Network Engineer

Position:

Role Summary

The Network Engineer will be responsible for designing, implementing, maintaining, and supporting the organizations network infrastructure. The role involves ensuring high levels of network availability, performance, and security across all sites and data centres. The ideal candidate has hands-on experience with routing, switching, firewalls, wireless technologies, and basic cloud networking.

Key Responsibilities

1. Network Operations & Maintenance

• Monitor, maintain, and troubleshoot LAN, WAN, WLAN, and VPN infrastructure.
• Perform regular health checks on routers, switches, firewalls, and load balancers.
• Ensure optimal network uptime and proactively identify potential issues.

2. Network Design & Implementation

• Assist in designing and deploying new network solutions and improvements.
• Implement changes in routing, switching, firewall rules, VLANs, and network segmentation.
• Coordinate with vendors on configuration, and rollout of network equipment.

3. Security & Compliance

• Manage firewall policies, ACLs, port security, and encryption protocols.
• Work with the security team to enforce network security standards.
• Perform periodic audits, patching, and firmware upgrades.

4. Documentation & Reporting

• Maintain updated network diagrams, asset inventory, and configuration documentation.
• Prepare reports on performance metrics, incidents, and network capacity planning.

5. Collaboration & Support

• Work closely with server, cloud, and cybersecurity teams.
• Provide L1/L2 support for escalated network issues from the service desk.
• Support new office setups, data center upgrades, and DR exercises.

Required Skills & Qualifications

Technical Skills

• Strong knowledge of routing & switching (BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, STP, VLANs, trunking).
• Experience with Cisco, Juniper, HP/Aruba, or similar network platforms.
• Hands-on expertise with firewalls (Fortinet, Palo Alto, Cisco ASA,etc.).
• Knowledge of load balancers, SD-WAN, and wireless controllers.
• Understanding of network monitoring tools (Site24/7,SolarWinds, PRTG, Nagios).
• Basic understanding of cloud networking (AWS, Azure VNETs, VPN Gateways).
• Ability to read and troubleshoot packet captures using Wireshark or similar tools.

Soft Skills

• Strong analytical and troubleshooting skills.
• Ability to document networks clearly.
• Good communication and coordination abilities.
• Ability to work under pressure during incidents or outages.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, IT, or related field.
• Certifications preferred: CCNA/CCNP, NSE,PCCET/PCCSA, Network+, or equivalent.

Basic Day-to-Day Tasks (At Star)

Daily Tasks

• Monitor network performance dashboards & alerts.
• Respond to incidents and troubleshoot connectivity issues.
• Validate that critical links (ISP, MPLS, VPN) are healthy.
• Review firewall logs for anomalies.
• Update tickets and communicate with end-users or internal teams.

Weekly Tasks

• Apply minor configuration changes (VLAN changes, ACL modifications, routing updates).
• Check backups of device configurations.
• Update network documentation if changes were made.
• Conduct Wi-Fi optimization checks for coverage or interference.
• Coordinate with vendors for pending RMA or service-related issues.

Monthly Tasks

• Review capacity reports & plan upgrades if needed.
• Apply firmware or security patches after approval.
• Test failover scenarios (HA pairs, dual ISP links).
• Participate in DR drills or network improvement meetings.