Director Forward Deployed Resercher

Description

Director, AI Forward-Deployed Researcher

Location: Remote (USA)

About TELUS Digital

TELUS Digital is a leading digital customer experience innovator that designs, builds, and delivers next-generation solutions, including the Fuel iX generative AI platform - an enterprise-scale platform proven with over 50,000 users that enables organisations to safely manage their AI applications, foundation models, and data sources.

Role Purpose

The Forward Deployed Researcher, Director is a strategic leader, advanced AI research specialist, and manager who directly oversees and engages in the highest-value customer implementations. This role is responsible for driving frontier AI research into production, setting the strategic technical direction for enterprise clients, and managing a team of Forward Deployed Researchers and Engineers. This role operates at the critical intersection of cutting-edge research, software engineering, executive-level strategic consulting, and team management.

As a Forward Deployed Researcher, Director, you will embed directly within Fortune 500 and highly regulated customer organizations to advance frontier AI implementations, shape AI strategy, deliver bespoke production systems, and build world-class technical teams. Unlike traditional research leaders who remain in labs or remote environments, you will be embedded within customer teams - walking the halls of banks, healthcare organizations, and tech companies - to understand their unique challenges, conduct applied research, and lead the delivery of transformative AI solutions grounded in both frontier techniques and practical enterprise constraints.

Key Responsibilities

1. Strategic AI Research & Executive Consulting (Primary)

Act as a trusted technical and research advisor to customer executive leadership (CTOs, Heads of AI, VPs of Engineering, Board Members) on overall AI strategy, roadmap, and competitive positioning

Translate frontier AI research and complex technical concepts into actionable business strategies and implementation plans that justify premium engagement and drive measurable ROI

Shape customer understanding of what constitutes "production-ready," "scalable," and "competitive" AI systems within regulated industries

Conduct market and technical landscape analysis to inform customer AI strategy and identify emerging opportunities

Provide thought leadership on AI best practices, emerging technologies, research trends, and industry benchmarks

Identify opportunities for AI adoption, value creation, and competitive advantage within customer organizations

Mentor customer AI leadership teams on research methodologies, experimentation, and validation practices

2. Team Leadership & Capability Building

Manage, mentor, and scale a team of Forward Deployed Researchers and Engineers embedded at high-value customer organizations

Oversee the development and delivery of bespoke, research-backed production systems across multiple, concurrent customer engagements

Establish best practices, technical frameworks, methodologies, and accelerators for the team that benefit multiple customers and scale across TELUS Digital

Recruit, develop, and retain top-tier Forward Deployed talent; create career development pathways and technical competency frameworks

Serve as an internal thought leader, sharing research insights, lessons learned, and best practices across the Forward Deployed Engineer community

Mentor junior Forward Deployed Engineers and Solutions Engineers on technical, consulting, and leadership skills

Foster a culture of innovation, customer-centricity, continuous improvement, and technical excellence within the team

Establish metrics, KPIs, and performance management systems for team success and customer impact

3. Customer-Embedded Research & Production Delivery

Lead high-impact, applied AI research initiatives to address the customer's most complex and ambiguous challenges during 3-6 month+ onsite engagements

Design and implement advanced GenAI/LLM solutions (e.g., advanced RAG, multi-agent systems, custom fine-tuning, synthetic data generation, RLHF) tailored to customer's unique requirements and constraints

Build production-ready AI systems addressing data quality, evaluation, governance, and deployment challenges in regulated environments

Conduct frontier AI experiments (novel architectures, training methodologies, evaluation frameworks) with direct applicability to customer use cases

Ensure all production systems meet stringent security, compliance, performance, and scalability requirements for Fortune 500 and highly regulated clients

Integrate TELUS Digital capabilities with customer infrastructure, data platforms, and workflows

Architect systems that customers can operate and evolve long-term with reduced dependency on external support

Own end-to-end delivery from discovery, research, and validation through production deployment and optimization

4. Cross-Functional Collaboration & Product Influence

Partner with TELUS Digital Product, Engineering, and Research teams to leverage platform capabilities and inform product roadmap based on customer research insights

Collaborate with Sales and Account teams on opportunity expansion, account strategy, and customer success

Represent customer voice internally to drive product, service, and research improvements

Participate in analyst relations and thought leadership initiatives to elevate TELUS Digital's market position

Work with other Forward Deployed Directors and Engineers to share learnings and establish organizational best practices

5. Technical Excellence & Innovation

Stay at the frontier of AI models, frameworks, and deployment patterns; maintain hands-on expertise in cutting-edge areas

Experiment with emerging AI technologies and assess applicability to customer challenges and competitive positioning

Publish or present technical work, contributing to TELUS Digital's thought leadership and industry recognition

Build and maintain expertise in frontier areas (LLMs, multimodal AI, agentic systems, synthetic data, RLHF, evaluation frameworks, etc.)

Document technical approaches, architectures, research methodologies, and lessons learned

Contribute to open-source projects or TELUS Digital's technical community

Qualifications

Required

10+ years of hands-on software engineering and AI/ML experience with production systems

4+ years in senior leadership or management roles managing technical teams of at least 5+ professionals (e.g., managing Forward Deployed Engineers, Solution Engineers, or Research teams)

Proven ability to serve as a strategic advisor and technical authority to C-level stakeholders

Deep expertise in frontier GenAI/LLMs, including:

RAG systems and vector databases

Agentic AI and multi-agent systems

Fine-tuning, prompt engineering, and in-context learning

Evaluation frameworks and metrics for LLM systems

Production MLOps and deployment

Hands-on proficiency with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and modern AI/ML frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow, LangChain, Hugging Face)

Proven track record of success in ambiguous, complex environments with a high degree of autonomy

Excellent communication skills across technical, research, and executive audiences

Self-directed and resourceful - comfortable operating independently at customer sites and leading without direct authority

Customer-centric mindset with ability to build trust and credibility quickly with C-level stakeholders

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, AI/ML, or related field

Preferred

Advanced degree (MS/PhD in Computer Science, AI/ML, or related field)

Experience at AI platform/research companies (Anthropic, OpenAI, Palantir, Scale AI, Cohere, etc.) in research, Forward Deployed, or leadership roles

Experience at top-tier consulting firms (McKinsey, Bain, Deloitte) in technical or engineering leadership roles

Published technical work or recognized AI/ML expertise, contributing to thought leadership and industry recognition

Prior work in regulated industries (financial services, healthcare) with compliance requirements and enterprise complexity

Track record of mentoring engineers and building high-performing teams

Computer vision and/or data annotation platform expertise

Multilingual capabilities for global customer engagement

Open-source contributions or active participation in AI research community

Experience building bespoke solutions vs. configuring off-the-shelf products

What Success Looks Like

First 90 Days

Successfully embedded at assigned customer account(s)

Built trust and credibility with customer technical and executive leadership

Conducted discovery and scoped research initiatives aligned with customer strategy

Established team structure, processes, and success metrics for Forward Deployed team

Delivered initial research insights, POC, or quick wins demonstrating value

Established clear research roadmap and delivery milestones

Year 1

Delivered production AI system(s) informed by applied research, driving measurable customer business outcomes

Customer views TELUS Digital as indispensable technical and research partner

Identified and scoped additional research and implementation opportunities within customer organization(s)

Mentored customer AI teams and Forward Deployed team members, building their research and production capabilities

Contributed technical and research insights that influenced TELUS Digital product/service offerings

Built reusable patterns, frameworks, or accelerators benefiting other customers and Forward Deployed Engineers

Established team as high-performing unit with strong retention and customer satisfaction

Ongoing

Consistently delivers high-quality, production-ready, research-backed AI solutions across multiple customer engagements

Maintains deep, trusted relationships with customer technical and executive leadership

Expands TELUS Digital footprint and influence within customer organizations

Serves as technical authority and thought leader in AI research and enterprise implementation

Mentors Forward Deployed Engineers, Solutions Engineers, and customer teams

Contributes to TELUS Digital's thought leadership through publications, presentations, or research initiatives

Drives continuous innovation in AI solution architecture and deployment methodologies

Builds and scales high-performing Forward Deployed team with strong talent retention and career development

Work Environment

Onsite Presence

Embedded at customer locations (Fortune 500 enterprises, banks, healthcare organizations, AI-native companies)

Work within customer facilities alongside their engineering and research teams

Adapt to customer culture, processes, and working styles

Build deep relationships and trust through consistent presence and technical credibility

Travel Expectations

60-80% travel to customer sites

Extended onsite engagements (weeks to months)

Occasional travel to TELUS Digital offices for team collaboration, research initiatives, and knowledge sharing

Flexibility to support multiple customer locations as needed

Customer Types

Fortune 500 enterprises (Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, Google, and similar)

AI-native companies and frontier AI research teams

Highly regulated industries (financial services, healthcare) with complex AI requirements

Organizations with mission-critical, research-intensive AI challenges

Geographic Focus

Customers primarily in major US metro areas (Seattle, Bay Area, Boston, New York, etc.)

Key Competencies

Technical

Production software engineering (Python, TypeScript/JavaScript, SQL)

Frontier GenAI/LLM systems (RAG, agentic AI, fine-tuning, evaluation, vector databases)

Applied AI research methodologies and experimentation

Cloud platforms and MLOps (AWS, Azure, GCP, Kubernetes, CI/CD)

Data engineering, integration, and synthetic data generation

System architecture, scalability, and performance optimization

Model evaluation frameworks and metrics

Research & Innovation

Applied research in production environments

Frontier model evaluation and adaptation

Experimentation design and validation

Technical writing and documentation

Thought leadership and knowledge sharing

Emerging technology assessment and adoption

Consulting & Strategy

AI strategy and roadmap development

Requirements gathering and technical discovery

Stakeholder management and executive communication

Problem-solving in ambiguous, research-intensive environments

Change management and adoption strategies

Business value articulation and ROI analysis

Leadership & Management

Team leadership, recruitment, and development

Mentoring and coaching of technical professionals

Building trust and credibility quickly

Working effectively in customer cultures

Influencing without direct authority

Collaboration across organizational boundaries

Adaptability and resilience

Executive presence and communication

Performance management and KPI development

Why This Role Matters

In AI, the gap between research and production is where most organizations fail. While many companies can demonstrate AI capabilities or conduct research in isolation, few can successfully bridge cutting-edge research with complex enterprise implementations - combining frontier techniques with real data, real constraints, and real business impact.

Forward Deployed Researchers, Directors are the bridge between possibility and production. By embedding with customers and leading high-performing teams, they ensure TELUS Digital's AI solutions don't just impress in research papers or demos - they deliver transformative, research-backed results in the real world. They also elevate TELUS Digital's market position from services vendor to trusted AI research and implementation partner, while building the next generation of technical leaders.

This role is for technical leaders who want to:

Conduct applied AI research with real-world impact at enterprise scale

See their research and code drive tangible business outcomes

Work on diverse, frontier AI challenges across industries

Build and mentor high-performing technical teams

Operate at the intersection of cutting-edge AI research and enterprise reality

Shape how organizations adopt and scale AI

Contribute to the advancement of AI in production environments

Grow into executive leadership within a high-growth AI company

What We Offer

Executive leadership role overseeing cutting-edge AI research and implementations with Fortune 500 enterprises

Opportunity to build and scale world-class Forward Deployed team

Exposure to diverse industries, use cases, and frontier technical challenges

Direct impact on customer success, TELUS Digital growth, and AI industry advancement

Collaboration with world-class AI researchers, engineers, and thought leaders

Professional development in AI research, consulting, and executive leadership

Opportunity to contribute to thought leadership (publications, presentations, open-source)

Competitive compensation with performance bonuses

Comprehensive benefits package

Remote flexibility with meaningful customer engagement

About Company:

TELUS Digital is the customer experience transformation partner to the world's most admired brands. Our diverse team weaves data, technology, and human ingenuity to deliver differentiated customer journeys, drive operational effectiveness, and scale AI solutions with meaningful value and positive impact.

We craft real-world solutions in the moments that matter, from customer acquisition to lifelong loyalty. Enabled by our global reach - spanning 78,000 experts in 33 countries - and deep industry expertise, we help over 600 organizations make the customer experience feel effortless.

Our solutions span Data & AI, Digital Experience & IT, CX Management and Trust & Safety. At the core of our innovation is Fuel iX™, an enterprise-grade generative AI platform that helps clients safely access and optimize leading LLMs to scale their own AI from pilot to production.