Forward Deployed Engineer Fellowship

Moder is an AI-enabled, human-powered digital services company built for mortgage, insurance, and financial services. We meet clients where they are, tackle the toughest industry challenges, and build solutions that hold up in production environments where the stakes are real. Our partnership with Palantir brings Foundry and AIP to clients who need to move from AI experimentation to operational reality.

We have served clients across the full mortgage lifecycle — from origination through capital markets — and are now expanding that same operational depth into insurance and broader financial services. We RAISE the bar every day: Results, Accountability, Innovation, Service, Excellence.

Moder is building its first cohort of Forward Deployment Engineers and we are doing it intentionally, carefully, and with you at the center of the design. The FDE Fellowship Program is a full-time, structured launch pad for recent graduates who want to do more than start a career. We are looking for people who want to help build one. Fellows in this Cohort  will be the first people to go through “Foundry Academy”, the first to deploy on live client engagements, the first to stress-test our training curriculum, and the first to tell us what works and what doesn't. Your feedback will directly shape how Moder trains, develops, and grows FDEs for years to come. That is not a responsibility we take lightly and it is not an opportunity that comes around often. This program is for engineers who are technically sharp and genuinely curious about how AI gets deployed in the real world, not in demos, but inside financial institutions with messy data, legacy systems, and high stakes. If you want to understand how AI changes how a business operates, this is where that learning happens.

Fellows are not observers. They are contributors. From week one, you will be working on real problems, inside real platforms, alongside experienced engineers who are counting on your thinking — not just your output.

Most early-career programs rotate you through assignments until someone decides you are ready for real work. This is not that. Here is what you are actually signing up for:

Cohort 1 doesn't follow a fully established program — they help create it. Your experience, your feedback, and your capstone work will directly shape Moder's FDE onboarding, training curriculum, and deployment methodology. Future cohorts will learn from what you build.

You will work from Moder's Philadelphia hub at least three days per week. This is intentional. The best learning happens in proximity — with mentors in the same room, on whiteboards, in real-time conversations. You will also travel periodically to client sites, which means your context for the work is always grounded in reality, not theory.

FDE work sits at the intersection of engineering and client relationships. You will build data pipelines and you will present them to a CFO. You will configure AI workflows and you will train the people who use them. The combination of technical depth and communication clarity is rare — and we will develop both deliberately.

The Fellowship is the entry point to the FDE track. There is no ambiguity about where it leads. Fellows who perform become Associate FDEs. The path from there is clear: Associate FDE → FDE → Senior FDE → Principal FDE. Advancement is tied to what you deliver, not how long you have been here.

We are not looking for people who wait to be told what to explore. The engineers who thrive here ask the uncomfortable question in the client meeting, chase the anomaly in the data no one asked them to investigate, and push back on assumptions with evidence. Curiosity is not a soft skill here — it is a job requirement. We will actively create space for it.

Fellows work across three interconnected areas simultaneously. These are not phases — they happen together, from the beginning.

Essential Job Duties and Responsibilities:

• Work on active Palantir Foundry deployments alongside senior FDEs, owning defined scopes within real client engagements — not sandbox projects.

• Build data pipelines, ontology structures, and workflow automations in Foundry's Pipeline Builder and Workshop — moving from supported execution to independent delivery as your confidence builds.

• Wrangle real, complex financial services datasets: cleaning, transforming, integrating, and making them usable inside Palantir's ontology layer. The data will not be clean. That is the point.

• Develop hands-on proficiency in Foundry's core tools: Pipeline Builder, Workshop, Ontology Manager, Code Repositories, and AIP.

• Contribute to architecture and technical design discussions — your perspective as someone newer to the platform is genuinely valuable, not just tolerated.

• Build working familiarity with AI and LLM-driven workflows through Palantir AIP, understanding where AI adds real operational value and where it doesn't.

• Participate in client-facing sessions — discovery meetings, technical reviews, status updates — alongside senior FDEs, learning and contributing from the first month.

• Support training and handoff sessions for client teams, helping communicate what has been built and why it works the way it does.

• Develop the ability to translate technical realities into business language across a range of audiences, from data analysts to C-suite executives.

• Represent Moder in-person at client locations when travel is required, carrying the kind of credibility that comes from actually knowing the work.

• Participate actively in Moder Academy — our structured onboarding covering the mortgage lifecycle, insurance operations, Palantir Foundry, and client engagement frameworks — and tell us honestly what is missing or unclear.

• Maintain a structured learning log throughout the Fellowship, capturing client patterns, platform observations, and deployment insights that feed directly back to Moder's product and training teams.

• Complete a capstone project — a client-facing workflow or internal accelerator that you own end-to-end — and present it to Moder leadership at the close of your Fellowship period.

• Provide formal feedback at structured checkpoints that will be used to improve the program for Cohort 2. Your candor is valued, not just encouraged.

Other Job Duties and Responsibilities:

• Performs other related duties as assigned.

• Comply with all company policies and procedures.

• Maintain regular and punctual attendance.

We are not looking for the most experienced candidate. We are looking for the most curious one — with the technical foundation to do real work and the disposition to thrive in environments that are still being defined.

Qualifications:

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential function satisfactorily. The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required.

• Recent graduate (undergraduate or graduate) with a degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems, Mathematics, or a related technical field.

• Programming ability in Python — you write it independently, not just read it. Data manipulation, API calls, scripting, and a working understanding of how data moves between systems.

• Working SQL proficiency for querying and exploring datasets; comfort working with structured data at meaningful scale.

• A highly analytical mindset: you break problems down, find the data that matters, and build a structured case for what to do — rather than waiting for direction.

• High degree of intellectual curiosity and inquisitiveness — you ask questions others skip past, investigate the edges of problems, and are never fully satisfied with 'it works.'

• Clear communication in writing and in conversation, to both technical and non-technical audiences. We will assess this directly in the interview process.

• Comfort with ambiguity and open-ended environments where what you need to do is discovered through engagement, not handed down in a spec.

• Ability to commute to and work from Philadelphia at least three days per week.

• Coursework, projects, or research involving data engineering, machine learning, enterprise data platforms, or applied AI. Foundry experience is rare at this level — curiosity and technical aptitude matter far more.

• Any exposure to AI/ML concepts including LLMs, retrieval-augmented generation, or agentic systems — enough to understand why they matter in an enterprise context.

• Prior experience in a client-facing, consulting, or applied research capacity — you have translated between technical work and a non-technical audience before.

• Background or coursework in financial services, mortgage, insurance, or a regulated industry. You do not need to be an expert — an informed curiosity is enough.

• Familiarity with cloud environments (AWS, Azure, or GCP) at any level.

We know you have options. Here is why Fellows choose Moder:

You will not spend your first months observing. You will be given defined ownership over real scopes within live client engagements. When something ships, your name is on it.

Moder Academy is a comprehensive onboarding program covering the mortgage and insurance lifecycle, Palantir Foundry platform certification, and Moder's client engagement framework. As a Cohort 1 Fellow, you also get to improve it. If something is missing or unclear, we want to know — and we will fix it.

Every Fellow is paired with a dedicated senior FDE from day one. Weekly 1:1s, structured feedback, and real mentorship — not a name on an org chart. Your mentor's goal is to help you get to Associate FDE, and their success is tied to yours.

The hybrid model is not a compromise — it is a feature. Three days in the office means you are in the same room as the team, learning through proximity, building relationships that remote work cannot replicate. Philadelphia is also a growing hub for financial services technology, and being embedded in that environment matters for your career.

The Fellowship is the explicit entry point to the FDE track. Strong performance converts directly to an Associate FDE offer. The path after that is written down, not implied: Associate FDE → FDE → Senior FDE → Principal FDE. Your advancement is tied to what you deliver, not how long you wait.

Cohort 1 Fellows will have more influence over Moder's FDE program than any group that follows. The playbooks you help build, the feedback you provide, and the standards you set will define what Moder looks for and how it develops engineers for years. That is a real legacy.

The FDE Fellowship is not a trial period — it is the beginning of a career track. Cohort 1 Fellows who perform will receive Associate FDE offers. The track beyond that is clear and merit-based.

The full path:

FDE Fellow  →  Associate FDE  →  FDE  →  Senior FDE  →  Principal FDE

Advancement is tied to client outcomes, technical depth, and the quality of insight you bring back to Moder's product and training teams — not to time in seat. The best FDEs at Moder shape what we build next. That starts in the Fellowship.

Work Complexity:

Addresses problems that are not immediately evident but typically not complex. Problems are typically within the immediate job area. Problems are typically solved through drawing from standard procedures and basic analysis.

Work Environment:

The work environment characteristics described here are representative of those an employee encounters while performing the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. Work is normally performed in a typical interior office work environment which does not subject the employee to any hazardous or unpleasant elements. The noise level in the work environment is usually moderate.

Physical Demands:

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. While performing the duties of this job, the employee is frequently required to sit and talk or hear. The employee is occasionally required to stand; walk; use hands to finger, handle, or feel; and reach with hands and arms. The employee must occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds.

Equal Employment Opportunity:

The company is committed to providing equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants without regard to race, ethnicity, color, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, pregnancy, religion, national origin, age (40 and over), disability, military status, genetic information, or any other basis protected by applicable federal, state, or local laws.

Americans with Disabilities Act:

Applicants as well as employees who are or become disabled must be able to satisfactorily perform the essential job functions of the position either with or without reasonable accommodation. Applicants as well as employees are encouraged to meet with Human Resources as the organization shall review reasonable accommodations on a case-by-case basis in accordance with applicable law.

Job Responsibilities:

The statements reflect the general duties and responsibilities considered necessary to perform the essential functions of the job and should not be considered as an all-inclusive list of all the work requirements of the position. The company may change the specific job duties with or without prior notice based on the needs of the organization.