Founding Sales Engineer

The Founding Sales Engineer will guide enterprise customers from technical discovery through production deployment of Voice AI solutions. The role combines sales engineering, solution architecture, demos, proofs of concept, and cross-functional product influence, requiring customer-facing technical experience and a bachelor's degree.

About the job

Responsibilities

Technical Sales & Customer Discovery

Partner with Account Executives throughout the sales cycle, from discovery through production handoff.
Lead technical discovery sessions to understand customer architecture, business goals, and technical requirements.
Develop technical win strategies for strategic enterprise opportunities.
Present technical solutions to engineering teams, architects, and executive stakeholders.

Solution Architecture & Design

Design enterprise Voice AI solutions, including APIs, integrations, conversation architecture, security, and deployment strategies.
Translate customer requirements into scalable technical solution designs.
Recommend best practices for production deployments across enterprise environments.
Guide customers through architecture reviews and technical decision-making.

Demos & Proofs of Concept

Build compelling demos, prototypes, and proofs of concept that demonstrate measurable business value.
Support customer pilots and technical evaluations.
Create sample integrations and technical assets that accelerate customer adoption.
Help customers transition from evaluation into production.

Technical Product Expertise

Become the technical expert on Retell's Voice AI platform, LLMs, prompting, telephony, APIs, and deployment best practices.
Lead architecture reviews, product deep dives, and security discussions.
Own RFP responses, technical documentation, security questionnaires, and architecture diagrams.
Partner with Product and Engineering to influence the roadmap based on customer feedback.

Cross-Functional Leadership

Work closely with Sales, Product, Engineering, and Customer Success to close complex enterprise opportunities.
Establish best practices for technical sales and customer onboarding.
Support strategic customers throughout their implementation journey.
Represent customer needs internally to improve the product and customer experience.

Requirements & Qualifications

2+ years of experience as a Sales Engineer, Solutions Engineer, Solutions Architect, Forward Deployed Engineer, Customer Success Engineer, or in another customer-facing technical role.
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field.
Strong technical fundamentals across APIs, cloud infrastructure, distributed systems, software architecture, and integrations.
Ability to present to engineering teams and executive stakeholders.
Experience building demos, prototypes, or proofs of concept.
Ability to simplify complex technical concepts into business value.
Interest in AI, LLMs, Voice AI, and emerging technologies.
Ability to thrive in fast-moving startup environments with high ownership and ambiguity.
Cross-functional collaboration skills across Sales, Engineering, Product, and Customer Success.
Strong customer-problem-solving and customer-success orientation.

Compensation & Benefits

Cash compensation: $170,000–$260,000.
Meaningful equity.
100% coverage for medical, dental, and vision insurance.
$70/day DoorDash credit for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks.
$200/month wellness reimbursement.
$300/month commuter reimbursement.
$75/month phone bill reimbursement.
$50/month internet reimbursement.
Three cash-equity balance options with no negotiation required.
Work authorization sponsorship may be available for qualified candidates.

Skills

APIs, Cloud Infrastructure, Distributed Systems, Software Architecture, Integrations, Voice Ai, LLMs, Prompting, Telephony, Security, Proofs Of Concept, Architecture Diagrams, Rfp Responses, Technical Documentation