Lead Forward-Deployed Engineer: AI Prototyping & Impact

McKesson’s Corporate; Mississauga; Hybrid; CAD 170,000 - 226,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid work model

Office two days per week

Job summary

McKesson is seeking a Lead Forward Deployed Engineer (FDE) to partner with business teams and translate complex AI-enabled problems into validated prototypes. This hands-on, senior role requires deep software engineering judgment and stakeholder engagement across AI delivery lifecycle.

The role combines problem framing, prototype development, and collaboration with AI, data, and security teams to define scalable production paths with governance and reliability.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience building, integrating, troubleshooting, or delivering enterprise software solutions.
• Strong hands-on full-stack engineering across modern web apps, APIs, data, AI services, identity, security, and cloud infra.
• Hands-on experience with React, Node.js, TypeScript, and Python.
• Proficiency in API diagnostics and browser-based troubleshooting.
• Experience with Snowflake and Databricks, data pipelines, quality, and performance tuning.
• Experience using logs, metrics, traces, dashboards, and alerting for root-cause analysis.
• Ability to translate ambiguous business problems into working technical solutions and prototypes.
• Experience prototyping AI-enabled solutions (copilots, agents, RAG, semantic search, workflow automation).
• Experience with AI coding assistants and applying Responsible AI, data governance, security.

Responsibilities

• Embed with practice and business teams to understand workflows and outcomes.
• Lead discovery workshops and problem-framing sessions with executives and clinical staff.
• Translate business needs into testable hypotheses, technical options, and prototype scopes.
• Design pragmatic solution approaches using enterprise tech and data assets.
• Build prototypes, proofs of concept, and thin-slice solutions for user feedback.
• Define production handoff to engineering and ensure governance and security controls.
• Collaborate with AI engineers, data engineers, MLOps, and product leaders to shape delivery path.

Job description

McKesson is seeking a Lead Forward Deployed Engineer (FDE) to partner with business teams and translate complex AI-enabled problems into validated prototypes. This hands-on, senior role requires deep software engineering judgment and stakeholder engagement across AI delivery lifecycle.

The role combines problem framing, prototype development, and collaboration with AI, data, and security teams to define scalable production paths with governance and reliability.