Forward Deployed Engineer
AI summary of the role
Emerge Career is a mission-driven startup building a workforce development platform for justice-impacted individuals.
What you’ll do
- Conduct market and vocational research to identify high-opportunity trades and validate new program ideas using labor market data and employer demand.
- Engage directly with external partners (training vendors, employers, credentialing bodies) and translate feedback into product and operational requirements.
- Prototype MVPs for early-stage tools and automations using React, TypeScript, Retool, Zapier, and AI-native tools.
- Lead the first cohort for each new vocation, ensuring success from enrollment through employment.
What you’ll bring
- Willing to relocate and work in-person in New York City
- Experience taking a project from 0 → 1 (founder, early engineer, or independent builder)
- Strong proficiency in React and TypeScript
- Demonstrated ability to conduct market research and validate new ideas
Technologies
React · TypeScript · Retool · Zapier · N8N · Customer.io · AI-native tools
Source and classification
Deployment strategy · Evidence for this classification:
60% of formerly incarcerated people remain unemployed a year after incarceration, seeking work but not finding it. The reality is shocking, workforce development programs are severely limited inside prison, with only one-third of incarcerated people ever participating. To worsen, the available prison jobs offer meager wages, often less than $1 per hour, and often do not equip individuals with the skills for long-term stable employment. We’re looking for a Forward Deployed Engineer — someone who can think like a founder, ship like an engineer, and operate like a field strategist. You’ll be embedded in the launch of new vocations from scratch — identifying market needs, engaging stakeholders, prototyping tools and systems, and turning early experiments into scalable programs that become part of our national blueprint. This is not a traditional software engineering role. You’ll code,
More from the job description
Who We Are: Emerge Career’s mission is to break the cycle of poverty and incarceration. We’re not just building software; we’re creating pathways to real second chances. Through an all-in-one platform deeply embedded within the criminal justice system, we recruit, train, and place justice-impacted individuals into life-changing careers. Our vision is to become the country’s unified workforce development system, replacing disconnected brick-and-mortar job centers with one integrated, tech-powered solution that meets low-income individuals exactly where they are. Today, the federal government spends billions annually on education and training programs, yet only about 70% of participants graduate, just 38.6% secure training-related employment, and average first-year earnings hover around $34,708. By contrast, our seven-person team has already outperformed the job centers in two entire states (Vermont and South Dakota) in just the past year. With an 89% graduation rate and 92% of graduates securing training-related employment, our alumni aren’t just getting jobs—they’re launching new lives with average first-year earnings of $77,352. The results speak for themselves, and we’re just getting started. Before Emerge, our founders Zo and Gabe co-founded Ameelio, an award-winning tech nonprofit that is dismantling the prison communication duopoly. Backed by tech luminaries like Reid [... source excerpt omitted ...] arket and vocational research to identify high-opportunity trades where Emerge can build new pathways. Validate new vocation ideas using labor market data, wage trends, licensing requirements, and employer demand. Define success metrics and “kill-switch” criteria for each new program before launch. 2. Stakeholder Engagement Engage directly with external partners — training vendors, employers, and credentialing bodies — to ensure programs are designed with end-to-end alignment. Translate stakeholder feedback into actionable product and operational requirements. Collaborate with internal ops and coaching teams to ensure field readiness for pilots. 3. Development & Prototyping P [... source excerpt omitted ...] d automations supporting each new vocation (using React, TypeScript, Retool, Zapier, and AI-native tools). Collaborate with other engineers to translate prototypes into scalable, production-ready systems. Collect field data and user insights to refine both the technical and operational blueprint. 4. Program Launch & Scale Lead the “first cohort” for each new vocation, combining product, data, and human touch to ensure success from enrollment through employment. Build dashboards, automations, and integrations that make early manual processes scalable. Document and codify what works — turning pilot learnings into SOPs, playbooks, and reusable infrastructure. Who You Are You’r
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