Solutions Engineer (Acquisition Focused)

We’re not just building better tech. We’re rewriting how data moves and what the world can do with it. With Confluent, data doesn’t sit still. Our platform puts information in motion, streaming in near real-time so companies can react faster, build smarter, and deliver experiences as dynamic as the world around them.

It takes a certain kind of person to join this team. Those who ask hard questions, give honest feedback, and show up for each other. No egos, no solo acts. Just smart, curious humans pushing toward something bigger, together.

One Confluent. One Team. One Data Streaming Platform.

About the Role:

Confluent Solutions Engineers are the technical spearhead in the acquisition sales cycle, specializing in landing new customers and accelerating pipeline velocity. You will be the primary technical advisor to the sales team, partnering closely with them to position the Confluent platform's capabilities to new prospects.

Your mission is to secure the technical win by adeptly uncovering a prospect's implicit or stated Business Needs and designing a validated Technical Solution to meet them. From inspiring prospects with "Art of the Possible" demonstrations and storytelling to navigating complex technical roadblocks and Proofs of Concept (POCs), you are instrumental in ensuring the successful acquisition and initial deployment of Confluent technology. This role is a critical component of our strategy to expand our global customer base and will report into the Global Scale organization.

What You Will Do:

• Own the Technical Sale: Conduct deep-dive discovery and whiteboard sessions to identify and refine innovative Data Streaming use cases, translating them into validated solution architectures and paths to Go-Live.

• Lead and execute Technical Proofs of Concept (POCs) to secure new customer logos and drive deal closure velocity.

• Technical Triage & Qualification: Exceptional skill in rapidly qualifying technical fit early in the process. The SE must quickly identify if the prospect is a good fit for the standard offering and, crucially, know when to disqualify a deal that requires too much customization or post-sales effort.

• Consultative approach to value selling: ability to connect business objectives with technical solutions and present in a value-centric approach.

• Be an Evangelist: Deliver compelling Technical Talks and Workshops to prospects, acting as a trusted advisor and demonstrating Thought Leadership in event-driven architecture.

• Accelerate Onboarding: Forge strong relationships with key prospective customer stakeholders and serve as a dependable technical partner throughout the evaluation and initial onboarding process.

• Develop and maintain reusable technical assets: contribute toward scaling efforts by developing and maintaining assets that address the most common use cases

• Product Advocacy: Serve as a critical feedback loop to Product and Engineering teams, ensuring the voice of the prospect is clearly articulated, and acting as a key advocate for the Confluent platform across the ecosystem.

What You Will Bring:

• 4+ years of Solutions Engineering or similar work experience in a technical pre-sales capacity.

• Process & Efficiency, a “scale” mindset. An ability to quickly leverage standardized demo environments, template proposals, and documented Proof of Concept (PoC) scopes to minimize preparation time.

• Experience with Event-Driven architecture, Data Integration & Processing Techniques, Database & Data Warehouse technologies.

• First-Hand exposure to Cloud Architecture, Migrations, Deployment & Application Development.

• Experience with Automation, GitOps and Kubernetes.

• Proficiency in Java, Python or SQL.

• Development or implementation experience in a cloud-based environment, along with Technical certifications (e.g., Cloud Developer/Architect, Data Engineering & Integration).

• Clear, consistent demonstration of self-starter behavior, a desire to learn new things and tackle hard technical problems.

• Managing multiple evaluation processes across various industry verticals and use cases, ability to be nimble and organized is a must

• Exceptional presentation and communications capabilities to all levels across an organization.

• Ability to explain complex concepts in plain, non-technical language that resonates with mid-level managers and business owners.

• Fluency in English is a requisite.

What Gives You an Edge:

• Previous experience building solutions with Apache Kafka.

• Understanding of systems operations concepts (disk, network, operating systems, etc).

• Experience with software development tools, infrastructure automation, and CI/CD tooling (Terraform, Ansible) is a plus

• Experience building and operating large scale systems.

• Experience in technical pre-sales or consultative roles.

Ready to build what's next? Let’s get in motion.

Come As You Are

Belonging isn’t a perk here. It’s the baseline. We work across time zones and backgrounds, knowing the best ideas come from different perspectives. And we make space for everyone to lead, grow, and challenge what’s possible.

We’re proud to be an equal opportunity workplace. Employment decisions are based on job-related criteria, without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other classification protected by law.