MODULE 05 · FDE ACADEMY
Forward deploy
The engineering in modules 02 to 04 is necessary and it is not what makes a forward-deployed engineer useful. What makes the role work is being close enough to the process to see it, trusted enough to be told the awkward constraint, and disciplined enough to leave behind something the customer can run.
- Lessons
- 5
- Module
- 05 of 5
Every lesson here has a written artefact: a stakeholder map, an observation record, a quote with an exclusion list, a runbook, and a deployment record. None of them is optional and all of them take less time than the argument they prevent.
The commercial frame throughout is the 3-Day AI Deployment Sprint on this site: observe, design, deliver one clearly scoped implementation or proof of concept. It is a good template for engagements of any length, mostly because of what it refuses to promise.
- Covers
- stakeholder managementworking inside customer teamshandoverdocumentationcommercial scoping
Free and self-paced. No certification is offered.
Lessons
5 lessons
Each one ends with a task carried out somewhere on this site.
- 01Find the person who owns the processSponsors, owners, users and blockers are four different people who are rarely the same one. How to identify them in the first week and what to do when the process has no owner at all.About two hours of conversations, plus half an hour to draw the map.change-management5 steps
- 02Working inside a customer teamThe first week, the cadence that keeps trust, how to say no without ending the engagement, and how to avoid becoming the shadow IT department nobody approved.One day-one session run properly, plus the write-up.change-managementcompliance-governance5 steps
- 03Commercial scoping: days, ranges, and refusalsQuote in engineer-days with a stated basis, in ranges with what they exclude, and never quote a price you have not read. What the Sprint charges and what it deliberately does not include.About two hours to produce a defensible quote for a deployment you understand.change-managementcompliance-governance5 steps
- 04Handover, and the documentation that survives youThe runbook, the restore somebody else performs, and the two-week test: if the deployment cannot run without you for a fortnight, it has not been handed over.A day to write, a half-day to rehearse with the owner.change-managementlinuxpostgresql5 steps
- 05Turn the deployment into evidenceWhat a verified deployment is on this site, what may be published and what may not, and how a finished piece of work becomes something a future customer can check rather than take on trust.About an hour, once the deployment is live and the customer has been asked.change-management5 steps