Principal Network Engineer - Routing & Switching

Leidos•Odenton, MD

4d•$116,350 - $210,325

About The Position

Leidos is seeking a Principal Network Engineer specializing in routing and switching to serve as the senior technical authority for the routed and switched enterprise. The role advances network innovation through strategic design and implementation efforts that improve the security, scalability, resiliency, and performance of the enterprise network. It provides network engineering support across planning, designing, and evaluating network components; specifying network architecture; assessing needs; evaluating and recommending technologies; and directing installation, modification, testing, and servicing of network infrastructure. The position owns enterprise routing and switching architecture and standards, leads strategic engineering and modernization projects from concept through implementation and operations transition, and serves as the final technical escalation point for complex network issues. It provides technical direction and guidance to other engineers, reviews designs and implementation work, communicates recommendations and risks to leadership and stakeholders, and maintains engineering and operational documentation.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience and 12 or more years of relevant experience, or a master's degree with 10 or more years of experience; specific experience, education, and training may be considered in lieu of a degree.
Expert-level hands-on experience designing, engineering, and troubleshooting enterprise routing and switching infrastructure in large, complex environments.
Deep knowledge of TCP/IP, BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, route policy and redistribution, VLANs, spanning tree, link aggregation, VRFs, MPLS, multicast, QoS, NAT, and high-availability design.
Experience evaluating enterprise network architectures and developing improvement plans across LAN, WAN, WLAN, routing, switching, firewalls, VPN, proxies, software-defined networking, and cloud-connected environments.
Experience leading network engineering projects from planning through implementation, including requirements analysis, dependency management, risk reduction, contingency planning, execution oversight, validation, and operational transition.
Experience serving as a senior technical lead directing other network engineers, administrators, or analysts.
Hands-on experience with at least two of Cisco, Aruba, Palo Alto, Dell, Infoblox, and Brocade.
Experience documenting network designs, implementation plans, risks, dependencies, decision points, and technical recommendations with tools such as Visio, PowerPoint, Cameo, or similar.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including presenting architecture recommendations, implementation plans, risks, and status to technical leadership, stakeholders, and approval boards.
Current IAT Level II or higher certification, such as Security+ or CISSP.
Active DoD Secret clearance.

Nice To Haves

Cisco Certified Network Professional (CCNP) Enterprise, CCIE, or equivalent certification.
Experience leading enterprise network innovation, such as segmentation, enterprise Wi-Fi modernization, IPv6 transition, automation, SDN, cloud connectivity, zero-trust-aligned networking, or security stack modernization.
Experience with SD-WAN, SD-Access, Cisco Catalyst Center (DNA Center), or similar controller-based network architectures.
Experience with network automation and infrastructure-as-code using Python, Ansible, REST APIs, or similar.
Experience integrating enterprise networking with cloud infrastructure, including hybrid connectivity, cloud routing, and secure interconnects.
Experience developing repeatable engineering execution frameworks, implementation playbooks, migration runbooks, technical standards, and risk-reduction processes.
Experience with Jira, Confluence, or other project and knowledge-management tools used to coordinate technical work across distributed engineering teams.
Understanding of Federal Government application, server, and network security requirements such as NIST, FedRAMP, FISMA, RMF, and DoD cybersecurity requirements.

Responsibilities

Own enterprise routing and switching architecture, including core, distribution, access, WAN edge, and data center interconnect designs.
Define routing architecture and policy standards for BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, and static routing, including addressing, route filtering and summarization, path selection, redistribution boundaries, and convergence targets.
Define Layer 2 and high-availability architecture, including VLAN and spanning-tree strategy, link aggregation, redundancy, VRF and segmentation, multicast, and QoS policy.
Evaluate current network architecture, identify gaps and improvement opportunities, estimate level of effort, assess implementation risk, and develop engineering plans.
Specify network architecture, evaluate and recommend technologies, and conduct needs assessments to inform design and investment decisions.
Establish and enforce configuration standards, design patterns, and technical baselines.
Drive strategic engineering projects from concept through implementation, including architecture evaluation, requirements analysis, dependency identification, coordination, planning, execution, validation, and transition to operations.
Develop and manage implementation plans, schedules, cutover strategies, contingency and rollback procedures, validation steps, stakeholder communications, and change documentation for mission-critical changes.
Lead modernization efforts such as segmentation, IPv4/IPv6 transition, network optimization, connectivity consolidation, lifecycle replacement, automation, and software-defined networking adoption.
Coordinate change windows, maintenance activities, test validation, and rollback procedures for high-impact network activities.
Partner with architecture, cybersecurity, operations, project management, and technical subject-matter-expert teams to resolve blockers, manage dependencies, and reduce delivery risk.
Serve as the final technical escalation point for complex routing, switching, transport, and performance issues across domains and vendors.
Provide technical direction, mentoring, and day-to-day guidance to network engineers, administrators, and analysts; review designs and implementation work for technical quality.
Organize priorities, track concurrent efforts, manage competing demands, and maintain accountability against schedules.
Improve engineering processes, documentation standards, implementation playbooks, migration runbooks, technical standards, and execution models.
Develop and maintain logical and physical designs, architecture diagrams, routing standards, addressing plans, configuration standards, implementation and cutover plans, test plans, risk and decision registers, playbooks, runbooks, as-built documentation, and operations transition documentation.