IT Engineer - Network

Equity Residential•Chicago, IL

6d•Hybrid

About The Position

The IT Network Engineer designs, secures, and maintains a reliable, highly available hybrid network across Vivmark Residential’s datacenters, corporate offices, residential properties, and public cloud. The role requires expertise in enterprise routing and switching across Cisco (including Meraki), Juniper, Arista, and Palo Alto platforms, with working knowledge of application delivery, cloud networking, and DDI. Security is built into network design, in partnership with Security Operations and other teams. The engineer manages assigned infrastructure initiatives, including load balancing and edge technologies such as F5 and Cloudflare, and DDI technologies such as Infoblox. The role serves as a technical contributor to project teams and a resource to network engineering counterparts across the merged organization, provides infrastructure escalation support across multiple technologies, and recommends approaches to address current and future needs, including SASE and zero trust networking. The current onsite schedule requires attendance Monday through Thursday, with remote work permitted on Fridays. The position may require after-hours or weekend support for maintenance and incident response, participation in an on-call rotation, and travel to Chicago-area datacenters and other company locations as needed. The stated salary is $111,000–$136,000 per year, plus a discretionary 10.5% annual bonus. Starting pay depends on job-related skills, experience, and qualifications.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related discipline, or equivalent experience.
At least seven years of related experience in enterprise IT environments performing infrastructure engineering, planning, implementation, and management, with network engineering as the primary focus.
Cisco CCNA certification or equivalent demonstrated knowledge.
Expert knowledge of enterprise routing and switching, including BGP, OSPF or EIGRP, VRFs, VLANs, and high-availability design, using Cisco NX-OS, IOS-XE, traditional WLCs, and Meraki, plus at least one additional vendor such as Arista or Juniper.
Strong cyber awareness and a security-first approach to design and change; working knowledge of firewalls, segmentation, TLS inspection, VPN, DDoS mitigation, zero trust, and SASE concepts.
Working knowledge of load balancing and application delivery, including TLS and PKI concepts.
Working knowledge of Azure networking, including virtual networks, private connectivity, VPN, hybrid DNS, and routing.
Experience with DDI, wireless networking, and network monitoring tools.
Experience with scripting and automation using Python, PowerShell, Ansible, or Terraform.
At least one year of project management experience, including managing cross-functional projects, making project decisions, monitoring progress, and reporting results.
Ability to independently turn ambiguous requirements into documented, implemented, and supportable designs.
Ability to plan infrastructure requirements two to four years ahead, adapt to changing technology, and apply it to business needs.
Strong technical knowledge of networks, network topologies, and advanced troubleshooting; ability to resolve infrastructure issues and manage performance and capacity.
Ability to communicate effectively with end users and multiple management layers, provide strong customer service, and explain complex problems or situations.
Good judgment, analytical skills, follow-up, and organizational skills.
Ability to conduct and prepare feasibility studies, estimate costs, time, and resources, and complete cost-benefit analyses.
Flexibility to provide after-hours or weekend support and participate in an on-call rotation.
Ability to travel to Chicago-area datacenters and other company locations as needed.
Ability to meet the company’s professional business dress expectations; wear a property uniform when required.
Ability to converse by phone and in person, interpret and communicate detailed instructions, and see well enough to use a computer and read written communications.
Ability to lift, push, pull, or carry up to 15 pounds; may be required to climb stairs depending on the property structure.

Nice To Haves

CCNP Enterprise certification.
Working knowledge of AWS networking, including virtual networks, private connectivity, VPN, hybrid DNS, and routing.
Palo Alto firewall experience.
Hands-on experience with F5 Distributed Cloud or BIG-IP and Cloudflare.
Infoblox experience.
Juniper Mist experience.
Equivalent experience may be accepted in place of the stated bachelor’s degree.

Responsibilities

Design, configure, and manage enterprise routing and switching across datacenter, corporate office, and property environments using Cisco (including Meraki), Arista, and Juniper platforms.
Manage internal and external routing using BGP, iBGP, OSPF, and EIGRP, including multi-homed internet edge, VRF-based segmentation, and datacenter interconnects.
Administer wired and wireless networking at properties and offices, including Juniper Mist, Cisco wireless LAN controllers, and Meraki, and support these platforms through transitions.
Maintain 802.1X wireless authentication in partnership with the Identity team.
Administer Infoblox DNS, DHCP, and IPAM, and support external DNS services.
Maintain network monitoring, alerting, and capacity reporting, and act on trends before they become incidents.
Manage internal and internet-facing application delivery, including F5 Distributed Cloud Customer Edge load balancing and Cloudflare DNS, WAF, TLS, tunnels, application protection, and traffic management.
Manage TLS and certificate lifecycles for load-balanced and proxied services with the Identity team.
Troubleshoot application delivery end to end across edge, perimeter firewall, load balancer, and server layers.
Design, implement, and support hybrid connectivity between on-premises environments and Azure and AWS, including routing, segmentation, private connectivity, VPN, and hybrid DNS.
Support cloud network security constructs such as network security groups, virtual firewalls, private endpoints, and hybrid DNS resolution.
Use automation and infrastructure as code, including Ansible, Terraform, Python, or PowerShell, to build, deploy, audit, and back up network configurations.
Partner with Security Operations on segmentation, Palo Alto firewall policy, TLS inspection, VPN, and zero trust access; apply threat awareness to network design and operations.
Harden network devices; maintain firmware and software; and support vulnerability remediation, patching, and lifecycle planning.
Support security incident response through traffic analysis, log review, packet capture, and containment actions on network devices.
Secure the network management plane, including AAA, MFA, configuration backup, and change control; support audit and compliance requests for network controls.
Recommend, plan, and manage hardware and software implementation for assigned infrastructure components and participate in infrastructure improvement projects.
Deliver assigned projects, provide status reports, and align project charters with Infrastructure Group objectives and goals.
Research and evaluate technologies and recommend and manage implementation of software or systems to meet company requirements.
Maintain infrastructure and ensure compatibility and compliance with regulations, contracts, and licensing agreements.
Develop and maintain procedures, runbooks, and network diagrams, ensuring documentation covers installations and operations.
Provide input to technical standards and procedures, and participate in network disaster recovery design and testing.
Provide third-level support to IT personnel and end users as needed.
Partner with network engineering counterparts across the merged organization on integration, coexistence, and consolidation; provide technical guidance and knowledge transfer.
Help coordinate team tasks, mentor team members, and build cross-technology knowledge across Enterprise Infrastructure Operations.
Liaise with vendors and carriers as needed; analyze situations and recommend solutions.
Monitor and analyze network problems to maintain a stable enterprise-wide performance environment and resolve issues rapidly and efficiently.
Maintain professional and courteous conduct with residents, coworkers, and the public; perform other duties as necessary.
Provide after-hours or weekend support for maintenance windows and incident response, including participation in an on-call rotation.
Travel to Chicago-area datacenters and other company locations as needed.