https://scottfelten.com/blog/ Practical analysis of Forward Deployed Engineering and enterprise AI delivery. en-us Mon, 31 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT https://scottfelten.com/blog/if-the-agent-can-change-the-test-it-did-not-pass/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/if-the-agent-can-change-the-test-it-did-not-pass/ Mon, 31 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT An agent evaluation is decision-ready only when the system under test cannot rewrite the baseline, success oracle, or retained evidence used to approve it. https://scottfelten.com/blog/the-agents-tool-list-is-not-its-authority-model/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/the-agents-tool-list-is-not-its-authority-model/ Fri, 28 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT A connected-tool inventory shows where an agent can reach. Production requires an authority ledger that makes each consequential action attributable, conditional, time-bound, testable, and revocable. https://scottfelten.com/blog/the-contract-is-not-the-deployment/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/the-contract-is-not-the-deployment/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Buying AI creates access. Deployment begins when a named workflow has an owner, evidence standard, operating boundary, and path to adoption. https://scottfelten.com/blog/fde-is-a-delivery-system-not-a-job-title/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/fde-is-a-delivery-system-not-a-job-title/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google disclose different ways to allocate field delivery. Compare the responsibilities and handoffs, not the labels. https://scottfelten.com/blog/build-buy-or-partner-first-ai-deployment/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/build-buy-or-partner-first-ai-deployment/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Build, buy, and partner are not mutually exclusive bets. They are choices about who should own each layer of the first production workflow. https://scottfelten.com/blog/openai-fde-loop-product-model/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/openai-fde-loop-product-model/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT OpenAI’s public FDE role connects discovery and production adoption to eval-driven product and model feedback. The return path is where field work can compound. https://scottfelten.com/blog/anthropic-fde-portfolio-scarce-capacity/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/anthropic-fde-portfolio-scarce-capacity/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Anthropic’s public FDE roles expose qualification, prioritization, partner routing, commercial coordination, and handoff as one delivery system. https://scottfelten.com/blog/google-fde-model-scales-through-partners/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/google-fde-model-scales-through-partners/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Google's public partner design shows how frontier delivery can distribute capacity without losing accountability—if context, evidence, and escalation have named owners. https://scottfelten.com/blog/qualified-deployment-is-the-unit-of-fde-capacity/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/qualified-deployment-is-the-unit-of-fde-capacity/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT A full FDE queue can hide weak allocation. Govern capacity as a portfolio of qualified deployments with a workflow, evidence plan, owner, route, and stop condition. https://scottfelten.com/blog/when-services-accelerate-software/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/when-services-accelerate-software/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Field delivery can increase adoption and improve the product—or build a shadow product. A four-ledger review shows whether services are compounding or consuming software economics. https://scottfelten.com/blog/measure-workflow-change-not-token-burn/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/measure-workflow-change-not-token-burn/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Usage shows that an AI system was touched. A decision-ready evidence plan shows whether a bounded workflow changed enough to expand, hold, reshape, or stop. https://scottfelten.com/blog/incumbent-ai-delivery-function-five-teams/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/incumbent-ai-delivery-function-five-teams/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Traditional vendors distribute forward-deployed work across guidance, services, success, specialists, and partners. Buyers should map ownership and handoffs, not search for one title. https://scottfelten.com/blog/microsoft-fasttrack-product-guidance-boundary/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/microsoft-fasttrack-product-guidance-boundary/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Microsoft's explicit FastTrack scope can become a practical ownership map for the custom deployment work that remains. https://scottfelten.com/blog/salesforce-fde-partner-ecosystem-map/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/salesforce-fde-partner-ecosystem-map/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Salesforce's FDE Partner category is a real market signal, but buyers still need to inspect accountability, evidence, operation, and transfer. https://scottfelten.com/blog/installed-base-advantage-deployment-tax/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/installed-base-advantage-deployment-tax/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT An installed base brings enterprise context and distribution, but also every unresolved data, authority, integration, and operating decision. https://scottfelten.com/blog/design-fde-team-topology/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/design-fde-team-topology/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT A scalable FDE organization starts with explicit responsibilities and artifact handoffs, not an ever-rarer all-in-one hire. https://scottfelten.com/blog/custom-work-that-must-become-product/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/custom-work-that-must-become-product/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Field work compounds only when each custom asset becomes supported product, reusable delivery capability, a visible exception, or a documented stop. https://scottfelten.com/blog/agent-handoff-rules-product-requirements/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/agent-handoff-rules-product-requirements/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT An enterprise agent is defined as much by what it must escalate as by what it can automate. Put authority, handoffs, and recovery into the specification before integration. https://scottfelten.com/blog/who-owns-product-field-learning/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/who-owns-product-field-learning/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Customer feedback can mean data, patterns, evals, requirements, or code. A durable field-to-product loop gives each one an owner and a disposition. https://scottfelten.com/blog/bounded-deployment-alternative-to-unbounded-ai-consulting/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/bounded-deployment-alternative-to-unbounded-ai-consulting/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT The way out of pilot limbo is not a larger transformation promise. It is a consequential workflow with visible evidence, owners, dependencies, and a stop rule. https://scottfelten.com/blog/transfer-by-design-independent-fde/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/transfer-by-design-independent-fde/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT A runbook written at the end cannot repair ownership decisions deferred at the beginning. Transfer must shape architecture, access, evidence, and delivery from intake. https://scottfelten.com/blog/independent-fde-practice-operating-system/ https://scottfelten.com/blog/independent-fde-practice-operating-system/ Thu, 27 Aug 2026 12:00:00 GMT Senior judgment is necessary, but it does not make a repeatable practice. The practice needs explicit systems for qualification, service design, delivery control, evidence, and ecosystem transfer.