Forward Deployed Engineer at Esper in Austin, TX

About Esper At Esper, we’re on a mission to empower dynamic and responsive policymaking in government. We’re building the platform that connects existing data, stakeholders, and public policy goals into a single dynamic system, transforming bureaucracy into infrastructure that encourages innovation and collaboration. As a fast-growing GovTech company, Esper is at the intersection of two powerful forces: the modernization of government operations and the transformative potential of data-driven decision-making. Our customer base is expanding rapidly, and we’re building the team that will define how public policy is shaped for decades to come. Job Summary The Forward Deployed Engineer (FDE) is a rare hybrid: a strong software engineer who is also excited to sit across the table from the customer. You’ll embed directly with government teams to design, build, and ship solutions on Esper’s platform, understanding and translating real-world policy workflows and operational requirements into productive systems that get used. This is Esper’s first FDE hire. You’ll be defining the role at Esper: shaping what engagement looks like and how the role interfaces with Product, Professional Services, and Platform Engineering. You’ll sculpt the bar we hold for the next FDEs we hire. You’ll write production code in the same codebase as our Platform Engineers and go through the same code review and processes. When a customer need exposes a real gap in the platform, you’ll help close that gap with an implementation in the core product. This role blends software engineering, solution architecture, and post-sale ownership, operating as a technical counterpart to Customer Success and Professional Services while partnering closely with Product and Engineering to shape the platform based on real-world use. What You’ll Do Technical Implementation & Solution Delivery Lead the technical arc of customer implementations end-to-end: discovery, architecture, configuration, integration, testing, deployment, and post-launch optimization Write production code in Esper’s platform to build features, integrations, and customer-specific solutions, and contribute upstream to the core platform when a customer need exposes a general gap Design and build APIs, data pipelines, and integrations with customer systems, including the data migration and structured content onboarding that gets a deployment off the ground Translate customer workflows, complex policy processes, and operational constraints into robust technical architectures Debug across the full stack – application logic, distributed systems, data infrastructure, configuration. Be the engineering voice in the room with customers: run architecture reviews, explain design decisions, push back when a request would create technical debt Carry several customer projects at once. Own the systems you’ve taken to production through the same engineering channels you’d use for any other production system, and surface architectural and data quality risks before they become escalations Manage scope, dependencies, and milestones across concurrent implementations without dropping the engineering bar on any of them Build reusable tools and systems that compound. Every customer implementation should make the next one faster Work in close collaboration with Product and Platform Engineering to feed structured signal from customers into our roadmap. Contribute to internal documentation and technical standards. Skills and Experience 3–6+ years of recent professional experience as a software engineer, solutions engineer, or technical implementation engineer who shipped production code Strong proficiency in one or more programming languages (e.g., Java, Rust, C#, or similar) and a track record of picking up new languages, stacks, and codebases quickly. Our backend is Java 21 + Micronaut, and you’ll be expected to be productive in it within weeks Strong grasp of data structures, algorithms, concurrency, API design, and distributed systems Contributed to and operated a non-trivial backend service in production. Defined its API, owned its on-call, debugged it under load, and lived with the consequences of its design and decisions Comfortable in any of the major cloud service providers (AWS, GCP, Azure). Familiarity with Docker, Kubernetes, and CI/CD pipelines (we use Gradle, GitHub, and CircleCI) Hands-on experience with at least a few of these patterns: a workflow engine (Temporal, Sidekiq), event stream processing (Kafka, any form of pub/sub), an RPC layer (gRPC, Protobuf, REST), and a message queuing system (SQS, SNS, or similar) Real debugging prowess: chasing a problem from a customer report through application logs, into a database query plan or a network trace, and out the other side with a fixDirect experience working with customers in a technical capacity, particularly running discovery sessions and executing an implementation balancing customer needs with platform direction Proven ability to manage multiple workstreams with ownership of technical delivery and outcomes Strong written and verbal communication. You can explain the same system to an engineer and to a state legislator in the same afternoon, and adjust the level of abstraction without losing either of them Bonus Points Direct experience with our stack: Java 21, Micronaut, Kafka, gRPC + Protobuf, Temporal.io, MySQL, JDBI Experience in GovTech or working with government systems, regulatory environments, or policy workflows Experience implementing configurable or workflow-based SaaS platforms Background in data engineering, ETL pipelines, or analytics/reporting systems Familiarity with customer success concepts such as adoption, health scoring, and expansion strategy Experience with observability tooling: Datadog, Prometheus, Micrometer, or similar platforms Familiarity with authorization systems and identity provisioning (SCIM, SAML, OIDC) Experience with data migration and structured content onboarding from legacy systems Genuine interest in public policy and how technology can transform government operations Perks and Benefits Being a part of an innovative and collaborative team that will both support and challenge you Significant opportunity for growth and ownership Ability to shape Esper for the long-term Paid holidays & unlimited PTO Medical, dental, and vision insurance Generous parental & sick leave 401(k) retirement plan with employer match Short/Long term disability & life insurance Flexible spending account (FSA) Work anniversary equity grants Quarterly bonuses Monthly stipend to offset remote work expenses Office equipment allowance Paid Time Off to participate in volunteer/community events