The Forward Deployed Engineer Track

Short, self-contained lessons, beginner→advanced at the FDE level. Each lesson teaches one idea tied to the mission — be genuinely ready for Forward Deployed Engineer (AI) work in three months — and every lab produces a real artifact (working code, an eval harness, a demo, a scoping doc) that goes into your portfolio repo and works as interview evidence. One continuous scenario threads the course: a fictional virtual-care provider whose systems you prototype, ground, evaluate, harden, and finally deliver as a full field engagement. Grounded in verified 2026 sources: real FDE job postings, current Anthropic and OpenAI engineering docs, and recognized practitioners on evals, agents, and production LLM systems.

Lessons

Module 1 · The FDE Role & Mindset · Beginner

• Lesson 01 What a Forward Deployed Engineer Actually Does Half engineer, half consultant, full owner — the role's Palantir origins, the 2026 market, the four competencies hiring managers actually test, and your first artifact: a gap map from three real job postings. ⏱ ~13 min lesson · 🧪 ~45 min lab

Reference

• Your portfolio Artifact Tracker Tick off the 13 lab artifacts as you produce them — the raw material of your portfolio repo and interview stories.
• Living document Glossary The canonical vocabulary for the course — the FDE role, context engineering, agents, RAG, evals, guardrails. Every lesson uses these terms exactly.