Principal Network Architect

Ascend Technologies•Little Rock, AR

2d•$155,000 - $160,000•Remote

About The Position

The Principal Network Architect is responsible for the technical design, delivery, and quality of complex network projects for Ascend Technologies’ Professional Services team and its clients. This is a hands-on role in which the architect directly works on projects while acting as technical lead for network engagements—shaping solutions before deals are signed, guiding engineers through delivery, and establishing standards for consistent, reliable network work. Daily responsibilities are remote, but candidates must be located near Little Rock, Arkansas, or Chicago, Illinois, for onsite visits as needed. The position includes architecting and leading complex network engagements such as data center and colocation migrations, firewall migrations, and Azure network builds across Fortinet, Cisco, Aruba, and Meraki platforms. The architect owns technical outcomes, develops project engineers, establishes delivery standards, contributes to presales scoping, and acts as the final technical escalation point for complex network issues. Ascend emphasizes diversity, equity, and inclusion and seeks people who demonstrate its values: commitment to client success, teamwork, integrity, accountability, and transparency. The starting salary expectation is $155,000; final compensation is commensurate with experience, skills, qualifications, and other stated factors. Benefits include health, dental, and vision insurance, retirement savings options, flexible time off, and professional development opportunities.

Requirements

12+ years of network engineering experience, including 5+ years in an architect or technical lead role at an MSP, consulting, or professional services firm.
Expert-level Cisco knowledge across switching, routing, firewalls, and wireless, including IOS/IOS-XE/NX-OS, Catalyst, Nexus, ISR/ASR, ASA/FTD, and Catalyst 9800.
Expert-level Fortinet knowledge, including FortiGate (HA, VDOMs, SD-WAN, VPN), FortiSwitch, FortiAP, FortiManager, and FortiAnalyzer.
Hands-on experience with Aruba switching and wireless and Meraki MX, MS, and MR.
Experience leading client network migrations involving data center or colocation infrastructure, including firewall, switching, and WAN cutovers.
Hands-on Azure networking design and build experience, including hub-spoke VNets, VPN Gateway/ExpressRoute, NSGs, UDRs, and FortiGate NVAs.
Strong routing and switching fundamentals, including BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, VLANs, STP, LACP, VRFs, vPC, and QoS.
Proven ability to lead other engineers through design reviews and mentoring and to establish technical standards.
Presales experience scoping network projects and reviewing SOWs for risk, assumptions, and effort.
Executive-level client presence and the ability to explain complex technical trade-offs to executives and engineers.
Able to sit, stand, and bend for the duration of a shift; the work is mainly sitting, with occasional lifting up to 50 lbs and driving to client work sites.
Must be located near Little Rock, AR, or Chicago, IL, for onsite visits as needed.

Nice To Haves

Cisco CCNP Enterprise or Security; CCIE or CCDE is a strong plus.
Fortinet FCSS – Enterprise Firewall or SD-WAN; FCX is a strong plus.
Microsoft Azure AZ-700 (Network Engineer).
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, IT, MIS, or a related STEM field.
Wireless surveys and heat mapping experience using Hamina or similar.
NAC experience with Cisco ISE, FortiNAC, or ClearPass and SASE/SSE experience with Zscaler, FortiSASE, or Cisco Umbrella.
Experience with additional firewall platforms such as Palo Alto, SonicWall, or Check Point.
Network automation experience with Python, Ansible, or FortiManager/Meraki APIs.

Responsibilities

Carry a personal project workload and directly design, configure, and cut over network solutions.
Own the technical outcome of assigned network projects by defining the approach, risks, and definition of done before work begins; remain engaged through delivery; and raise risks and scope gaps early through RAID logs and change orders.
Architect and lead complex network engagements, including client data center and colocation migrations, firewall migrations, and Azure network builds across Fortinet, Cisco, Aruba, and Meraki platforms.
Develop engineers on assigned projects through shadowing, design reviews, and direct feedback, teaching rather than taking over.
Establish and maintain network delivery standards, including templates, checklists, and reference architectures, and review work against those standards before closeout.
Partner with Solutions Architects to review incoming network deals for scope, risk, assumptions, and effort, and feed lessons learned into future SOWs.
Serve as the last level of technical escalation for complex network issues, including major incident response and root cause analysis.
Perform other responsibilities as assigned by management.