Change Network Engineer

Senior Network Engineer
Location: Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire
Security Clearance Level - High DV Required

UNLEASH YOUR POTENTIAL

At Leidos, we deliver innovative technology and engineering solutions through the expertise of our diverse and talented people. We work with our customers to solve some of the most complex challenges across defence, government, safety, security and critical national infrastructure.

As part of the Programme, you will join an experienced and collaborative technical team delivering and supporting secure, mission-critical network services within a demanding Government environment.

This is an opportunity for an experienced Network Engineer to take a senior technical role, working directly with customers and programme teams while contributing to the design, delivery, assurance and continuous improvement of a complex and highly secure network environment.

We are looking for an experienced Senior Network Engineer with strong technical expertise across enterprise, data centre and security networking.

You will play a key role within the network engineering team, providing technical leadership across both operational service delivery and project/change activities. You will be expected to take ownership of complex technical problems, develop robust network solutions and provide engineering assurance throughout the lifecycle of network services.

The role offers significant technical variety, covering network architecture, high-availability infrastructure, security, technical refresh, service improvement, troubleshooting and the introduction of new technologies. You will work closely with customers, architects, engineers, service teams and delivery partners to ensure that network solutions are secure, resilient, supportable and aligned with operational requirements.

The role is customer-facing and will require regular attendance on secure Government sites in Cambridgeshire, potentially up to five days per week. Occasional travel to other Leidos and customer locations may also be required.

As a Senior Network Engineer, you will:

• Provide senior-level network engineering expertise and technical leadership across the Programme.
• Develop and deliver secure, resilient and scalable network solutions across data centre, campus and wide-area environments.
• Produce and assure technical designs, including High-Level Designs (HLDs), Low-Level Designs (LLDs), implementation documentation and work instructions.
• Lead network engineering activities across the full lifecycle, from requirements and design through implementation, testing, acceptance and operational support.
• Work closely with architects, project teams, operational support teams and delivery partners to ensure successful integration of network services.
• Provide technical assurance and contribute to the definition and maintenance of engineering standards, processes and best practice.
• Lead the investigation and resolution of complex network incidents and problems, taking ownership through to successful resolution.
• Support major technical refresh programmes involving large numbers of network and security devices.
• Identify opportunities for service improvement, automation and operational efficiency.
• Evaluate new and emerging technologies and identify opportunities where they can improve capability, resilience, security or service delivery.
• Contribute to verification and validation activities, ensuring solutions meet defined technical, security and operational requirements.
• Work directly with customers to understand requirements, resolve technical issues and provide expert engineering advice.
• Communicate complex technical information effectively to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Support the development of junior engineers and share knowledge across the wider technical team.

TECHNICAL EXPERIENCE

The successful candidate will have extensive experience in network engineering and a strong understanding of enterprise and data centre technologies.

Networking

• Strong experience of Layer 2 and Layer 3 networking and network design.
• Extensive knowledge of routing and switching within enterprise, data centre, campus and WAN environments.
• Strong understanding and practical experience of static and dynamic routing protocols.
• Experience designing and supporting high-availability network environments.
• Experience of data centre spine-leaf architectures.
• Experience supporting large-scale network infrastructure and technical refresh programmes.
• Understanding of network resilience, redundancy and fault-tolerant design.

Network Security

Experience with a range of network security technologies, including:

• Cisco routing, switching, firewalls and security technologies.
• Fortinet FortiGate and FortiSwitch.
• Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Firewalls.
• Juniper SRX.
• VMware NSX and related virtual networking technologies.
• Network segmentation and security controls.
• Encryption technologies and secure network design.

Infrastructure & Platforms

• Experience supporting critical data centre workloads across Windows Server and Linux/RHEL environments.
• Good understanding of supporting infrastructure services including:
  • Active Directory
  • DNS
  • DHCP
  • Group Policy
• Experience working with SAN and storage-connected environments.
• Understanding of virtualised infrastructure and data centre platforms.

Monitoring & Management

• Strong experience with network monitoring and management technologies.
• Experience with SolarWinds or comparable enterprise network monitoring platforms.
• Ability to analyse monitoring, logging and performance information to identify faults, trends and opportunities for service improvement.

SECURITY AND DEFENCE

Experience working within a Defence, Government or other highly secure environment would be highly desirable.

You will need to demonstrate an understanding of the requirements associated with operating secure and mission-critical infrastructure, including technical assurance, security standards, configuration management and controlled change.

DV security clearance is required for this role, or you must be able to obtain and maintain the required level of clearance.

WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR

We are looking for someone who can combine strong technical capability with a proactive and collaborative approach.

You will ideally demonstrate:

• Significant commercial experience in network engineering.
• The ability to operate confidently at senior engineer / technical lead level.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
• The ability to take ownership of complex technical issues.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Experience producing high-quality technical documentation and network designs.
• The ability to work effectively with customers, suppliers and multidisciplinary engineering teams.
• A commitment to engineering quality, security and continuous improvement.
• The ability to understand the wider business and operational context when making technical decisions.
• A willingness to investigate and adopt appropriate new technologies and automation approaches.

WHY JOIN THE NETWORK TEAM?

This role provides the opportunity to work on a technically challenging and operationally important programme, where your engineering decisions have a direct and demonstrable impact on the customer and the services they depend upon.

You will have the opportunity to work across a broad range of networking and security technologies while contributing to major infrastructure refresh, service improvement and transformation activities.

For an experienced engineer, this is an opportunity to broaden your technical expertise, take ownership of significant engineering activities and develop towards technical leadership, architecture and solution design roles.

Are you ready to make an impact? Begin your journey of a flourishing and meaningful career, share your CV with us today!

What we do for you:

At Leidos we are PASSIONATE about customer success, UNITED as a team and INSPIRED to make a difference. We offer meaningful and engaging careers, a collaborative culture, and support for your career goals, all while nurturing a healthy work-life balance.

We provide an employment package that attracts, develops and retains only the best in talent. Our reward scheme includes:

Contributory Pension Scheme

Private Medical Insurance

33 days Annual Leave (including public and privilege holidays)

Access to Flexible benefits (including life assurance, health schemes, gym memberships, annual buy and sell holidays and a cycle to work scheme)

Flexi-TIme

Commitment to Diversity:

We welcome applications from every part of the community and are committed to a truly diverse and inclusive culture.  We foster a sense of belonging, welcoming all perspectives and contributions, and providing equal access to opportunities and resources for everyone.  If you have a disability or need any reasonable adjustments during the application and selection stages please let us know, and we will respond in a way that best fits your needs.

Who We Are:

Leidos UK & EUROPE – we work to make the world safer, healthier, and more efficient through technology, engineering and science.

Leidos is a growing company delivering innovative technology and solutions focused on safeguarding critical capabilities and transformation in frontline services, our work in the United Kingdom includes addressing some of the most complex problems in defence, healthcare, government, safety and security, and transportation.

What Makes Us Different:

Purpose: you can use your passion and abilities at Leidos to keep the people you care about safe. We are at the forefront of machine learning, AI, cyber security and solutions. Using your skills in the technology frontline by helping to build a safer world.  You can inspire change.

Collaboration: having flexibility to do your job is one of our core benefits, enabling you to become part of our extraordinary team.  We have been empowering our people to work flexibly for years.  Whether you work from home, the office or on customer sites, we will give you the digital tools and the flexibility to work smarter and align your needs and ours.          

People: Leidos empowers people from every background to be themselves and gives you the tools to learn new skills by enabling growth whilst developing. We believe that extraordinary people need opportunities to grow, to be inspired and to inspire others. At Leidos, we invest in technical academies, career rotations and a career development plans that enhance your future.

If you're looking for comfort, keep scrolling. At Leidos, we outthink, outbuild, and outpace the status quo — because the mission demands it. We're not hiring followers. We're recruiting the ones who disrupt, provoke, and refuse to fail. Step 10 is ancient history. We're already at step 30 — and moving faster than anyone else dares.

The Leidos pay range for this job level is a general guideline only and not a guarantee of compensation or salary. Additional factors considered in extending an offer include (but are not limited to) responsibilities of the job, education, experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities, as well as internal equity, alignment with market data, applicable bargaining agreement (if any), or other law.