We have heard time and again that artificial intelligence would bring new jobs to the tech sector, and we have finally begun seeing evidence of this. First we had Prompt Engineers, then AI Managers, AI Scientists, and of course, Forward Deployed Engineers (FDEs).
FDEs are more than just a role made popular by Palantir, and they have quickly become one of the fastest-growing roles at Salesforce. But where are they coming from? And why are Salesforce Architects making the shift to this agentic specialization?
What Is a Forward Deployed Engineer?
A Forward Deployed Engineer is a deep technical expert in AI, and in the world of Salesforce, FDEs work in the intersection of Salesforce’s product teams and services teams, helping customers get their first few agents off the ground.
Jennifer Cramer, the SVP of Forward Deployed Engineering and Customer Success for AI Products at Salesforce, previously told SF Ben that FDEs are typically “master builders or master fixers”.
FDEs at Salesforce are chosen based on whether or not they have a “growth mindset”, in Cramer’s words, and while there is sometimes formal training for the role, oftentimes any training can be considered purely hands-on learning or experimentation.
A New Wave of FDEs
Now that Salesforce has fully embedded itself in the AI space, FDEs are needed more than ever, making them one of the fastest-growing positions at the company. At the time of writing, there are currently 68 open positions.
It is also a position that former Salesforce employees are increasingly coming back to the company to work in as part of the “boomerang” phenomenon that has seen ex-employees return to the Mothership.
Salesforce even put together a blog post highlighting how Agentforce had inspired three former employees – Krista Hardebeck, Simeon Dimitrov, and Usman Nasir – to return to be in FDE roles. Krista formerly worked with MuleSoft for nearly five years, Simeon worked in Salesforce strategy for seven years, and Usman was formerly a Sales Engineering Team Lead.
The FDE role is also one that existing technical employees are transitioning into, especially architects. Almost 20,000 Salesforce employees over the last 12 months are in positions that did not exist a year ago, and the FDE role has been a key part of this effort.
Why Are Architects Becoming FDEs?
Professionals such as Dhruv Thakkar and Sarah Khalid started their careers at Salesforce as architects before transitioning into FDE roles. Dhruv, previously a Senior Solution Architect, is now a Senior Forward Deployed Engineer. Sarah, previously a Senior Success Architect, is now a Director of Forward Deployed Engineering.
Dhruv explained to SF Ben that a big driver for him in becoming an FDE was having the chance to get more involved in building and delivering AI solutions.
“While working as a Solution Architect, I had the opportunity to work on an Agentforce proof of concept for a large enterprise customer, where I collaborated closely with Forward Deployed Engineers,” he said. “Seeing firsthand the impact FDEs were making in helping customers adopt Agentforce made me realize that this was something I wanted to do more of.”
“Having spent several years as a Solution Architect, primarily focused on Revenue Cloud implementations, I was also looking for a new challenge and an opportunity to expand my skill set.”
He also explained that he found the transition fairly seamless, going through a six-week bootcamp, including two weeks of in-person training.
“One of the highlights was a capstone project that simulated a real-world customer engagement, where we built an AI agent for a realistic business scenario and presented our solution to a group of experts,” he said.
Dhruv also recommends other architects to make the same transition if they’re curious, as a lot of the skills developed as an architect are transferable to the FDE role.
“For architects who enjoy hands-on work, experimentation, and thrive in a fast-paced environment, I think the FDE role can be a great career move,” he said.
“One of the biggest differences I’ve noticed is the pace of execution. In a traditional enterprise implementation, depending on the size of the project, an architect might spend several weeks conducting discovery workshops, gathering requirements, and defining and prioritizing the backlog before getting into hands-on development.
“As an FDE, you’re typically focused on a smaller set of high-impact use cases, sometimes identified even before you’re brought into the engagement. This means you’re often hands-on and building solutions within the very first week.”
Final Thoughts
The Salesforce Architect to Forward Deployed Engineer move is a transition that largely makes sense. Emerging technology like agentic AI needs extra support to get customers started, understanding it, and past their hesitancy, so design and delivery can no longer be cleanly separated.
Salesforce’s FDE job ads make the overlap with the architect profile explicit: the roles involve owning technical components from the choice of architecture through to being deployed, validated, and observable in production, working across different AI architectures, and communicating with engineering peers, architects, and executives.
As Dhruv said, it is also a move that is well-supported by Salesforce, and it will only be a matter of time before it becomes more commonplace in the partner ecosystem and beyond.
