Robotics Forward Deployed Engineer

Tutor; Watertown (MA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health + dental

Unlimited PTO

Job summary

Tutor Intelligence is deploying robotics solutions at production sites, with the engineer serving as the primary technical partner for customer sites. This role blends field presence, troubleshooting across software and hardware, and building tooling to reduce manual work over time.

You will diagnose complex, real-world issues, translate field insights into product feedback, and work closely with customers’ operations teams and internal engineering to drive durable fixes.

Qualifications

• Demonstrated ability to work with vague, multi-factor problems and drive resolution.
• Excellent judgment on what to fix, automate, or elevate.
• Strong relationship orientation and customer trust over years.
• Clear, technical communication with engineers and non-technical operators.

Responsibilities

• Own a portfolio of customer sites end-to-end as the primary technical partner.
• Automate repetitive tasks with tooling, scripts, and playbooks.
• Develop deep knowledge of robot systems to diagnose issues.
• Diagnose and resolve multi-factor issues in real-world environments.
• Collaborate with engineering to implement deeper fixes with field validation.
• Track fleet health, uptime, throughput, and customer satisfaction.

Skills

Ambiguity tolerance

Judgment

Relationship orientation

Clear communication

Job description

The Company

Tutor Intelligence is building the technology and processes to let robots go where they've never gone before: the average American factory and warehouse. We understand that general-purpose and generally intelligent robots are going to be built in our lifetimes, and we're not content to sit on the sidelines.

Tutor Intelligence is building the technology and processes to let robots go where they've never gone before: the average American factory and warehouse. We understand that general-purpose and generally intelligent robots are going to be built in our lifetimes, and we're not content to sit on the sidelines.

Founded by MIT alumni and backed with over $40M in funding by leading investors in AI and robotics, Tutor combines human and artificial intelligence to build something greater than the sum of its parts - a Tutor Intelligence. As an AI software company that deploys its inventions directly into the facilities that need them, every line of code, process change, and decision at Tutor has a direct impact on the physical economy.

The Role

We're looking for a technically credible, customer-oriented engineer to own a portfolio of customer sites running Tutor robots in production. You'll be the primary partner for each of your sites - the person their operations, engineering, and maintenance teams call first when something matters - and you'll be accountable for the operational and technical success of those deployments over time.

This isn't a traditional customer success role, and it isn't core product engineering. You won't own the product roadmap or build new robotic capabilities - that's R&D. But you will write code: the scripts, tooling, dashboards, and playbook logic that turn today's manual interventions into things that run themselves. The point of the job is to make your sites need you less over time, and to solve the hard, multi-factor problems that no playbook covers yet. You'll develop deep working knowledge of how our robots actually behave in the real world, diagnose issues across software, mechanical, and process dimensions, and partner with engineering to drive the deeper fixes - bringing the field context, prioritization, and validation that makes those fixes right.

The role is also genuinely relationship-driven. The customers in your portfolio will know you, trust you, and rely on you. You'll spend real time on-site at your facilities, remote time on diagnosis, tuning, and building, and ongoing time partnering with your customers' engineering and operations leaders. Your insights from the field will directly shape our product roadmap. This role sits at the intersection of robotics, operations, and customer partnership - and the right person is energized by all three.

Responsibilities

• Own a portfolio of customer sites end-to-end: be the primary technical partner for each, build deep trust with their operations, engineering, and maintenance teams, and be accountable for the operational and technical success of those deployments
• Automate yourself out of the repetitive work. Convert recurring manual interventions into tooling, scripts, and playbooks that your customers and our remote team can run without you. The fleet grows; your manual workload shouldn't. This is the core of the job, not a side effect
• Develop deep working knowledge of our robot systems - software, hardware, and operational characteristics - sufficient to diagnose issues credibly and build real solutions at the boundary of the product
• Diagnose and resolve ambiguous, multi-factor issues in real-world environments - across software configuration, mechanical adjustment, process change, and root‑cause analysis - and own the ones with no playbook yet
• Partner with engineering on the deeper fixes: package high‑confidence cases with repro conditions, logs, and a likely root cause, and bring field validation rather than just a complaint
• Track the health and performance of your fleet - uptime, reliability, throughput, customer satisfaction - and act proactively on early signals
• Be the voice of your customers in our internal roadmap conversations; translate field reality into structured product insight
• Partner with Account Executives on expansion conversations, where operational success creates natural openings for growth

Requirements

You clear a real technical floor, and then we select hard on judgment and people skills. Both halves matter; the second is what we weight most.

What we actually rank on

• Thrives in ambiguity - can take a vague, half-described, multi-factor problem with no clear owner and drive it to resolution. This is the single quality we weight most heavily
• Strong judgment about what to fix yourself, what to automate, and what to elevate
• Genuine relationship orientation - you take pride in being trusted by a customer over years, not just in shipping a project
• Clear communication in both directions: technically credible with customer engineering and ops teams, and plain-spoken with non-technical operators and leaders

The reality of the job

• Roughly 30% travel to customer sites. The work happens on factory and warehouse floors - early shifts, PPE, noise, and real industrial environments. If that energizes you, great; if it doesn't, this isn't the role

Nice to haves (zero or more)

• Direct experience deploying or supporting robotics in production
• Background in warehouse, manufacturing, or other industrial operations
• Experience bringing field context into engineering decisions to resolve technical issues
• Deep interest in robotics, automation, or the future of physical AI

Why This Role Is Unique

• Work at the intersection of cutting-edge robotics and real-world industrial operations
• Own the success of real customers running real robots in production - your work directly determines whether the future of physical AI happens in their facility
• Join during a period of rapid growth, where this function is central to scaling the fleet
• Help define what this function looks like at Tutor - you'll be among the people who build the tooling and playbooks that later hires inherit

Tutor Intelligence is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome applicants from all backgrounds and are committed to building a diverse and inclusive team. All offers include fully covered health + dental and unlimited PTO.