Director, Forward Deployed Engineering

C3.ai, Inc.; Atlanta (GA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity plan

Competitive compensation

Excellent benefits

Job summary

C3 AI is seeking a Director for Forward Deployed Engineering to lead strategic client relationships and delivery across multiple engagements. You will set the technical and commercial roadmap, own executive-level communications, and build a high-performing engineering team capable of delivering production AI systems.

In this role you will navigate complex scopes, manage risks, and partner with Sales, Presales, and Product to expand adoption of our enterprise AI platform with Fortune 500 and

Qualifications

• 10+ years in management consulting or FDE/delivery leadership in enterprise software
• BS/MS in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or equivalent
• Experience hiring, developing, and performance-managing a team
• Track record delivering multi-workstream engagements for Fortune 500 or large public-sector clients
• Direct experience with AI agent deployment or enterprise AI platforms in production
• Comfort reading code and evaluating technical design docs
• Executive presence and ability to run C-suite briefings
• High agency and comfort with ambiguity
• Ability to build trust with both business and technical stakeholders

Responsibilities

• Own delivery outcomes across a portfolio of strategic accounts, coordinating Forward Deployed Engineers (FDEs), FDTLs, Presales, and stakeholders against a single plan.
• Set engagement structure across portfolio - scope, milestones, dependencies, value hypotheses.
• Run executive briefings and steering committee updates across accounts for C-suite sponsors.
• Own escalation management across portfolio and drive engagements back to green.
• Manage a team of Forward Deployed resources: hiring, onboarding, performance, career development.
• Allocate staffing across accounts and maintain a bench.
• Set technical and delivery bar for the team and coach FDTLs and FDEs.
• Own headcount planning and manage underperformance.
• Create a bench strong enough to mitigate single-point losses.
• Lead or oversee technical discovery, map workflows, and define MVP scope.
• Translate business objectives into sequenced technical roadmaps for delivery teams.
• Hold architecture conversations to evaluate trade-offs and catch feasibility issues.
• Hands-on when needed to validate data models or integrations.
• Identify high-value use cases and build ROI justifications.
• Drive pilot-to-production adoption and surface new use cases.
• Build executive relationships to surface the next use case for expansion.
• Collaborate with Sales and Presales on expansion opportunities.
• Codify reusable patterns and contribute feedback to Product and Solutions.

Skills

Executive presence

Client relationship management

People leadership

Delivery leadership

Strategic planning

Communication

Problem solving

Education

BS/MS in Computer Science or related field

Job description

C3 AI (NYSE: AI), is the Enterprise AI application software company. C3 AI delivers a family of fully integrated products including the C3 Agentic AI Platform, an end-to-end platform for developing, deploying, and operating enterprise AI applications, C3 AI applications, a portfolio of industry-specific SaaS enterprise AI applications that enable the digital transformation of organizations globally, and C3 Generative AI, a suite of domain-specific generative AI offerings for the enterprise.Learn more at: C3 AI

C3 AI's Forward Deployed Engineering organization sits inside some of the world's largest and most complex enterprises, turning signed contracts intoproductionAI systems that change how those businessesoperate. As Director, you will own a portfolio of our most strategic customer relationships end to end, from signature through production and into expansion, and you will lead the team of engineers who make that delivery happen.

You will be two things at once: the executive the customer trusts to tell them the truth about their program, and theleaderyour team trusts to give them clear direction, real support, and room to grow. You set the technical and commercial roadmap for each engagement in your portfolio, run the relationship at the C-suite level, and build, staff, and develop the team of engineers executing against that roadmap.

This is a role for someone who has run high-stakes client relationships, whether in top-tier consulting, enterprise software delivery, or technical program leadership, and who is ready to build and lead a team rather than sit inside a single account. You willoperateat the executive table with the customer, go deep enough technically to catch a bad scope or a wrong estimate before it becomes a delivery risk, and build a team capable of delivering without you in the room.

Responsibilities

Portfolio leadership and delivery

• Own delivery outcomes across a portfolio of strategic accounts, from signed SOW through production go-live and into expansion, coordinating Forward Deployed Engineers (FDEs), Forward Deployed Team Leads (FDTLs), Presales, and customer stakeholders against a single delivery plan per engagement.
• Set engagement structure across your portfolio - scope, milestones, dependencies, and value hypotheses - and hold the line on scope discipline as customer priorities shift.
• Run executive briefings and steering committee updates across accounts, translating delivery status and technical trade-offs into language a C-suite sponsor acts on.
• Own escalation management across your portfolio; when an engagement is at risk, you are the first call and the person who drives it back to green.

People management and team leadership

• Manage a team of Forward Deployed resources across your portfolio, including hiring, onboarding, performance management, and career development.
• Allocate staffing across accounts based on account priority, risk, and growth stage, and reallocate quickly when an engagement's needs change.
• Set the technical and delivery bar for your team, and coach FDTLs and FDEs on how to run their own accounts with the same rigor you apply to yours.
• Own headcount planning for your portfolio: build the case for new roles, identify underperformance early, and manage out where needed.
• Create a bench strong enough that losing any single person does not put an account at risk.

Technical fluency and scoping

• Lead or oversee technical discovery across your portfolio, mapping customer workflows,identifyingdataand integration constraints, and defining MVP scope for new use cases.
• Translate customer business objectives into sequenced technical roadmaps that FDEs and FDTLs execute against.
• Hold architecture conversations with customer and internal engineering stakeholders credibly enough to evaluate trade-offs and catch scope or feasibility problems before they become delivery risk.
• Get hands-on when it matters - pressure-test a data model, sketch an integration approach, or validate a data assumption yourself when it's faster than waiting on someone else.

Use case adoption and expansion

• Identifythe highest-value use cases across your portfolio and build the business case for each, including baseline metrics, target outcomes, and ROImeasurement.
• Drive pilot-to-production conversion by removing organizational and technical blockers that stall adoption after a use case proves out technically.
• Build the executive relationships that surface the next use case before the customer asks for it, turning single-workflow engagements into multi-year account growth.
• Partner with Sales and Presales to shape expansion opportunities using direct field insight into where customer problems and appetite sit.

Playbooks and organizational contribution

• Codify what works across your portfolio into reusable patterns - scoping templates, value measurement frameworks, staffing models, and stakeholder playbooks - that other Directors and FDTLs can use.
• Feed field signal back into Product and Solutions on where the platform and base applications fall short of what customers actually need.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of experience in management consulting or FDE/delivery leadership, with meaningful time in enterprise software, professional services, or technical consulting; consulting leadership experience at the Associate Partner/Principal level (McKinsey, BCG, Bain, or equivalent) is strongly preferred.
• BS/MS in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Engineering, or equivalent practical experience.
• Prior people management experience - hiring, developing, and performance-managing a team, not just leading a workstream.
• A track record owning complex, multi-workstream delivery for Fortune 500 or large public-sector clients across multiple simultaneous engagements, with direct accountability for outcomes, not just process.
• Direct experience with AI agent deployment, LLM-based systems, or enterprise AI platforms in production, with enough technical fluency to understand data architecture, integration patterns, and agentic system concepts well enough to scope work and evaluate trade-offs.
• Comfortable enough with code to read a pull request, leverage agentic tools to write code, or follow a technical design doc without translation.
• Executive presence: comfortable running C-suite briefings, navigating enterprise politics, and holding firm on scope and priorities under pressure from a sponsor.
• High agency and comfort with ambiguity, including managing a team through it.
• Demonstrated ability to build trust with both a customer's business stakeholders and their technical teams simultaneously, and to build that same trust with a team you manage.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in a key industry vertical such as advanced manufacturing, energy, heavy industrial, CPG, agriculture, defense, or public sector.
• Prior experience in a forward-deployed, embedded delivery model at another enterprise software or AI platform vendor with a professional-services or forward-deployed motion.
• Experience building or scaling a delivery function or team, not just operating within one.

C3 AI provides excellent benefits, a competitive compensation package and generous equity plan.

C3 AI is proud to be an Equal Opportunity and Aff. Employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of any legally protected characteristics, including disabled and veteran status.