Network Automation Engineer - Federal Customer (Chantilly, VA) (on-site 5 days per week: TS/SCI Clearance Required) Job summary If you enjoy working with new technologies, enterprise-leading equipment, and seeking to optimize systems to achieve maximum performance, we would like to speak to you. This position will play a key role in driving the performance, stability, and scalability of next-generation networks to support enterprise Information Technology (IT) workloads. You will join a diverse team of software and platform engineers to design, deploy, and maintain network infrastructure. You will collaborate with people inside and outside the organization to deliver the highest standards for building, deploying, and scaling networks. The Network Development Engineer is focused on automating the deployment and support of critical network infrastructure. This includes interacting directly with networking hardware (switches, routers, firewalls, etc.) and enterprise software-defined control planes. Key Job Responsibilities Network Development Engineers perform high-quality network and systems operations, deployments, scaling, technology refresh, sustaining engineering, best practices applications, optimization, internal/external customer interactions, and produce appropriate technical documentation. • Create and implement changes through automation • Deliver simple, sustainable, and repeatable solutions and processes • Operate and trouble-shoot network routing, interconnectivity, platforms, performance, and configuration issues; including low level application interaction, Linux systems, and next-gen networking software tools • Maintain standards across the networking toolset and ensure that we are fully compliant with those standards and policies • Drive and support innovation from Top of Rack to the Network Border and everything in between • Work closely with the Network Architect to ensure fast, smooth roll-out of new designs and products, as well as assist with deployment and sustaining of network infrastructure and tooling • Proficient in either Python or Go programming language • Experience working with networking protocols and APIs, ideally Open vSwitch and/or any RESTful APIs for network devices and services • Proficient in network topologies and architecture (VLAN, LAN, WAN) • Experience with automation frameworks, specifically Ansible, to write scripts and automate network configurations • Experience with SONiC and Cumulus Network Operating System (NOS) • Experience in rail-optimized technology • Experience with key Kubernetes networking concepts • Experience using the Kubernetes Container Network Interface (CNI) to interact with network plugins and manage pod networking • Familiarity with configuring, deploying, and maintaining the MetalLB Operator for traffic load balancing on bare metal clusters • Ability to effectively communicate with team members, vendors, and customers to understand requirements and implement solutions • Proficient time management to prioritize tasks and meet deadlines in a fast-paced networking environment Required Qualifications • Extensive experience designing, deploying, and troubleshooting large-scale enterprise WAN architectures using core routing protocols (BGP, OSPF, EIGRP), MPLS, and overlay networks across geographically distributed sites. • Proven hands-on track record configuring and managing enterprise-grade Software-Defined WAN platforms (e.g., Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN/Viptela, Fortinet Secure SD-WAN, VMware Velocloud, or Silver Peak), including centralized policy enforcement, zero-touch provisioning (ZTP), and dynamic path selection. • Proficiency in developing production automation scripts and configuration frameworks using Python and Ansible, with practical experience consuming network REST APIs, NETCONF/RESTCONF, and data serialization formats (JSON, YAML, XML). • Strong background implementing secure transport connectivity across WAN boundaries, including IPsec site-to-site tunnels, MACsec, Next-Gen Firewall policies, and QoS traffic shaping for latency-sensitive application traffic. Preferred Qualifications • Experience using Terraform to declare network state alongside version-controlled GitOps workflows (e.g., GitLab CI, GitHub Actions) to automate change validation, linting, and continuous network deployment. • Practical experience with model-driven telemetry (gRPC, gNMI), YANG data modeling, and streaming observability pipelines (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana, ELK/OpenSearch, ThousandEyes) for proactive latency, jitter, and loss analytics. • Experience integrating enterprise SD-WAN topologies with major public clouds (AWS Transit Gateway/Direct Connect, Azure Virtual WAN/ExpressRoute) and Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) solutions (e.g., Zscaler, Palo Alto Prisma Access). • Advanced networking and automation credentials, such as Cisco Certified DevNet Professional / CCNP Enterprise (with Network Automation focus), CCIE, or equivalent automation-centric certifications.