Forward Deployed Engineer, Team Lead
Luminai
San Francisco, CA · $190k–$270k a year · Posted August 11, 2026
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Where San Francisco, CA ranks
Where San Francisco, CA placed in our monthly rankings, month by month. Each month stays online at its own address.
November 2026
- #1Best cities for security jobs316 openings · of 20
- #1Best cities for technology jobs7,178 openings · of 100
- #1Best cities for financial services pay after cost of living$173k · of 33
- #1Best cities for entry-level jobs that want AI skills35% · of 100
- #1Best cities for entry-level jobs that want AI skills in the West Coast35% · of 54
- #1Cities with the most jobs that do not need a four-year degree in the West Coast902 jobs · of 47
Rankings about engineering jobs
- Best cities for software and engineering jobs #1 San Francisco (3,412 openings)
- Best cities for engineering pay after cost of living #1 San Mateo ($216k)
- Most requested AI skills in engineering jobs #1 AI tools in daily work (6.1%)
- AI tools named most often in engineering jobs #1 Claude (1.7%)
- Employers with the most engineering jobs #1 Amazon (2,992 roles)
Pay compared with the market
This listing pays about $230,000 a year. Across 123 open forward deployed engineer listings that state pay, the middle half runs $165,000 to $238,000 and the median is $200,000. That is inside the middle half of those listings, 15% above the median.
Listed pay is what employers advertise, not what people are paid.
Forward Deployed Engineer salaries by state · Check your own pay
How AI is used in this kind of work
Among software developers, AI is already used for some of the tasks. Measured exposure for software developers: 29% (some).
Share of this job’s tasks that AI is already used for at work, from real usage. It is not a forecast of job loss, and a low number means no use seen yet. Source: Anthropic Economic Index.
Skills this job asks for
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About the job
ABOUT LUMINAI
Healthcare operations have always depended on people to bridge the gaps that technology couldn't. It relies on complex manual work to carry out critical internal processes, yet most health systems don’t have enough resources to properly automate these tasks, leaving them stuck in outdated, labor-intensive SOPs.
Luminai structures the chaos, automates the manual handoffs, and deploys end-to-end workflows across every system, providing the integrated intelligence layer to improve processes over time. By delegating to autonomous AI systems those mission-critical workflows that previously expended valuable human time, Luminai allows doctors and administrators to do what they do best: Focus on Patients.
We've raised $60M in funding, including our recent Series B led by Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia India), with participation from healthcare-focused Define Ventures and continued support from General Catalyst and Y Combinator. We're backed by some of the best investors in Silicon Valley, including Kevin Weil (Chief Product Officer at OpenAI), Arash Ferdowsi (co-founder of Dropbox), Katie Stanton (former VP Global Media, Twitter), and CEOs of companies such as Flexport, Notion, Front, Ramp, and Twitch.
Our team is in-office 4 days a week (Monday - Friday, Wednesday optional WFH) in either San Francisco, California or New York, New York.
About the role
As a Forward Deployed Engineering Lead, you will sit at the intersection of engineering, product, and customer delivery, while also raising the bar for how the FDE team operates. You'll embed directly with customers, deeply understand their workflows, and design and deploy AI-powered solutions that deliver immediate, real-world impact, while also setting the technical standard for the team around you.
This is a highly autonomous, hands-on role for someone who thrives in ambiguous environments, enjoys working directly with customers, and wants to shape product direction through what they see in the field. You'll partner closely with Product and Engineering to turn customer needs into scalable systems that improve how healthcare organizations operate, and you'll bring the judgment of a more senior builder to a team that's still growing into that muscle.
What You'll Do
- Embed directly with customers to understand their workflows, constraints, and success criteria
- Design, build, and deploy AI-driven solutions tailored to real operational problems
- Build and maintain production systems including APIs, integrations, monitoring, and feedback loops
- Translate business requirements and customer needs into technical architectures and implementations
- Operate in high-stakes environments where reliability, speed, and judgment matter
- Identify patterns across customer deployments and feed insights back into core product and platform development
- Partner closely with Product and Engineering to influence roadmap, abstractions, and long-term system design
- Own deployments end-to-end, from initial scoping through launch and iteration
- Set technical direction and best practices for the FDE team, raising the bar on code quality, architecture decisions, and deployment rigor
- Mentor and unblock other FDEs, acting as a senior voice in the room on ambiguous technical and customer tradeoffs
What We're Looking For
- 5+ years of software engineering experience, ideally as an FDE or in backend / systems-focused work
- A track record of being the senior, steady hand on a team, comfortable operating with less oversight and setting the bar for others
- Strong proficiency in Python (TypeScript / JavaScript experience is a plus)
- Experience working with cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP, or Azure)
- Ability to translate ambiguous requirements into working, production-ready systems
- Strong communication skills and comfort working with both technical and non-technical stakeholders
- High ownership mindset with the ability to operate independently in fast-changing environments
- Experience with AI systems (LLMs, vector databases, prompt engineering, or agent frameworks) is a strong plus