Forward Deployed Engineering Manager

deepset is hiring a Forward Deployed Engineering Manager for a remote role open to applicants in Germany. Level rates it ; you can apply on deepset.

Level's read on this job

On Level's scale, this forward deployed engineer role is Works on AI ●●●○: the daily work is on AI products, without building the model.
The posting lists this role as remote.
Tools and skills the posting cites include Haystack, RAG and engineering management.
Level lists 3 other open roles at deepset.
The role was posted within the past week.

AI in this role

Lead the Forward Deployed Engineering team delivering enterprise AI platform and RAG solutions into production.

haystackrag

ragengineering-managementteam-leadershiprag-pipelinescloud-deploymentcustomer-engineering

TL;DR

We’re hiring a Manager to lead our Forward Deployed Engineering (FDE) team in Customer Engineering. You build a healthy, high-trust team and make sure it delivers deepset’s AI Platform into enterprise and public sector production environments, on target and on quality. You came up close to the work and still go deep when it matters.

Why deepset

At deepset, we’re on a mission to make custom AI solutions accessible to every organization. With Haystack, thousands of developers build advanced LLM applications every day, while our enterprise-ready AI Platform helps companies turn large language models into business value. We’re remote-first, flexible, and built on a culture of trust and ownership. You’ll collaborate with top-tier tech talent, tackle meaningful challenges, and help transform complex AI into solutions that are simple, powerful, and ready for the real world.

What you will do

Lead and Develop the Team

Own team health and culture across the four FDE profiles (Advisory, Builder, Operating, Support): a safe space where hard questions are welcome and engineers share patterns instead of working in silos.
Run strong 1:1s and career conversations so every FDE knows where they stand and how to grow.
Build the hiring and onboarding pipeline for a remote-first, async-heavy team.
Clear blockers fast, and escalate the ones you can’t resolve before they become delivery risks.

Run the Delivery Engine

Staff the right FDE profile to the right engagement and deliver against your team’s utilization targets, protecting against both burnout and idle capacity.
Hold the technical bar: review architecture and solution decisions across RAG pipelines, retrieval quality, deployment topology, and production operations.
Deliver engagements on scope and on plan, follow our delivery processes, and own resolution of customer escalations.

Collaborate Across the Organization

Partner with the Delivery Lead and Value Engineers on scope, feasibility, and staffing, with clear ownership at each handoff.
Feed field insight to Product and Engineering, and build reusable patterns that reduce custom work.

What you bring to the team

Experience leading customer-facing engineering, professional services, or delivery teams in enterprise software, AI, or infrastructure.
Strong coaching instincts: you develop engineers and build high-trust teams.
Technical depth to hold the bar: RAG (retrieval, embeddings, re-ranking, evaluation), cloud and self-hosted deployments, model optimization, APIs, integrations, and IAM/security fundamentals.
Commercial awareness: you understand how scope, staffing, and execution affect utilization, revenue, and margin.
Clear, written and verbal communication with technical and executive audiences, and comfort with ambiguity in a remote-first setup.

Nice to have

Experience running services or delivery inside a SaaS or platform company navigating the move to enterprise and self-hosted deployments.
Experience with OKR frameworks and squad-based delivery organizations.
Familiarity with agent-based systems, LLM platforms, and AI-native engineering tooling-

Benefits

Remote-first setup with flexible hours & tech of your choice
30 days vacation + extra days for family sick leave
Competitive salary & stock options for every team member
Monthly sports & mental health support allowance with Oliva
Annual learning & development budget
Monthly team socials & in-person meetups
Dog-friendly Berlin HQ

About us

Founded in 2018, deepset builds open and enterprise-grade tools that help teams build AI with purpose. From Haystack, our open-source framework, to the Haystack Enterprise Platform, we give developers and organizations the building blocks to solve complex, high impact challenges with AI with full control, transparency, and sovereignty. Backed by GV and Balderton, we’re growing the world’s production AI community and customer base solving challenges too critical to get wrong.

How we rate this

Forward Deployed Engineering Manager at deepset rates 65 out of 100 for how much of the daily work is AI. That makes it Works on AI (AI Level 3 of 4). The level is about AI in the job, not seniority.

Classification

Works on AI. The daily work is on AI products, without building the model.

●●●● Builds AI80 to 100
●●●○ Works on AI60 to 79
●●○○ Uses AI40 to 59
●○○○ Little AI0 to 39

Levels come from how often the tools, models and workflows of the role are named in the posting itself. Read the description and count the AI tools, models and workflows it names.

Key facts

Forward Deployed Engineering Manager is an open job at deepset.
Level rates this role AI Level 3 of 4: Works on AI.
The role is based in Berlin and is marked remote.
The job was posted on October 22, 2026.
Seniority: lead.
Applications are handled by deepset. Apply on deepset

Prepare for this job

Built from this posting and from similar jobs on Level.

Skills and AI tools this role asks for

RAGEngineering ManagementTeam LeadershipRAG PipelinesCloud DeploymentCustomer EngineeringHaystack

Also common in forward deployed engineer jobs at this level

Python TypeScript JavaScript AI agents AWS Azure

Pay

Typical forward deployed engineer job: $182k

This posting doesn't list pay. Use the typical forward deployed engineer figure when pay comes up. See forward deployed engineer jobs

Questions you could be asked

How would you design a retrieval step so the model answers from real data instead of guessing?
Tell me about a project where engineering management was part of your work. What did you do?
Tell me about a project where team leadership was part of your work. What did you do?
Tell me about a project where rag pipelines was part of your work. What did you do?
Tell me about a project where cloud deployment was part of your work. What did you do?

Adapt your resume

List these exact terms on your resume: RAG, Engineering Management, Team Leadership, RAG Pipelines, and Cloud Deployment. An applicant tracking system matches the wording, not the idea.
Attach one line of real, concrete experience to at least one of them. A tool named with nothing behind it rarely survives a human read.
Show where AI is part of your daily process, not a one-off project. This role expects it to be a running habit.

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