Forward Deployed Engineer

Job Description

AgentLabs is an agentic transformation studio. We believe AI should make work better for the people doing it, so we build agentic systems where agents carry the volume, people keep the judgment, and the client's team owns the result. Production-grade agentic AI: governed, auditable, and theirs to run.

- The role

Forward deployed engineer means the engineer goes to the client. This is a senior role: you embed inside a Dutch mid-market company, at least three days a week on site, and build the agentic systems we scoped together with them: agents wired into their live systems, their data, and their people's daily work.

You are accountable for one outcome: agents doing real work in the client's production workflows, and a client team that can run the system after handover. A delivered artifact that nobody uses does not count.

Two things this role is not. It is not pre-sales wearing a fresher title, and it is not a consultancy bench: you are matched to one engagement at a time and you own its delivery end to end.

- What a week looks like

Most of the week at the client site, working next to the people whose workflows you are changing. Protected build time, because embedded engineers who spend the whole week in meetings ship nothing. A standing session with the studio on architecture, governance gates, and what your engagement is teaching us.

- Compensation and engagement

We work with both employed and freelance engineers. Employment: €90,000 to €130,000 base, depending on what you bring. Freelance: a day rate in the €700 to €950 range, scoped per engagement. If you are strong and the band is your objection, apply anyway and say so.

- How the talent pool works

We are building this pool ahead of demand, and we want to be straight about what that means: applying does not put you in a queue for one open seat. It starts a conversation, and when an engagement opens that matches you, we scope timing and terms together.

- Why AgentLabs

Most forward deployed roles in the Netherlands today are platform vendors hiring engineers to deploy their own product. Here you build on whatever stack the client actually runs, and the system you leave behind belongs to them.

Required Skills

Hard Skills

• Production software engineering
• LLMs
• Agents
• Python
• TypeScript
• REST APIs
• Webhooks
• Data mapping
• System integration
• Workflow automation
• Audit trails
• Governance design
• Evaluation systems
• Legacy system integration
• Documentation
• Production operations

Soft Skills

• Systems thinking
• Ownership
• Communication
• Stakeholder management
• Adaptability
• Comfort with ambiguity
• Leadership
• Collaboration
• Accountability
• Problem solving

Job Requirements

• 7+ years building and running production software.
• Experience shipping, operating, and debugging systems under real load.
• Strong systems thinking and ability to design resilient workflows and data flows.
• Experience with LLMs and agents, including at least one LLM-backed system used by real users.
• Integration fluency with Python or TypeScript, REST APIs, webhooks, and data mapping.
• Comfort owning stakeholder conversations, kickoffs, and weekly steering.
• Ability to explain technical decisions in plain language to non-technical executives.
• Comfort with ambiguity and half-documented processes.
• Eligible to work in the Netherlands without visa sponsorship.
• Experience working on one engagement at a time and owning delivery end to end.

Key Responsibilities

• Embed at client sites in the Netherlands and work directly with client teams on-site.
• Build agentic systems integrated with the client's live systems, data, and daily workflows.
• Own production adoption by getting agents used in real workflows and converting pilots to production.
• Design and implement integrations across APIs, webhooks, data flows, and legacy systems.
• Build governance mechanisms such as human approval points, audit trails, evaluations, and spend visibility.
• Deliver documentation and train the client team to operate, maintain, and improve the system after handover.
• Contribute patterns, tooling, and lessons learned back into the studio playbook.
• Lead kickoffs, weekly steering sessions, and explain agent decisions to business stakeholders.
• Work through ambiguous, partially documented processes and requirements.
• Own one engagement end to end from delivery through handover.

About the Company

AI should make work better for the people doing it. That is the bet behind AgentLabs, a compact agentic transformation studio: we accelerate workforces with agentic systems where agents carry the volume, people keep the judgment, and your team owns the result. It is led by two founders who cover both the system and the organisation it runs inside.

Company Values

• Collaboration
• Empowerment
• Transparency
• Authenticity
• Fun
• Innovation
• Continuous Learning
• Ownership
• Entrepreneurship
• Results-Driven

Employee Benefits

• Flexible Hours
• Remote Work
• Company Events
• Team Building