Forward Deployed Engineers sit at the intersection of technical excellence and customer success. Unlike traditional software engineers, FDEs are deployed directly to customer sites to solve complex problems, implement mission-critical systems, and ensure operational success. FDE interviews test your ability to think strategically about production systems while keeping customer impact at the center.
FDE Interview prepares you for this unique blend of skills. You'll practice rapid incident diagnosis, build frameworks for production troubleshooting, and develop the judgment to balance short-term mitigation with long-term solutions. Our AI coach simulates real-world deployment scenarios and provides feedback on how your decisions impact customer trust and revenue.
How it works
- Practice on-site deployment scenarios from real FDE interviews at Databricks, Figma, Palantir, Datadog, and Cloudflare
- Master production incident response frameworks and operational decision-making
- Get AI-powered feedback on your diagnostic approach, impact quantification, and customer communication
- Track your progress across 20+ FDE competencies including incident response, system reliability, and stakeholder management
Why FDE interviews need dedicated prep
FDE roles demand a skill set that generic software engineering or customer success training doesn't cover. Traditional engineering interviews focus on algorithms and system design. Customer success training focuses on soft skills. But FDE interviews evaluate something much harder: your ability to diagnose unfamiliar systems under time pressure, quantify business impact, and design solutions that work within real operational constraints.
The AI coach pushes you in distinctly FDE ways. You'll face ambiguous production problems where the root cause is hidden across multiple systems. You'll have to explain your reasoning to both technical and non-technical stakeholders. You'll practice making trade-offs between customer impact, technical debt, and implementation timeline. These are skills that only come from repeated practice in realistic scenarios.
Built for aspiring FDE professionals
This platform is designed for engineers transitioning into deployment roles, candidates preparing for FDE interviews at top-tier infrastructure and data companies, and technical professionals who want to master production troubleshooting and customer-facing technical leadership. Whether you're coming from a backend engineering, infrastructure, or customer engineering background, FDE Interview meets you where you are and builds the specific skills FDE teams evaluate.