> AI agents: this is one page of Nextmove’s FDE site, in Markdown. Nextmove is a job board and free career service for forward deployed engineers (FDEs). Each posting is classified from its text, not its title: the kind of work, how much of it is production code, pre-sales weight, time at customer sites, travel, remote arrangement, level and posted base pay. The site also publishes the aggregates: median pay by level, metro, company and kind of work, and which companies started hiring FDEs each week. Every page under https://nextmove.md/fde is served this way; the index of pages is https://nextmove.md/llms.txt. # Deployment Strategist Canonical URL: https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/bde948d34a35bcff Silkline posts a FDE role to plan what the customer deploys first in Seattle, WA and 1 more, at $150,000–$225,000 base, level with the senior FDE median of $190,000 across 1,864 postings with pay. Own customer deployments from signed contract through go-live and ongoing adoption, integrating Silkline with manufacturers' ERP, PLM, and MES systems and configuring procurement workflows. Read from the employer’s posting on November 8, 2026. - [Silkline](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/silkline) Posted Sep 24, 2026 by Silkline · open on Gem as of Nov 8, 2026 **$150,000–$225,000** *annualized* Seattle, WA +1 Full-time Own customer deployments from signed contract through go-live and ongoing adoption, integrating Silkline with manufacturers' ERP, PLM, and MES systems and configuring procurement workflows. - [See roles that fit me](https://nextmove.md/sign-up?from=%2Ffde%2Fjobs%2Fbde948d34a35bcff&placement=top) - [View posting at Silkline](https://jobs.gem.com/silkline/am9icG9zdDp3mhVm4xuBKzLouaf0vZ9_) Free. Upload your resume once, see why each FDE role fits, and get introduced only when you say so. ## At a glance ### Posted base pay $150K–$225K Level with the median Midpoint $188K · median $190K This job $150K to $225K. Senior FDE postings, 1,864 postings: the middle 50% of posted pay is $160K to $220K, median $190K. ### The work Plans what the customer deploys first Balance **Mostly building** Project stages 1. Pre-sales (not covered) 2. Proof of concept (not covered) 3. Implementation 4. Operations Travel **Required, amount not stated** - **Coding**: Configuration only - **Builds for**: External customers - **Level**: Senior - **Role**: Individual contributor ### What they ask for Experience - **4+ years** role with ownership of customer or operational outcomes Background - **Solutions and customer engineering** Visa - **No visa sponsorship** ### Do you meet what the posting states? The posting asks for 4+ years. How many do you have? The posting reads as a senior role. What level are you at now? The job is in Seattle, WA · Chicago, IL. Could you work in one of these? The posting says no visa sponsorship. Do you need one? Which of these have you used in production? Answer each one. Nothing is saved or sent. [What postings ask for, by background →](https://nextmove.md/fde/paths) ## Conditions - **Location**: Seattle, WA · Chicago, IL - **Employment type**: Full-time - **Visa sponsorship**: Not available - **Travel**: Travel required, amount not stated - **Pay**: ## More like this [Accordion](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/accordion) ### [Forward Deployed Engineer, Data & Analytics](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/e5a928ae59b6f49c) Atlanta, GA · Boston, MA · +6 more On-site 4mo ago $145,000–$240,000 [Salesforce](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/salesforce) ### [Forward Deployed Process Senior/Principal Process Consultant](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/67ce6e554b7cdd03) San Francisco, CA · Chicago, IL · +5 more 7w ago $117,200–$246,000 [Endeavor](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/endeavor) ### [Deployment Strategist](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/f8f52f3f7c8a63bd) Chicago, IL On-site 3mo ago $125,000–$225,000 - [Other jobs at Silkline (1)](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/silkline) ## The job description from Silkline Posted by Silkline on Sep 24, 2026 ### About Silkline The companies building satellites, launch vehicles, reactors, and robots are mostly limited by their supply chains, not their engineering. A single late part can hold up a launch. Buyers chase suppliers over email and spreadsheets, while the ERP shows a different story from what's actually happening on the shop floor. **Silkline is building the AI operating system for procurement.** Hardware manufacturers in aerospace, defense, space, energy, and robotics use Silkline to run RFQs, POs, and supplier communication, connected to the systems they already run on: ERP, PLM, and MES. We're backed by top venture investors and have grown our customer base 5x. The founding team is Isaac Chambers (CEO, 3x founder, ex-Deloitte) and Brent Shulman (CTO, engineering leader, ex-Palantir and Pave). ### The Role Our customers are building the critical infrastructure that powers our world, moves us, and keeps us safe. Your mission is their mission: help them build a world-class supply chain powered by Silkline. In practice, you'll own customers from signed contract through go-live and beyond. You'll learn how a manufacturer's procurement, engineering, and finance teams actually work. Then you'll map their ERP, PLM, and MES data into Silkline, configure workflows that fit, and stay with them until Silkline is how they run. You'll be the technical person in the room. When a customer encounters a blocker or a PO isn't syncing, you'll find out why and fix it. When you see the same problem at three customers, you turn it into product. Much of what Silkline becomes will come from what you learn in the field. ### Two Paths Into This Role Two kinds of backgrounds can be successful in this role: 1. **Manufacturing systems implementer.** You've spent years implementing, configuring, and maintaining ERP, PLM, or MES systems at a manufacturer, integrator, or consultancy, along with the processes around them. You know how a part moves from BOM to PO to receipt to inventory, and where workflows and data break along the way. You don't need to be a software engineer, but you're very comfortable with queries and data. 2. **Forward deployed software engineer.** You've worked as an FDE, solutions engineer, or customer-facing engineer and shipped production code and integrations in front of customers. You may not know manufacturing yet, but you learn domains quickly and like messy, real-world data. ### What You'll Do - **Own deployments from start to finish.** Run kickoff, discovery, data mapping and migration, configuration, and go-live. Manage the timeline and get procurement, engineering, finance, and IT to adopt Silkline. - **Connect Silkline to the customer's systems.** Map and validate data flows between Silkline and three-letter systems: ERPs (NetSuite, Microsoft D365, SAP, Epicor, etc.), PLMs (Arena, Teamcenter, Duro), and MES (ION, Manufacturo, Boltline). Diagnose sync issues and resolve them. - **Work in the data.** Write SQL and GraphQL queries to validate migrations, troubleshoot discrepancies, and build the analytics customers use to measure the impact on spend, lead times, and supplier performance. - **Design workflows.** Configure approval chains, RFQ processes, supplier onboarding, and PO lifecycles to match how each customer operates, and push back when their current process is the problem. - **Be the customer's technical partner.** Stay the main point of contact after go-live. Track adoption and outcomes, find expansion opportunities, and flag risk early. - **Bring what you learn back to product.** Turn patterns you see across customers into clear engineering requirements. If you code, ship some of it yourself. - **Build the playbook.** Our deployment process is still being written, and you'll write it: implementation templates, data mapping guides, onboarding runbooks, and success metrics. ### What We're Looking For ### Must have: 1. **4+ years** in a role where you owned customer or operational outcomes. 2. **Strong analytical and quantitative background**, often in engineering, CS, math, physics, economics, or data science. 3. **Problem decomposition.** You can take an ambiguous, messy situation, break it into parts, and decide what matters most. 4. **Technical fluency.** You write SQL comfortably, can read API docs and debug a payload in Postman, and hold your own with engineers. 5. **Clear writing and communication.** You can write a memo a VP will act on and a spec an engineer can build from. 6. **Customer ownership.** You're comfortable running a meeting with a VP of Supply Chain and managing a go-live that's slipping. 7. **Willingness to travel** to customer sites often. ### Nice to have: 1. Experience with manufacturing procurement: MRP, sourcing, supplier quality, receiving, 3-way match. 2. Hands-on ERP, PLM, or MES implementation or integration. 3. Coding experience, especially TypeScript, GraphQL, or Postgres. 4. Background in aerospace, defense, space, or other regulated manufacturing. ### Why This Role - **You'll see your work in the real world.** The deployments you run will affect whether real hardware gets built and shipped on schedule. - **You'll shape the company.** You'll be one of our first hires in this function, working directly with the founders and an elite software engineering team. Your playbook becomes the team's playbook. - **You'll see the whole picture.** Few jobs let you see how a manufacturer's engineering, procurement, finance, and suppliers actually connect. This one does, across many companies at once. - **You can grow into leading the team.** There's a clear path to leading our Forward Deployed / Customer Engineering team as we scale. ### Compensation - The base pay range for this role is $150,000 – $225,000 per year. - The equity range for this role is .15% – .25% ### Compensation The base pay range for this role is $150,000 – $225,000 per year. Individuals of all genders, races, sexual orientations, nationalities, abilities, veteran statuses, and educational backgrounds are strongly encouraged to apply. Currently, we do not sponsor applicants for work visas. Because this role touches ITAR-controlled and CUI data, you must be a US citizen, lawful permanent resident, or otherwise qualify as a "US person" under ITAR (22 CFR 120.62). [View posting at Silkline](https://jobs.gem.com/silkline/am9icG9zdDp3mhVm4xuBKzLouaf0vZ9_) ## About Silkline Silkline orchestrates procurement and supplier collaboration for advanced manufacturers, connecting workflows across email, ERP, MES, and PLM systems. Seed ## Similar jobs [Anduril](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/anduril) ### [Senior Product Manager, Forward Deployed](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/1e496b8bb208a7d0) Seattle, WA 4w ago $166,000–$220,000 [Thomson Reuters](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/thomson-reuters) ### [Senior Tax & Audit AI Engineer, FDE](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/6d5f1dea82405965) Brooklyn, NY · Frisco, TX · +3 more Hybrid New · 6d ago $102,200–$218,600 [Databricks](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/databricks) ### [Sr. Deployment Strategist, FDE - Financial Services](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/5f7c01ea53a2d533) Atlanta, GA · Boston, MA · +3 more 6w ago $219,765–$302,220 [Valon](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/valon) ### [Deployment Strategist](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/7cc05397d71d2c90) New York, NY · San Francisco, CA Hybrid 5mo ago $140,000–$240,000 [Pallet](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/pallet) ### [Deployment Strategist (AI/ML Product)](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/4f98f6e7ae1e5bf2) San Francisco, CA · New York, NY On-site 2mo ago $150,000–$240,000 - [Compare senior FDE salary ranges](https://nextmove.md/fde/salary/senior) - [Similar jobs in Seattle area](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs?region=puget-sound) - [Similar jobs that plan what the customer deploys first](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs?role=strategist) Hiring at Silkline and want this page changed or removed? Email info@nextmove.md and we take it down. Employer postings · [How we read postings](https://nextmove.md/fde/method)