical playbooks

and frameworks that enable the team to scale deployments efficiently

How You'll Work.

Team & Collaboration

Partner with AI labs and cross-functional stakeholders; Drive alignment across teams; Mentor and uplevel other engineers

Communication Scope

Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills; ability to build trust with both technical and non-technical audiences

Process & Methodology

Lead technical projects end-to-end, Translate ambiguous requirements into actionable engineering plans

Full Job Description

ABOUT HANDSHAKE Handshake was founded on a simple belief that everyone deserves a path to a great career, regardless of where they went to school or who they know. Today, we power 25 million job seekers, 1 million+ employers, and 1,600 educational institutions. In 2025, we started Handshake AI and built the fastest-growing AI data business in history. We work directly with frontier AI lab researchers to create evaluations, publish benchmarks, and push the boundary of data. We’ve grown from $0 to ~$1B run rate and pay ~$60M to over 30K individuals every month. Why join Handshake now: - Shape how every career evolves in the AI economy, at global scale, with impact your friends, family and peers can see and feel - Partner hand-in-hand with world-class AI labs, Fortune 500 partners and the world’s top educational institutions - Work together with engineers, scientists, operators, and more from Palantir, Meta, Scale AI, and former YC founders - Build a massive, fast-growing business with billions in revenue About Handshake AI Human data is the core infrastructure to AI advancement. Frontier AI labs currently improve model capabilities with various data-intensive post-training techniques. We believe that data spend for AI training will increase by 3-5x in the next few years and continue for much longer as models take on new domains. Handshake AI supports all of the frontier AI labs, working on their most complex data at the largest scale. ABOUT THE ROLE As a Senior Forward Deployed Engineer, you'll serve as a technical leader at the intersection of our engineering organization and our most strategic customers, including leading AI labs. You'll own the end-to-end lifecycle of high-impact deployments—from scoping complex technical requirements to architecting, building, and scaling solutions that directly improve customer workflows and model performance. You'll operate across the stack in highly ambiguous, fast-changing environments, and your judgment will shape how we appr

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