Founding Forward-Deployed Engineer

Who we are is what we do.

Deel is the all-in-one payroll and HR platform for global teams. Our vision is to unlock global opportunity for every person, team, and business. Built for the way the world works today, Deel combines HRIS, payroll, compliance, benefits, performance, and equipment management into one seamless platform. With AI-powered tools and a fully owned payroll infrastructure, Deel supports every worker type in 150+ countries—helping businesses scale smarter, faster, and more compliantly.

Among the largest globally distributed companies in the world, our team of 7,000 spans more than 100 countries, speaks 74 languages, and brings a connected and dynamic culture that drives continuous learning and innovation for our customers.

Why should you be part of our success story?

As the fastest-growing Software as a Service (SaaS) company in history, Deel is transforming how global talent connects with world-class companies – breaking down borders that have traditionally limited both hiring and career opportunities. We're not just building software; we're creating the infrastructure for the future of work, enabling a more diverse and inclusive global economy. In 2024 alone, we paid $11.2 billion to workers in nearly 100 currencies and provided healthcare and benefits to workers in 109 countries—ensuring people get paid and protected, no matter where they are.

Our momentum is reflected in our achievements and customer satisfaction: CNBC Disruptor 50,  Forbes Cloud 100, Deloitte Fast 500, and repeated recognition on Y Combinator's top companies list – all while maintaining a 4.83 average rating from 15,000 reviews across G2, Trustpilot, Captera, Apple and Google.

Your experience at Deel will be a career accelerator. At the forefront of the global work revolution, you'll tackle complex challenges that impact millions of people's working lives. With our momentum—backed by a $17.3 billion valuation and $1 B in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) in just over five years—you'll drive meaningful impact while building expertise that makes you a sought-after leader in the transformation of global work.

About Akai

Akai by Deel is the agent platform built for your operations. We build cutting-edge AI technology to automate the manual, repetitive work that operational teams grind through every day — the work that doesn’t have an API, doesn’t have a clean integration, and doesn’t get solved by traditional automation.

We built Akai out of Deel’s own frustration. To run one of the most complex financial structures in the world — transacting billions of dollars per month across 170+ countries — we needed agents that could operate the same systems our teams do, only faster, more accurately, and without the burnout. Nothing on the market did it. So we built it ourselves and it worked. Now we’re bringing it to every operations team that’s been told to “just hire more people” to clear the queue.We're operating as a small, scrappy team inside Deel — engineering-led, moving fast, defining what delivery looks like as we go.

The Role

We're looking for a Founding Forward Deployed Engineer to help us build the delivery function from the ground up. You'll work directly with Fortune 500 finance and operations teams — sitting with them, understanding what they're actually stuck on, and building the agents and custom tooling that solve it. You own the outcome end-to-end and will be expected to be ready to solve your own problems and be the expert on the product.

This is a founding role in the truest sense: you are joining a small team, as one of the first client-facing roles and you will define how Akai delivers value to customers as we scale. That means the role is unusually generative — you'll shape the playbook, not follow one.
We're being deliberate about the profile: we're not looking for a senior specialist. We're looking for someone 2-4 years into their career who's been building things — with AI, with agents, with automation — on the side, and wants to make that the day job. Hungry, adaptable, and comfortable being dropped into ambiguous customer environments where the right answer isn't obvious yet.

What you'll do

• Own customer implementations end-to-end. Discovery, solution design, agent build, deployment, monitoring, expansion — you're the technical relationship
• Sit with enterprise customers (finance, treasury, payments, ops teams) to understand their workflows, then translate that into agent-based solutions on the Akai platform
• Write production code (AI is your best friend here). Build custom integrations against internal ERPs, portals, and proprietary systems. Ship the tooling that makes each customer successful
• Feed customer learnings back into the Akai core product — you're the shortest loop between what customers need and what gets built
• Drive expansion through delivery quality. Our pricing is usage-based, so effective agents = revenue growth. Your best upsell is a working demo, not a slide deck
• Define what "great" looks like for the Akai FDE function as it scales from one to many

What you'll bring

• 2-4 years of software engineering, solutions engineering, consulting, start-up or forward-deployed experience. Titles vary, and direct engineering experience isn’t required — what matters is that you’re comfortable with understanding code, you’ve built products for customers or you’ve helped customers navigate difficult technical problems 
• Comfort with ambiguity. You've worked in environments where the right answer wasn't handed to you, and you've built your way to it
• Curiosity about AI agents. You don't need to be a specialist — you need to have played with LLMs, agent frameworks, or automation on your own time, and formed opinions about what works
• Customer instincts. You can sit across from a Fortune 500 finance lead, understand their real problem (not the one they described first), and translate it into something buildable
• Strong communication. You can explain a technical trade-off to a non-technical stakeholder without dumbing it down
• Ideally located in the Americas time zone (US, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina) but we’re flexible. You will be expected to support clients predominantly in AMS and EMEA, so your timezone should reflect that

Bonus points

• You've built and shipped an agent or automation project on the side, on your own initiative
• Background in fintech, payments, treasury, or financial operations
• Prior experience at a smaller startup where you owned outcomes across engineering, product, and customer work
• You've been on an FDE-like team at a smaller AI or data infrastructure company
• You've worked with legacy or undocumented systems and enjoy the reverse-engineering part

Total Rewards

Our workforce deserves fair and competitive pay that meets them where they are. With scalable benefits, rewards, and perks, our total rewards programs reflect our commitment to inclusivity and access for all.

Our salary range reflects gross base salary. For commercial roles with commission eligibility, this figure represents On-Target Earnings (OTE), inclusive of base salary and target commission.

Salary ranges are quoted in USD as a consistent global reference. Your offer will be localized to your country's currency using a market-aligned conversion.

Final pay is based on objective, job-related criteria including experience, skills, and location.

We don't ask about salary history. Offers are based on the role and what you bring to it.

Some things you'll enjoy

• Stock grant opportunities dependent on your role, employment status and location
• Additional perks and benefits based on your employment status and country
• The flexibility of remote work, including optional WeWork access

Locations:

Argentina, Colombia, Perú, Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Uruguay, Costa Rica, Mexico, Panama, Venezuela, Paraguay, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Puerto Rico, El Salvador, Guatemala

At Deel, we're an equal-opportunity employer that values diversity and positively encourage applications from suitably qualified and eligible candidates regardless of  race, religion, sex, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability status, pregnancy or maternity or other applicable legally protected characteristics.