Strategic Solutions Engineer, West
$175k - $205k USD
Cresta is on a mission to turn every customer conversation into a competitive advantage by unlocking the true potential of the contact center. Our platform combines the best of AI and human intelligence to help contact centers discover customer insights and behavioral best practices, automate conversations and inefficient processes, and empower every team member to work smarter and faster. Born from the prestigious Stanford AI lab, Cresta's co-founder and chairman is Sebastian Thrun, the genius behind Google X, Waymo, Udacity, and more. Our leadership also includes CEO, Ping Wu, the co-founder of Google Contact Center AI and Vertex AI platform, & co-founder, Tim Shi, an early member of Open AI.
We’ve assembled a world-class team of AI and ML experts, go-to-market leaders, and top-tier investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Greylock Partners, Sequoia, and former AT&T CEO John Donovan. Our valued customers include brands like Intuit, Cox Communications, Hilton, and Carmax and we’ve been recognized by Forbes and Bain Consulting as one of the top private AI companies in the world.
Join us on this thrilling journey to revolutionize the workforce with AI. The future of work is here, and it's at Cresta.
About the role:
As a Strategic Solutions Engineer, you’ll be at the forefront of the AI transformation in customer experience. Partnering with Sales Directors, you’ll serve as both a business consultant and technical expert—guiding prospective customers through the discovery, design, and validation of Cresta’s AI-powered solutions.
You’ll connect deeply with customer stakeholders to understand their business goals, technical environments, and operational challenges, and architect intelligent solutions that combine the power of LLMs, SLMs, and real-time AI assistance. Your ability to translate both technical complexity and business impact will be critical to driving successful sales cycles and long-term customer outcomes.Responsibilities:
- Act as a consultative partner to customers—uncovering business objectives, technical environments, and operational challenges to map them to AI-driven solutions.
- Act as a consultative advisor to prospective customers, uncovering operational workflows and strategic goals to design solutions leveraging Cresta’s real-time AI capabilities, including virtual agents, agent assist, and conversation intelligence.
- Lead technical discovery sessions to understand customer systems, including contact center infrastructure, telephony and IVR architecture, and CRM/workforce management platforms.
- Qualify and translate customer requirements into robust, scalable Cresta configurations, ensuring tight alignment with business value and technical feasibility.
- Design and deliver compelling, tailored product demonstrations that highlight how Cresta’s AI-powered virtual agents, real-time coaching, and analytics can deliver measurable business outcomes.
- Own the technical design and delivery of proof-of-value (POV) engagements, including integrations, real-time coaching workflows, and virtual agent use cases.
- Run ROI workshops and build business case models that connect Cresta’s capabilities to quantifiable customer impact (e.g., cost reduction, efficiency, CSAT).
- Provide insights based on your experience with AI technologies, contact center transformation, and customer success strategies.
- Serve as a technical liaison between Sales, Product, and Engineering—providing feedback on platform capabilities, customer needs, and market trends in AI, NLP, and contact center transformation.
- Stay current on emerging technologies, including LLMs, SLMs, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), speech recognition, and contact center AI platforms.
- Deliver persuasive, tailored product demonstrations that showcase how Cresta’s AI—built on a proprietary architecture using large and small language models—drives measurable ROI through automation, efficiency, and improved customer outcomes.
Qualifications We Value:
- 7+ years of experience in customer-facing roles, including 1–3 years in pre-sales, solutions engineering, or consulting within the enterprise software or contact center industry.
- Deep knowledge of contact center solutions, including telephony architecture (SIP, SBCs, ACDs, IVRs) and CCaaS platforms (e.g., Genesys, NICE, Five9, Amazon Connect).
- Strong understanding of AI/ML technologies, especially large language models (LLMs), small language models (SLMs), and how they are applied in conversational AI and agent augmentation.
- Experience with real-time systems, CRM tools (e.g., Salesforce), analytics platforms, and SaaS solution architecture.
- Ability to design and communicate complex solutions clearly to both technical and business audiences.
- Consultative mindset with a proven track record of leading strategic conversations, influencing stakeholders, and tailoring solutions to business goals.
- Fast learner and self-starter who thrives in high-growth, high-collaboration environments.
- Enthusiastic about Cresta’s mission and motivated to help customers unlock value from AI.
- You embody our core Operating Principles
Perks & Benefits:
We offer a comprehensive and people-first benefits package to support you at work and in life:
- Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage with plans to fit you and your family
- Flexible PTO to take the time you need, when you need it
- Paid parental leave for all new parents welcoming a new child
- Retirement savings plan to help you plan for the future
- Remote work setup budget to help you create a productive home office
- Monthly wellness and communication stipend to keep you connected and balanced
- In-office meal program and commuter benefits provided for onsite employees
Compensation at Cresta
Cresta’s approach to compensation is simple: recognize impact, reward excellence, and invest in our people. We offer competitive, location-based pay that reflects the market and what each individual brings to the table.
The posted base salary range represents what we expect to pay for this role in a given location. Final offers are shaped by factors like experience, skills, education, and geography. In addition to base pay, total compensation includes equity and a comprehensive benefits package for you and your family.
This role is variable target compensation eligible. There is potential to exceed target earnings when goals are surpassed.
Base Salary Range: $175,000–$205,000 + variable & Offers Equity
We have noticed a rise in recruiting impersonations across the industry, where scammers attempt to access candidates' personal and financial information through fake interviews and offers. All Cresta recruiting email communications will always come from the @cresta.ai domain. Any outreach claiming to be from Cresta via other sources should be ignored. If you are uncertain whether you have been contacted by an official Cresta employee, reach out to recruiting@cresta.ai