NETWORK ARCHITECT

As a UW employee, you have a unique opportunity to change lives on our campuses, in our state, and around the world. UW employees offer their boundless energy, creative problem-solving skills, and dedication to build stronger minds and a healthier world. By being deeply invested in our work, showing compassion in our interactions, and embodying the spirit of a team player, each member contributes to a thriving community. UW is committed to attracting and retaining a diverse staff; your experiences, perspectives, and unique identities will be honored at the University of Washington. Together, our community strives to create and maintain working and learning environments that are inclusive, equitable, and welcoming.

UW Information Technology (UW-IT) is the central information technology organization for the University of Washington, responsible for strategic planning, oversight, and direction of the UW’s IT infrastructure, resources, and services. UW-IT provides critical technology support to all three campuses, UW Medicine, and research operations around the world, partnering with the UW community to enable innovation, learning, discovery, and service.”

Within the Infrastructure division of UW-IT, the Networks & Communications Technologies (NCT) unit supports several networks of varying scales from campus to international – including the three University of Washington campuses (approximately 100,000 students & staff) with associated labs and facilities throughout the region; UW Medicine (3 hospitals and over a dozen clinics across the state); the Washington State K20 Education Network (connecting ~400 school districts); the Pacific Northwest Gigapop – the regional point of presence for research & education networking; the Pacific Wave international R&E peering facility; and the C3 optical ring around Lake Washington. We also design, deploy, and operate partner-owned fiber, DWDM, and commercial third-party ethernet & cellular services. These networks use both open-source and commercial management systems to ensure stable and reliable operation for our customers.

UW-IT has an outstanding full-time opportunity for a Network Architect in our Network Design and Architecture (NDA) team. This senior network engineer is responsible for looking to the future of network architecture to ensure that UW and its partners and affiliates deploy efficient, cost-effective, leading-edge network constructs in support of research, teaching, learning and medicine. These services are foundational to the missions of the University of Washington and our networking partners.

ABOUT US

We are skilled IT professionals dedicated to the use of technology to support the missions of the University and our partners. We are committed to:

Teamwork, transparency, self-motivation, and individual accountability.

A collaborative workplace that promotes cross-disciplinary interaction.

Agility, responsiveness, and iterative means of delivering strategic value sooner.

Self-directed time for learning, innovation, and professional development.

Effective use of tools and processes to free people to do what they do best.

A healthy work/life balance, where our best work happens in a 40-hour work week.

ABOUT YOU

As a UW employee, you have a unique opportunity to change lives – on our campuses, in our state and around the world. UW employees offer their boundless energy, creative problem-solving skills and dedication to build stronger minds and a healthier world. UW is committed to attracting and retaining a diverse staff; your experiences, perspectives and unique identities will be honored at the University of Washington. Together, our community strives to create and maintain working and learning environments that are inclusive, equitable, and welcoming.

By applying for the position, you are telling us:

You are a successful, experienced senior network engineer with seven or more years of experience designing, deploying and supporting advanced, large-scale, critical, high-volume networks in Campus and/or Metro environments.

You have relevant industry experience developing Datacenter and Cloud strategies and suitable network architectures.

You are driven to understand our community’s needs, translate for others, and ask yourself questions like “What are their needs?” and “What are they trying to do?”

You believe in open engagement, dialog, clear communication, trust, and respect as the foundations for effective partnerships.

Your decisions are guided by vision, informed by data and process, and driven by a desire to make things work better.

You are motivated to work in higher education, at a public institution, and more specifically, at the UW.

You have an entrepreneurial spirit, agile mindset and desire to influence the evolution of the services we provide.

This position has three primary roles:

Network Architecture and Design – Construct a strong framework that defines strategic integration of automation and virtualization within UW’s and UW’s partner networks, assuring that this framework accommodates the requirements of our UW customers as well as the operation teams delivering and supporting the networks. Clearly document architectures and designs. Work with Wired and Wireless Service Owners and Managers to prioritize efforts to help achieve increased efficiency, reduced costs, mitigation of risk, and increased network reliability and sustainability. Work with customers and leaders to develop a strong Cloud and Datacenter strategy and suitable network architecture. Facilitate integration of network-related automation and virtualization efforts with and between many UW-IT groups, including Infrastructure Software Tools and Enterprise Architect teams. Integrate and promote common best-practices around advanced network service constructs including software tools and DevOps practices such as Change control. Oversee design of network modifications and network standards. Provide direction and expertise to assist with the deployment and transition into operational mode for new network technologies. Provide direction on staff skills and processes required to design, deploy, and operate networks with integrated automation and virtualization components. Mentor and train others in advanced network technologies.

Network Services – Solutions Researcher, Evaluator, and Developer – Oversee and provide direction on evaluating and testing of new technologies. Engage with peers in higher education, NRENs and industry and track results of others’ implementation of modern network constructs, including Cloud access. Stay abreast of new technologies. Routinely engage with appropriate vendors. Acquire, test and evaluate equipment to discover new technologies to meet UW’s network needs.

Project Lead on P1/P2/P3 projects – The network engineer will delegate, oversee, and substantially contribute to the preparation and submission of Business Cases that may lead to high-profile, strategic Wired or Wireless Networks projects approved and supported by UW-IT senior management. Once approved, this network engineer may act as Project Lead and oversee the development, delivery, milestones, reporting, and project-close activities. The network engineer may have responsibility for multiple, simultaneous projects.

This network engineer position reports to the Director of Network Design & Architecture.

REQUIREMENTS:

Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Telecommunications, Engineering, Mathematics or related field or experience.

Seven or more years of experience architecting, designing, deploying and supporting advanced, large-scale, high-volume and reliable networks both physical & logical, as well as software-defined networking constructs.

Experience as a lead network engineer in a major national or international production network environment.

Expected to be able to work independently with little direct supervision.

Strong expertise with a variety of Network Management systems and approaches.

Strong expertise with a variety of Datacenter and Cloud constructs as they relate to network infrastructure requirements both in support of the network itself as well as network users accessing Cloud resources.

Identification, creation and deployment of virtualization and automation constructs to increase efficiency and reliability and decrease costs.

Track record of successful, increased responsibility and decision making; successful design and deployment of major, large-scale leading-edge network constructs inclusive of automation and virtualization technologies.

Track record of successful evaluation and proof-of-concept of leading edge network technologies and tools.

Proven record of advanced project planning and organizational skills, including building strong and supportive team relationships with ability to mentor and coach, delegate, make decisions and hold people accountable.

Demonstrated excellent written/oral communication skills, technical documentation skills, user liaison skills, and personal interaction abilities.

DESIRED:

Experience in a major higher education, research, and/or medical/healthcare organization.

Experience with ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library, a set of detailed practices for IT service and asset management)

Software coding tools & practices such as Agile, DevOps, Python, Ansible, Django, github, Containers.

Prior experience using ServiceNow, Atlassian Confluence and JIRA, O365, Google Suite.

CONDITIONS OF EMPLOYMENT

This professional position requires the employee to fulfill the requirements of the job. This may entail occasional situations where work outside of standard work days is required to meet deadlines or respond to emergency situations.

This is an essential position and is required to report to work remotely when UW suspends operations.

Application Process:The application process may include completion of a variety of online assessments to obtain additional information that will be used in the evaluation process. These assessments may include Work Authorization, Cover Letter and/or others. Any assessments that you need to complete will appear on your screen as soon as you select “Apply to this position”. Once you begin an assessment, it must be completed at that time; if you do not complete the assessment, you will be prompted to do so the next time you access your “My Jobs” page. If you select to take it later, it will appear on your “My Jobs” page to take when you are ready. Please note that your application will not be reviewed, and you will not be considered for this position until all required assessments have been completed.

Committed to attracting and retaining a diverse staff, the University of Washington will honor your experiences, perspectives and unique identity. Together, our community strives to create and maintain working and learning environments that are inclusive, equitable and welcoming.

The University of Washington is an affirmative action and equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, age, protected veteran or disabled status, or genetic information.

To request disability accommodation in the application process, contact the Disability Services Office at 206-543-6450 or dso@uw.edu.

Applicants considered for this position will be required to disclose if they are the subject of any substantiated findings or current investigations related to sexual misconduct at their current employment and past employment. Disclosure is required under Washington state law.

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