Data Center Network Operations Engineer

Cloudflare•San Francisco, CA

11h

About The Position

The Data Center Network Operations Engineer helps maintain Cloudflare’s global network and infrastructure. The role works closely with Site Reliability Engineering, Network Engineering, Network Deployment Engineering, and external vendors and partners, including hardware vendors, data center and network providers, ISPs, logistics partners, and remote contractors. It is responsible for maintaining operational availability, developing and implementing consistent processes and visibility measures, and supporting infrastructure across Cloudflare’s global locations. The position requires a strong technical understanding of data center colocation environments, physical networking, and server technologies, along with communication, data analysis, and basic project-management skills. The role participates in a shared on-call rotation to support 24×7 global network availability and may involve limited travel. Hiring locations are Lisbon, Portugal, and London, United Kingdom.

Requirements

Experience with Juniper, Cisco, and DWDM network equipment.
At least 4 years of Linux systems administration experience.
Experience managing and instructing remote contractors.
Familiarity with work required to stand up infrastructure in remote colocation facilities.
Experience running and improving operational processes, including automation tooling, in a rapidly changing environment.
Familiarity with data center operations tasks and projects such as deployment, migration, and decommissioning.
Comfort handling basic program-management responsibilities such as prioritization, planning, scheduling, and status reporting, including with tools such as JIRA.
Strong verbal and written communication, problem-solving, attention-to-detail, and interpersonal skills.
Proactive approach, ability to learn quickly, and ability to execute multiple tasks simultaneously.
Ability to manage Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets.
Ability to work as a team player.

Nice To Haves

Bachelor’s degree with a technical background in engineering, computer science, or MIS.
Direct experience executing complex data center or infrastructure projects.
Experience installing or maintaining data center and other IT infrastructure, and using DCIM tools.
Multilingual ability or experience working with infrastructure in multiple countries.
Comfort with remote “lights-out” and out-of-band access to data center resources.
Linux certifications such as RHCSA.
Network certifications such as CCNA or JNCIA, or higher.
Experience with configuration management systems such as SaltStack, Chef, Puppet, or Ansible.
Scripting or software development experience in Bash, Python, or Go.
Familiarity with load balancing and reverse proxies such as Nginx, Varnish, HAProxy, or Apache.
Experience working within a large-scale SaaS vendor.

Responsibilities

Collaborate with Infrastructure, Network Engineering, and SRE teams.
Create documentation and manage remote contractors completing data center tasks; coordinate with hardware manufacturers, data center and network providers, logistics partners, and other service providers supporting more than 330 cities in over 125 countries.
Maintain data center operational availability.
Use AI tools to automate repetitive operational tasks, accelerate documentation, and speed troubleshooting and root-cause analysis.
Create and maintain documentation, plans, SOPs, and MOPs.
Support and configure network infrastructure where required.
Provide feedback to internal teams to improve internal tools and external vendor partnerships.
Participate in a shared on-call rotation to maintain 24×7 operational availability of the global network.
Seek opportunities to introduce effective, efficient, and scalable technology and automation to improve global infrastructure deployment and maintenance.
Assist with defining, documenting, and implementing consistent processes across all regions.
Handle basic program-management responsibilities, including prioritization, planning, scheduling, and status reporting.