Jr. Network Engineer

Socket.dev; Rockville (MD); On-site; USD 65,000 - 80,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

401K

Job summary

Socket.dev invites a Junior Network Engineer to join our client’s Network Operations Team at a biopharmaceutical facility in Rockville, MD. The role focuses on monitoring, maintaining, and supporting enterprise network infrastructure to ensure high availability in a 24x7 manufacturing environment.

On-site, you will handle daily requests, participate in an on-call rotation, and contribute to network projects.

Qualifications

• Associate's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or related field.
• Current Cisco CCNA certification is required.
• 2–3 years of hands-on experience supporting enterprise networks.
• Solid understanding of routing protocols: OSPF, EIGRP, BGP, and related tech.
• Must live within 1 hour of Rockville, MD for onsite work.

Responsibilities

• Maintain, troubleshoot, and support critical network devices (Cisco switches/routers, PAN firewalls, F5, Cisco wireless controllers).
• Monitor network performance to meet SLAs and respond to incidents.
• Handle tickets including solution definition, deployment, and documentation.
• Provide on-site and after-hours on-call support as required.
• Assist in planning infrastructure upgrades and project work.
• Perform lab testing for validation, bug fixes, and impact analysis.
• Coordinate with vendors and ISPs for escalation and maintenance.
• Maintain network documentation for LAN, data center, wireless, firewalls, and load balancers.

Skills

OSPF/EIGRP/BGP

Cisco IOS/NX-OS

LAN/WAN switching & routing

Network monitoring

Python/Ansible scripting

Unix/Linux familiarity

Bilingual Korean

On-site availability

Education

Associate's degree in Computer Science or related field

Cisco CCNA certification

Palo Alto Firewall / F5 Load Balancer / Cisco Wireless certifications

Job description

Job Details

• Job Title: Jr. Network Engineer
• Client: Korean IT Services and IT Consulting
• Working Location: Rockville, MD
• Working Style: On-site
• Employment Type: 1 year Contract / W-2
• Salary: $65,000 to$80,000/year (DOE)
• Benefit: No Insurance but 401K
• Visa Support: No
• Working Hours: 8AM to 5PM
• Language: English and Korean (bilingual)

Position Summary

The client is seeking a passionate Junior Network Engineer to join their Network Operations Team at the the client's biopharmaceutical business manufacturing facility in Rockville, MD. In this role, you will monitor, maintain, troubleshoot, and support enterprise network infrastructure to ensure high availability in a 24x7 manufacturing environment. Working alongside experienced engineers, you will handle daily system requests, participate in an on-call rotation, and support network implementation projects. The ideal candidate is proactive, eager to learn, adheres strictly to standard operating procedures (SOPs), and communicates effectively across all organizational levels.

Key Responsibilities

• Infrastructure Support: Maintain, troubleshoot, and support critical network devices (Cisco switches/routers, PAN firewalls, F5 load balancers, Cisco wireless controllers/APs).
• Proactive Monitoring: Monitor network performance constantly to elevate and resolve issues meeting internal Service Level Agreements (SLAs).
• Ticket Handling: Manage system requests and tickets including solution definition, deployment, and documentation for internal customers.
• On-Call Support: Provide onsite and after-hours support as required, including active participation in the team's on-call rotation.
• Project Support: Assist in planning and executing infrastructure expansion, hardware/software upgrades, and equipment replacements.
• Testing & Validation: Execute lab tests for validating technical solutions, bug fixes, and impact analysis.
• Vendor Coordination: Work with external vendors and ISPs for issue escalation, maintenance windows, and RMA processing.
• Asset & IP Management: Support inventory management, hardware staging, peer reviews, audits, and IP address assignment.
• Technical Documentation: Maintain comprehensive documentation for LAN, Data Center, Wireless, firewalls, and load balancers.
• Reporting: Generate weekly operations updates and ad-hoc reports required by management.
• Compliance: Adhere strictly to company checklists, standard operating procedures (SOPs), and corporate change-control policies.

The Right Candidate Will Possess

A proactive, detail-oriented professional with strong communication, ownership, and problem-solving skills who can collaborate effectively across business and technical teams.

Required Qualifications & Skills

• Education: Associate's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or a related field.
• Certification: Current Cisco CCNA certification is required.
• Experience: 2–3 years of hands‑on experience supporting enterprise networks (specifically switching and routing).
• Technical Knowledge: Solid understanding of networking protocols: OSPF, EIGRP, BGP, DHCP, NTP, SNMP, STP, VRF, IPv4 subnetting, 802.1x, TACACS+, Cisco IOS, and Cisco NX-OS.
• Location & Mobility: Must live within a 1-hour driving radius of Rockville, MD, and have the flexibility to work onsite at the the client's biopharmaceutical business facility.
• Attitude: Strong sense of responsibility, team-oriented mindset, and excellent instruction-following skills.
• Advanced Certifications: Palo Alto Firewalls, F5 Load Balancer, or Cisco Wireless certifications.
• Extended Experience: 5+ years of experience in an enterprise network operations role.
• Automation Skills: Familiarity with Unix/Linux environments and scripting capabilities (Python, Ansible, etc.) for network automation.
• Bilingual Korean Skill highly preferred