3 Rising AI Jobs and the Skills You Need For Each

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• Role: Forward Deployed Engineer (FDE)
• Role: AI Product Manager
• Role: AI Platform Engineer
• Meet Your Expert: Marco Gonzalo
• Learning AI Engineering at 4Geeks Academy

The tech landscape is rapidly prioritizing AI skills, driving high demand for specialized roles like AI Platform Engineers, AI Product Managers, and Forward-Deployed Engineers (FDEs). This shift requires engineers who can deploy, manage, and scale complex AI systems. To explore these three emerging AI careers, their required skills, and how engineers can transition into them, we interviewed Marco Gonzalo, who worked on 4Geeks Academy’s new AI Engineering program. He highlights the career opportunities at the intersection of software and AI and the vital role of practical training for the next generation of engineers.

Meet Your Expert: Marco Gonzalo

Marco, tell us how you got started in tech and what motivates you to help train the next generation of engineers?

I got started in tech at a very young age. When I was around 15 years old, during school vacations, my family would go to the beach – but I chose to stay with my grandparents so I could take technical courses on building computers and computer networks. Not long after, I moved into web development, which hooked me completely. From that point on, technology became a constant path of learning that eventually led me to study Computer Science at the university in Venezuela.

What motivates me to help train the next generation of engineers is a deep belief that technology is a tool for empowerment. I’ve seen firsthand that coding and software development are not reserved for a small group of gifted people. Anyone can learn to build software if they have a clear goal, commitment, and the discipline to practice consistently. Helping people realize that they are capable (sometimes before they believe it themselves) is what drives me to teach, mentor, and design learning paths that turn curiosity into real-world skills.

Learning AI Engineering at 4Geeks Academy

What are some other AI-related jobs you’re seeing 4Geeks graduates working in? Are there entry points into AI that you think are especially great for bootcamp grads? 

We’re seeing 4Geeks graduates with Full-Stack foundations developing AI skills and moving into teams that are embracing AI development, as well as teams that directly work with AI solutions, and using their personal backgrounds to add value. Most of these jobs don’t require a PhD or deep research background; they sit at the intersection of software engineering, data, and AI integration, which is exactly where bootcamp grads can add value quickly.

What does the curriculum of the new AI Engineering program cover?

The AI Engineering curriculum is designed to take students from software fundamentals to production-ready AI systems, with a strong focus on real-world applications.

It starts by building a solid foundation in how the internet works, programming basics, and full-stack application development, including Generative AI concepts and activities from the beginning, teaching how modern models work, how to communicate with them effectively, and how to use different interaction formats, coding agents, and AI engineering principles.

From there, students learn to design and build AI-powered backends, manage data with tools like Pandas, and create robust data pipelines optimized for storage, integrity, querying, and transport. The program wants to cover LLM tooling and architectures, including SDKs, RAG systems, chunking strategies, embeddings, vector databases, and memory/context management built on existing codebases.

A strong emphasis is placed on scalable and asynchronous systems, such as background processing, queues, tasks, cron jobs, serverless durable functions, streaming with WebSockets, and event-oriented architectures. Students also learn how to integrate AI systems with external services using workflow automation tools like n8n, modern integration patterns (MCPs as the new APIs), and third-party triggers.

The curriculum wants to culminate in building intelligent AI agents, including single-agent loops capable of calling tools and multi-agent systems that collaborate. Practical use cases include real-time customer support agents, prediction models, end-to-end integration plans, and using LLMs for cybersecurity audits – preparing graduates to design, deploy, and maintain AI systems in real production environments.

Who is the ideal student for the AI Engineering program? 

Someone who wants to build real AI-powered software, even if they are starting from scratch, but who is ready to commit to learning core technical foundations.

This program is designed for:

• Career changers who are motivated to enter tech and are willing to learn programming fundamentals before working with AI.

• Junior developers or bootcamp graduates who already understand basic web development and want to move into AI-driven roles.

• Full-Stack developers looking to add practical AI engineering skills without becoming researchers.

• Technical professionals (QA, data analysts, IT, automation specialists) who want to evolve into AI-focused engineering roles.

This is not a theoretical or academic program. It’s ideal for students who want to learn by building, understand how AI behaves in production, and ship real applications. The program assumes you may start at zero – but it expects commitment, focus, and the drive to become a professional engineer capable of working with modern AI systems.

Any other advice for someone about to start the AI Engineering program? 

While no prior AI experience is required, successful students typically bring:

• Basic programming exposure (or the willingness to learn it quickly), especially in logical thinking and problem-solving.

• Comfort with technology and curiosity about how software systems work.

• Discipline, consistency, and a goal-oriented mindset, since AI engineering combines multiple domains (software, data, systems, and AI).

You can read 4Geeks Academy reviews on Course Report. This interview was produced by the Course Report team in partnership with 4Geeks Academy. Thank you.