Lead Network Automation Engineer

Job Title: Lead Network Automation Engineer

Job Code: CUB/2025/SSE/024

Experience: 10 - 12 yrs

Job Location: Infopark, Kochi

Why Join Us?

• Innovative Environment: Join a forward-thinking company that encourages creativity and problem-solving
• Career Growth: Opportunities for professional development and career advancement
• Collaborative Culture: Work in a team-oriented environment where your contributions are valued
• Competitive Compensation: Attractive salary package and performance-based incentives

Key Responsibilities

• Lead end-to-end delivery of network automation and IaC initiatives across enterprise environments.
• Design scalable automation solutions for network provisioning, configuration, policy enforcement, drift detection, and compliance reporting.
• Develop and maintain Python-based automation frameworks, reusable libraries, utilities, and tooling (logging, validation, retries, reporting).
• Build and standardize IaC patterns using Terraform and Ansible (modules, roles, collections, inventories).
• Implement model-driven network automation using NETCONF and YANG (RESTCONF exposure is a plus).
• Design Jinja template-driven configuration generation and enforce “golden configuration” standards.
• Architect and build microservice-based network automation applications, including REST/gRPC APIs, async execution, idempotency, and retry strategies.
• Expose automation workflows through secure APIs for provisioning, change execution, audits, and compliance checks.
• Integrate automation workflows with CI/CD pipelines, including approvals, testing, validation, and rollback mechanisms.
• Ensure all solutions meet security, auditability, and compliance requirements, preferably aligned with banking-grade practices.
• Mentor engineers, conduct design and code reviews, and drive automation and engineering best practices across the team.

Required Skills

• 10-12+ years of experience in Networking / Infrastructure Engineering with a strong focus on automation.
• Strong Python scripting expertise for network automation (API integrations, structured data, parsing, error handling, packaging).
• Proven hands-on experience with Terraform and Ansible in production environments.
• Practical experience with NETCONF and YANG for model-driven network automation.
• Strong expertise in Jinja templating for configuration generation and standardization.
• Hands-on experience designing and delivering microservice-based applications in the network or infrastructure domain.
• Solid networking fundamentals (routing, switching, VLANs, VPNs, DNS/DHCP, load balancers, firewalls).
• Strong Git practices and understanding of CI/CD pipelines for infrastructure and network changes.
• Experience owning delivery or leading automation initiatives end-to-end.
• Preferred Skills
• Experience in banking or financial services projects, including change control, approvals, audit trails, and segregation of duties.
• Exposure to multiple network vendor ecosystems (Cisco, Juniper, Arista, Palo Alto, Fortinet, F5, etc.).
• Familiarity with RESTCONF, gNMI, streaming telemetry, and modern network observability patterns.
• Experience deploying automation services using Docker and Kubernetes.
• Knowledge of event-driven automation patterns using queues or streams (Kafka, RabbitMQ, SQS, etc.).
• Familiarity with Source of Truth concepts and tools (IPAM, CMDB, inventory systems, configuration baselines).
• Experience with secrets management and secure automation patterns (Vault, CyberArk, or similar).

Soft Skills

• Strong ownership mindset with focus on delivery quality, reliability, and maintainability.
• Ability to mentor and guide engineers, establish standards, and improve team velocity through reusable patterns.
• Clear and confident communication with technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Ability to present solution options, trade-offs, and architectural decisions effectively.
• Structured, detail-oriented, and security-conscious approach to engineering.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Computer Science, or equivalent practical experience.
• Networking certifications (CCNP, CCIE, JNCIP, or equivalent) are a plus but not mandatory.