Senior Solutions Engineering Manager, Named - North California

Job description

<div class="content-intro"><div><strong>About Us</strong></div> <div> <p>At Cloudflare, we are on a mission to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world’s largest networks that powers millions of websites and other Internet properties for customers ranging from individual bloggers to SMBs to Fortune 500 companies. Cloudflare protects and accelerates any Internet application online without adding hardware, installing software, or changing a line of code. Internet properties powered by Cloudflare all have web traffic routed through its intelligent global network, which gets smarter with every request. As a result, they see significant improvement in performance and a decrease in spam and other attacks. Cloudflare was named to Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top Company Cultures list and ranked among the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company.&nbsp;</p> <p>At Cloudflare, we’re not looking for people who wait for a polished roadmap; we’re looking for the builders who see the cracks in the Internet that everyone else has simply learned to live with. We value candidates who have the instinct to spot a "normalized" problem and the AI-native curiosity to create a solution using the latest tools. Our culture is built on iteration, leveraging AI to ship faster today to make it better tomorrow, while ensuring that every improvement, no matter how small, is shared across the team to lift everyone up. If you’re the type of person who values curiosity over bureaucracy, and that AI is a partner in solving tough problems to keep the Internet moving forward, you’ll fit right in.</p> </div></div><p><strong>Available locations: North California</strong></p> <h2>What you’ll do as a <strong>Senior Solutions Engineering Manager, Named Accounts&nbsp;</strong></h2> <p>As a Senior Solutions Engineering Manager for US Named Accounts at Cloudflare, you will lead a high-performing, geographically distributed team of Solutions Engineers partnering with our most strategic enterprise clients. You will work side-by-side with Enterprise Sales directors, Product Management, Engineering, and Customer Support to drive full-sales lifecycle technical activities and secure revenue targets. We are looking for an empathetic leader with an AI-native curiosity to streamline workflows and a player-coach mindset who isn't afraid to roll up their sleeves and dive into the technical details. Ultimately, you will foster a collaborative, transparent team culture dedicated to turning complex edge security, performance, and serverless challenges into scalable customer successes that help build a better Internet.</p> <h2><strong>Responsibilities</strong></h2> <ul> <li><strong>Lead and Scale the US Named Team:</strong> Oversee the hiring, technical onboarding, continuous enablement, and pre-sales performance of a highly skilled team of Enterprise Solutions Engineers across the United States.</li> <li><strong>Drive Strategic Revenue Goals:</strong> Partner directly with Named Account Sales Executives and leadership to effectively manage complex sales cycles, coordinate technical proof activities (PoCs), and accurately forecast pipeline progression.</li> <li><strong>Shadow and Coach Technical Fieldwork:</strong> Step into the field as a player-coach to shadow customer engagements, establish technical best practices, and guide your team in breaking down complex concepts into digestible business value.</li> <li><strong>Champion Cross-Functional Alignment:</strong> Build deep operational relationships with Cloudflare's core Product, Engineering, Customer Success, and Support teams to establish reliable escalation pathways and accelerate feature request implementations for top-tier accounts.</li> <li><strong>Facilitate Hive-Mind Knowledge Sharing:</strong> Cultivate internal communication channels to ensure scalable technical solutions, architectural frameworks, and unique team discoveries are seamlessly shared across regional SE teams to prevent repeating mistakes.</li> <li><strong>Manage Team Health and Morale:</strong> Keep a constant pulse on your team's individual capacity, strengths, and career development goals, maintaining an open environment where transparent feedback and critical insights are actively welcomed.</li> <li><strong>Driving Enterprise Adoption:</strong> Accelerating the sales cycle by helping customers move past "AI hype" into production-ready, high-ROI use cases.</li> <li><strong>Technical Excellence:</strong> Building a team that is viewed by customers not just as vendors, but as trusted consultants with thorough understanding of AI and how Cloudflare can be positioned to help.</li> </ul> <h2><strong>Requirements</strong></h2> <h3><strong>Must-Have Skills</strong></h3> <ul> <li><strong>Proven Technical Leadership:</strong> Minimum of 5+ years of experience directly managing and scaling a pre-sales Solutions Engineering team, coupled with 10+ years of related technology industry experience.</li> <li><strong>Enterprise Pre-Sales Track Record:</strong> A documented history of success driving technical pre-sales within the US Enterprise or Named Accounts market, showing strong alignment with sales methodologies like MEDDPICC.</li> <li><strong>Deep Architectural Expertise:</strong> Strong foundational knowledge of fundamental Internet protocols and cloud architectures, including OSI Model layers 1-7, DNS, BGP, TCP/IP, and SSL/TLS.</li> <li><strong>Communication:</strong> Exceptional ability to demystify complex AI concepts (like fine-tuning vs. RAG, or compute costs) for C-level executives, while remaining highly technical with data scientists.</li> <li>Oversee the design and delivery of high-impact technical validation events (custom demos, hackathons, and scoped PoCs).</li> <li>Ensure solutions adhere to enterprise-grade standards regarding AI ethics, data privacy, governance, and latency/cost optimization.</li> <li><strong>Customer Lifecycle:</strong> Clear understanding of the entire customer lifecycle management and ensure the team is properly aligned</li> <li><strong>Cross-Functional Influence:</strong> Demonstrated operational and analytical skills required to influence matrixed organizations, handle critical customer escalations, and manage distributed team resources effectively.</li> <li><strong>AI/ML Expertise:</strong> Proven, hands-on experience with AI/ML frameworks (e.g., PyTorch, TensorFlow), LLM orchestration tools (e.g., LangChain, LlamaIndex), vector databases, and MLOps pipelines.</li> <li><strong>Cloud &amp; Architecture:</strong> Strong understanding of cloud infrastructure (AWS, Azure, or GCP) and how to deploy scalable AI workloads.</li> </ul> <h3><strong>Nice-to-Have Skills</strong></h3> <ul> <li><strong>Advanced Portfolio Exposure:</strong> Familiarity with modern, emerging technical landscapes such as Zero Trust security architectures, serverless computing (Workers), and post-quantum cryptography.</li> <li><strong>Diverse Domain Background:</strong> Prior foundational experience working across overlapping technical disciplines like software engineering, product management, financial consulting, or enterprise project delivery.</li> <li>Serve as the subject matter expert on Generative AI, Large Language Models (LLMs), MLOps, and data architecture.</li> </ul> <p><strong>Travel Requirement:</strong></p> <ul> <li>The position requires up to 50% travel for attending meetings with prospects or customers, participating in conferences and industry events, and collaborating with Cloudflare colleagues.</li> </ul> <p><strong>Compensation</strong><br>Compensation may be adjusted depending on work location.&nbsp;<br>This role is eligible to earn incentive compensation under Cloudflare’s Sales Compensation Plan. The estimated annual salary range includes the on-target incentive compensation that may be attained in this role under the Sales Compensation Plan.<br><br>For Bay Area based hires: Estimated annual salary of $244,000.00 - $336,000.00<br><br><strong>Equity</strong><br>This role is eligible to participate in Cloudflare’s equity plan.<br><br><strong>Benefits</strong><br>Cloudflare offers a complete package of benefits and programs to support you and your family.&nbsp; Our benefits programs can help you pay health care expenses, support caregiving, build capital for the future and make life a little easier and fun!&nbsp; The below is a description of our benefits for employees in the United States, and benefits may vary for employees based outside the U.S.<br><br><strong>Health &amp; Welfare Benefits</strong></p> <ul> <li>Medical/Rx Insurance</li> <li>Dental Insurance</li> <li>Vision Insurance</li> <li>Flexible Spending Accounts</li> <li>Commuter Spending Accounts</li> <li>Fertility &amp; Family Forming Benefits</li> <li>On-demand mental health support and Employee Assistance Program</li> <li>Global Travel Medical Insurance</li> </ul> <p><strong>Financial Benefits</strong></p> <ul> <li>Short and Long Term Disability Insurance</li> <li>Life &amp; Accident Insurance</li> <li>401(k) Retirement Savings Plan</li> <li>Employee Stock Participation Plan</li> </ul> <p><strong>Time Off</strong></p> <ul> <li>Flexible paid time off covering vacation and sick leave</li> <li>Leave programs, including parental, pregnancy health, medical, and bereavement leave</li> </ul><div class="content-conclusion"><p><strong>What Makes Cloudflare Special?</strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">We’re not just a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company. We’re a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company with a soul. Fundamental to our mission to help build a better Internet is protecting the free and open Internet.</span></p> <p><a href="https://blog.cloudflare.com/protecting-free-expression-online/"><strong>Project Galileo</strong></a><span style="font-weight: 400;">: Since 2014, we've equipped more than 2,400 journalism and civil society organizations in 111 countries with powerful tools to defend themselves