Forward Deployed Engineers and the future of software — Forward deployed engineering is defined

• Forward deployed engineering (FDE) is defined more by accountability to customers than by a specific skill set; the role has become so broad that it risks being nonsensical without that focus. Implication: Agent/tool builders should design for tight customer feedback loops, not just technical features.

• Sierra calls its FDE-like role "agent engineer" to emphasize the technical work (building agents) over just customer obsession; most customer-specific work happens at the orchestration layer, not in the models themselves. Implication: Toolchain value lies in orchestration and integration, not just model selection.

• Product engineering and FDE are converging: when code is cheap, translating customer insights into product becomes easier; customer-facing engineers should build product, and product engineers should talk to customers. Implication: Developer tools should blur the line between customer-facing and product engineering roles.

原文：Forward Deployed Engineers and the future of software engineering · 作者 Latent Space