DevOps Consultant

Role Summary

Cisco is looking for a specialized DevOps Consultant to lead the implementation and management of Network as Code (NAC) solutions for a key customer. You'll serve as the primary expert for CI/CD pipeline creation, automation workflows, and infrastructure as code (IaC) practices within a networking environment.

In this role, you'll bridge the gap between traditional networking and modern software delivery. You'll work closely with customer teams to automate network deployments, ensure configuration consistency, and build reliable delivery pipelines using Azure DevOps.

Key Responsibilities

• Pipeline Engineering: Design, build, and maintain end-to-end CI/CD pipelines in Azure DevOps to automate Cisco network configurations and deployments.
• Automation Development: Write and manage high-quality Ansible playbooks, roles, and collections tailored for Cisco's Network as Code solution.
• Infrastructure as Code: Develop and maintain Terraform configurations to manage network infrastructure, providers, and state files.
• Version Control Management: Define and enforce branching strategies, manage pull requests, and lead code reviews across GitHub or GitLab.
• Standards & Governance: Establish YAML-based configuration standards and documentation for all automation artifacts.
• Operational Excellence: Troubleshoot pipeline failures, optimize execution times, and ensure the reliability of the automated deployment framework.
• Technical Advisory: Act as the subject matter expert for the customer on DevOps best practices, GitOps workflows, and automation scaling.

Required Skills & Experience

• Azure DevOps (Primary): Deep expertise in Azure Pipelines, environment management, and service connections. Must be able to build complex multi-stage pipelines from scratch.
• Ansible: Extensive experience using Ansible for network automation. Mastery of playbooks, roles, and collections, particularly within Cisco NAC environments.
• Terraform: Solid understanding of Terraform for infrastructure automation, including provider setup, state management, and module development.
• YAML: High proficiency in YAML for writing clean, readable, and functional pipeline definitions and configuration files.
• Version Control: Expert knowledge of Git, including branching models, merge conflict resolution, and PR workflows.
• DevOps Practices: Practical experience implementing GitOps and CI/CD methodologies specifically for infrastructure or networking.

Preferred Skills

• Cisco Networking: Strong foundational knowledge of Cisco technologies such as ACI, Catalyst/Nexus switching, and routing protocols.
• Scripting: Proficiency in Python for extending automation capabilities or data manipulation.
• API Integration: Experience working with REST APIs to integrate different tools within the automation stack.