We are seeking a Senior Network Automation Architect — a software engineer first, with deep domain expertise in network infrastructure.
This is not a traditional network engineering role with scripting. This position owns the design, development, and delivery of production‑grade automation software that operates across a large‑scale, multi‑vendor network environment for a Managed Service Provider (MSP).
You will define the developer experience for the network organization: setting coding standards, designing extensible software architectures, building reusable Python libraries and internal platforms, implementing CI/CD pipelines, and mentoring engineers in modern software development practices.
You think in design patterns, clean abstractions, testability, and long‑term maintainability — and you apply that mindset to infrastructure automation.
What You’ll Own
Software Architecture & Development
- Architect and develop production-quality Python applications, libraries, and CLI tools for network automation, orchestration, and observability.
- Design clean, extensible architectures using patterns such as factory, strategy, adapter, and plugin-based systems to abstract vendor differences.
- Build and maintain API integrations (REST, GraphQL, gRPC, JSON‑RPC) with platforms including:
- - Arista VeloCloud
- Palo Alto Prisma SD‑WAN
- Fortinet SD‑WAN
- Cisco Meraki
- Juniper Mist
- Traditional network OS platforms (IOS‑XE, NX‑OS, JunOS)
- Develop internal Python packages with:
- - Proper packaging (pyproject.toml)
- Semantic versioning
- Dependency management
- Internal PyPI distribution
- Write comprehensive test suites:
- - Unit tests (pytest)
- Integration tests
- Network validation tests using mocks and fixtures
- Shape Git strategies and repository structure.
- Leverage AI/LLM developer tooling responsibly to improve productivity and code quality.
Developer Experience & Engineering Standards
- Author and maintain coding standards, architectural decision records (ADRs), and development guidelines.
- Establish and enforce code quality tooling:
- - PEP8
- Ruff / Pylint
- Black
- MyPy
- Pre‑commit hooks
- Design and implement CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins) for:
- - Linting
- Testing
- Security scanning
- Build and release automation
- Define Git workflows:
- - Branching strategies
- Pull request standards
- Code review expectations
- Release management
- Create project templates, scaffolding, and cookiecutters to standardize automation development.
Innovation, Automation & Technical Leadership
- Identify manual workflows and operational pain points, then design automation solutions to eliminate them.
- Prototype new tools, frameworks, and approaches from idea through production adoption.
- Improve observability by integrating automation platforms with logging, monitoring, and alerting systems.
- Contribute to technology roadmap and vendor evaluation from a software architecture and productivity perspective.
Mentorship & Culture
- Mentor network engineers in:
- - Python development
- Testing strategies
- Code structure
- Debugging
- Version control
- Lead code reviews with a teaching mindset.
- Facilitate workshops, knowledge-sharing sessions, and pair programming.
- Partner with DevOps, Cloud, Security, and Application teams to align engineering practices.
Required Qualifications
Software Engineering (Primary)
- 7+ years of professional software development experience with Python as the primary language.
- Advanced Python expertise:
- - Type hints
- Dataclasses / Pydantic
- Async / await
- Context managers, decorators, generators
- Experience building Python libraries, packages, and CLI tools (Click, Typer, argparse).
- Strong testing background: pytest, mocking, fixtures, TDD.
- Advanced Git skills (rebase, cherry‑pick, bisect, hooks).
- Hands‑on experience designing and maintaining CI/CD pipelines.
- Solid grounding in SOLID principles, design patterns, and clean architecture.
- Experience writing technical documentation and developer guidelines.
Required Network Domain Expertise
- Strong understanding of:
- - Routing (BGP, OSPF)
- Switching
- VPNs and firewalls
- SD‑WAN
- Network security fundamentals
- Experience automating at least two or more of:
- - NetBox
- Arista VeloCloud
- Cisco Meraki
- Juniper Mist
- Palo Alto Prisma SD‑WAN
- Fortinet SD‑WAN
- Familiarity with Netmiko, NAPALM, Nornir, pyATS.
- Experience with JSON, YAML, XML, and Jinja2 templating.
Preferred Qualifications
- Terraform (including module or provider development)
- AWS networking and architecture
- Docker, Kubernetes, Linux
- Observability stacks (Grafana, Prometheus, ELK)
- Event-driven automation (Kafka, RabbitMQ, webhooks)
- Database integration (PostgreSQL, Redis, SQLite)
- Internal developer platforms, self‑service portals, or ChatOps
- Open-source contributions or public automation portfolio
- Relevant certifications (Cisco DevNet, CCNP/CCIE, AWS, Terraform)
Why This Role
- Architect the automation backbone of a modern MSP
- Own standards, tooling, and culture — not just scripts
- Solve large‑scale, real‑world infrastructure problems
- High autonomy, high impact, long‑term technical ownership
#LI-Remote #LI-PK1 #LI-Ohio
Due to U.S. Government requirements applicable to foreign-owned telecommunications providers, non-US citizens may be required to submit to an extensive government agency background check which will necessitate disclosure of sensitive Personally Identifiable Information.