AI Forward Engineering Lead - Hands-On, Client-Facing

EY; Tallahassee (FL); Hybrid; USD 126,000 - 230,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Total Rewards package

Medical & dental coverage

Paid time off

Job summary

EY is seeking a hands-on Lead Forward Deployed Engineer to own end-to-end delivery of AI-native systems for a single client in highly regulated industries. You will embed with the client, set technical direction, and translate business needs into production-grade, secure solutions.

The role blends deep coding with strong client presence, leading a small cell and ensuring deployment readiness while meeting safety and cost constraints. This position requires senior technical judgment and autonomy.

Qualifications

• 8+ years delivering complex enterprise systems, ideally in regulated or client-facing contexts.
• Hands-on engineering depth across integration-heavy architectures, cloud platforms, and distributed systems.
• Experience with modern AI-enabled application stacks (e.g., agentic systems, orchestration frameworks, LLM-backed services).
• Proven ability to operate in forward-deployed, customer-facing, or solutions-architecture roles, owning outcomes end to end.
• Demonstrated ability to lead a small technical team while remaining an individual contributor.
• Strong stakeholder-management skills, including managing client expectations under pressure.
• Solid understanding of software delivery lifecycle, quality gates, and production readiness in enterprise settings.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end outcome delivery for the cell, including scoping, tradeoffs, technical direction, and production readiness.
• Embed directly with the client to define the real problem and translate business needs into executable solutions.
• Serve as primary technical interface and trusted advisor to client stakeholders, managing expectations and tradeoffs.
• Stay hands-on, designing and building critical parts of the solution when needed.
• Deploy, adapt, and stabilize solutions in the client environment with templates and profiles.
• Direct the work of the cell’s Implementation Engineer and Data Engineer toward a coherent production-grade outcome.
• Ensure deployments meet safety, integrity, and cost constraints with regulators and internal review teams.

Skills

Outcome ownership

Client presence

Hands-on coding

AI/LLM stacks

Solution architecture

Stakeholder mgmt

Delivery lifecycle

Team leadership

Education

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science

Tools

Orchestration frameworks

LLM services

Cloud platforms

Job description

EY is seeking a hands-on Lead Forward Deployed Engineer to own end-to-end delivery of AI-native systems for a single client in highly regulated industries. You will embed with the client, set technical direction, and translate business needs into production-grade, secure solutions.

The role blends deep coding with strong client presence, leading a small cell and ensuring deployment readiness while meeting safety and cost constraints. This position requires senior technical judgment and autonomy.