Network Automation Engineer

OpticoreIT; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 65,000 - 90,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary

Discretionary bonus

23 days holiday + bank holidays

Private healthcare & dental

Pension

EV car salary sacrifice

Cycle-to-work scheme

Team & Company Social events

EMI share scheme

Job summary

Opticore IT is seeking Network Automation Engineers to join our automation team in large enterprise environments. Hybrid role with 2 days on site in Central London, focusing on Python-based tooling and CI/CD pipelines to deliver network changes rapidly.

You will work with Terraform, Docker, Nautobot, and GitOps practices to maintain data integrity and reliability across environments, alongside a dedicated Network Automation Architect.

Qualifications

• This role requires strong routing and switching experience in enterprise or service provider environments.
• Experience building CI/CD pipelines end-to-end and deploying containerised services.
• Hands-on expertise with Python and network automation tooling (Nornir, NAPALM, pyATS).
• Familiarity with IaC tooling (Terraform) and GitOps practices.
• Experience with container orchestration patterns and data integrity workflows.

Responsibilities

• Build, test, and deploy network configuration changes through automated CI/CD pipelines.
• Develop Python-based network automation tooling using Nornir, NAPALM, and pyATS.
• Manage Infrastructure as Code with Terraform, including brownfield migration.
• Build and deploy containerised services using Docker and Docker Compose.
• Integrate automation workflows with Nautobot as the single source of truth for network data.
• Implement GitOps practices to maintain data integrity across environments.
• Collaborate with the Network Automation Architect on design and pipeline architecture.
• Contribute to observability and telemetry for network infrastructure.
• Participate in code reviews, testing, and documentation.

Skills

Python

Nornir

NAPALM

pyATS

CI/CD pipelines

Terraform

Docker

Docker Compose

Nautobot

GitOps

Networking (routing & switching)

Tools

Terraform

Docker

Docker Compose

Nautobot

Job description

Opticore IT is a specialist Network Engineer and Project Management consultancy offering a wide variety of opportunities to work within fast-paced, challenging environments across our client base spanning multiple sectors including Finance, Broadcast Media, Telecommunications and more.

Opticore IT are currently searching for Network Automation Engineers to join an existing automation team within large enterprise environments. The successful candidate will work within an established automation framework built on Python, Terraform, Nautobot, and CI/CD tooling, delivering network changes at pace while maintaining data integrity and operational reliability through Day 1 and beyond.

This is a hybrid opportunity with 2 days on site in Central London

What you'll be doing:

• Build, test, and deploy network configuration changes through automated CI/CD pipeline
• Develop and maintain Python-based network automation tooling using Nornir, NAPALM, and pyATS
• Manage Infrastructure as Code (IaC) with Terraform, including brownfield migration
• Build and deploy containerised services using Docker and Docker Compose
• Integrate automation workflows with Nautobot as the single source of truth for network data
• Implement GitOps practices to maintain network data integrity across environments
• Collaborate with the Network Automation Architect on solution design and pipeline architecture
• Contribute to observability and telemetry solutions for network infrastructure
• Participate in code reviews, testing, and documentation

What you'll bring:

• Strong routing and switching background (enterprise/service provider environments)
• Building CI/CD pipelines end-to-end
• Building and deploying containers using Docker and Docker Compose
• Understanding of container orchestration patterns
• Managing IaC with Terraform (modules, state management, providers)
• Building network automation solutions using Nornir, NAPALM, and pyATS
• Building and maintaining Python codebases
• Familiarity with Nautobot or similar IPAM/DCIM tools

What you'll gain:

Here at OpticoreIT we believe in investing in our team as we understand that we are only as great as our engineers, so learning and development is a big deal for us. Whether you’re going for a CCNP, CCIE, Hashicorp, Python, Cloud Technology or anything in between OpticoreIT has your back with all our training, labs, courses, and shared knowledge and the most important part it’s all free! On top of that, we also give you:

• Competitive Salary & discretionary bonus
• 23 days holiday + bank holidays
• Private healthcare & dental
• Pension
• EV car, workplace nursery, tech, and cycle-to-work salary sacrifice schemes
• Team & Company Social events
• EMI share scheme

Diversity:

At Opticore IT we embrace diversity and are committed to equal opportunities. We actively recruit for an inclusive and diverse workforce and as such, want to ensure we do everything we can to support your application.

We want you to feel empowered to let us know if you require any adjustments to be made with your application or interview process so please speak to our recruitment team.