Networking Tech Lead- L2/L3 Forwarding Engineer

Cisco Systems, Inc; San Jose, Northern (CA, KY); Hybrid; USD 214,000 - 310,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco Systems, Inc.’s Datacenter Switching team is looking for a Tech Lead to design and deliver software for the Nexus 9000 series, enabling high‑density, low‑latency data center networking for AI and cloud workloads. You will partner with design and product management, develop technical designs, and guide teams through secure coding practices and best‑in‑class software delivery.

This role combines architecture leadership with hands‑on development, mentoring, and driving initiatives across

Qualifications

• Proficiency in C/C++ programming within a Linux environment.
• Minimum of 5 years of experience in the networking domain.
• Experience with L2/L3 forwarding concepts, with familiarity in Datapath architecture within ASICs.
• Proven experience in feature development for network switches and routers.

Responsibilities

• Recognized as an expert within Cisco.
• Proactively identifies and participates in the resolution of complex problems that impact the direction of the business.
• Develops and delivers innovative strategies that benefit customers and/or clients.
• Leads major business projects which impact a region or entire function.
• Contributes to the development of annual organizational objectives/priorities.
• Builds and maintains long-term relationships with key customers to ensure products and services reflect the needs and direction of the business.
• Translates and influences the regional or functional strategic vision into a technical vision with clear engineering priorities, ensuring understanding and alignment across teams.
• May lead projects that span the business segment, function or region.
• May drive large features from technical design through completion.
• Leads the development and implementation of software development lifecycle and agile engineering strategies across applicable teams in anticipation of the changing software development environment.
• Influences technical direction and deliverables across the function.
• Recognizes and makes trade-offs with respect to the whole system and defines new product categories.
• Leads design choices within the context of all Cisco offerings.
• Drives product success through creating metrics and influencing product adoption and direction.
• Writes and sets the standard for functional clean code.
• Develops and drives utilization and support for processes for issue identification and sustainable response, proactive tooling, and continuous improvement for production systems.
• Industry or thought leader on scale, performance, or design patterns.
• May represent or present team outputs at external events.
• Communicates product or program priorities, deadlines, and shifts in requirements in the context of engineering priorities and user needs.
• Negotiates and drives trade-offs in timing, design, and specifications to meet the needs of users and cross-functional partners.
• Leads, mentors, and influences senior engineers.
• Improves knowledge sharing processes.

Job description

The application window is expected to close on: 10/17/2026

Meet The Team

The Datacenter Switching team at Cisco is at the core of AI Networking. We are responsible for designing and developing the next generation of high-performance networking solutions for massive-scale cloud and AI environments. Our work focuses on the Cisco Nexus 9000 Series (Nexus 9K) switches, which serve as the foundational building blocks for modern data center architectures. Nexus 9K switches are critical in modern data centers for providing the high-density, low-latency, and power-efficient performance required for leaf-and-spine fabric. We focus on building and optimizing Cisco’s architecture to meet the demands of modern data center workloads and automated cloud environments. The team drives innovation in GPU-Connectivity with architectures to support high-compute clusters. Our scope includes the development of diverse fabric technologies, such as Pure L3, VXLAN, and SRv6 fabrics. Engineers on this team solve complex challenges in programmability, scalability, and telemetry at the core of the global internet infrastructure.

Your Impact

As a Tech Lead, You are responsible for developing software consistent with Cisco ‘Design Thinking Principles’ with a focus on simplification and UX (User Experience) at its core, using secure coding practices, ensuring user privacy, and following software development best practices. Partners with other teams, including design and product management to create the right solution for the customers. Creates technical design documentation to be used by the team as well as contributing to user documentation to be used by end users. Debugs and addresses software issues during development and in production systems to support customers. Brings new ideas for product innovation and helps improve software development processes.

What You’ll Do:

• Recognized as an expert within Cisco.
• Proactively identifies and participates in the resolution of complex problems that impact the direction of the business.
• Develops and delivers innovative strategies that benefit customers and/or clients.
• Leads major business projects which impact a region or entire function.
• Contributes to the development of annual organizational objectives/priorities.
• Builds and maintains long-term relationships with key customers to ensure products and services reflect the needs and direction of the business.
• Translates and influences the regional or functional strategic vision into a technical vision with clear engineering priorities, ensuring understanding and alignment across teams.
• May lead projects that span the business segment, function or region.
• May drive large features from technical design through completion.
• Leads the development and implementation of software development lifecycle and agile engineering strategies across applicable teams in anticipation of the changing software development environment.
• Influences technical direction and deliverables across the function.
• Recognizes and makes trade-offs with respect to the whole system and defines new product categories.
• Leads design choices within the context of all Cisco offerings.
• Drivers product success through creating metrics and influencing product adoption and direction.
• Writes and sets the standard for functional clean code.
• Develops and drives utilization and support for processes for issue identification and sustainable response, proactive tooling, and continuous improvement for production systems.
• Industry or thought leader on scale, performance, or design patterns.
• May represent or present team outputs at external events.
• Communicates product or program priorities, deadlines, and shifts in requirements in the context of engineering priorities and user needs.
• Negotiates and drives trade-offs in timing, design, and specifications to meet the needs of users and cross-functional partners.
• Leads, mentors, and influences senior engineers.
• Improves knowledge sharing processes.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelors + 12 years of related experience, or Masters + 8 years of related experience, or PhD + 5 years of related experience.
• Minimum of 5 years of experience in the networking domain.
• Proficiency in C/C++ programming within a Linux environment.
• Experience with L2/L3 forwarding concepts, with familiarity in Datapath architecture within ASICs.
• Proven experience in feature development for network switches and routers.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with VXLAN or other Overlay technologies.
• Comfortable with using AI tools such as CoPilot and Cursor
• Proven ability to design and maintain scalable infrastructure automation using Python.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills, with the ability to bridge technical and non-technical stakeholders to drive project alignment

Why Cisco?

At Cisco, we’re revolutionizing how data and infrastructure connect and protect organizations in the AI era – and beyond. We’ve been innovating fearlessly for 40 years to create solutions that power how humans and technology work together across the physical and digital worlds. These solutions provide customers with unparalleled security, visibility, and insights across the entire digital footprint.

Fueled by the depth and breadth of our technology, we experiment and create meaningful solutions. Add to that our worldwide network of doers and experts, and you’ll see that the opportunities to grow and build are limitless. We work as a team, collaborating with empathy to make really big things happen on a global scale. Because our solutions are everywhere, our impact is everywhere.

We are Cisco, and our power starts with you.

Message to applicants applying to work in the U.S. and/or Canada:

The starting salary range posted for this position is $214,100.00 to $309,800.00 and reflects the projected salary range for new hires in this position in U.S. and/or Canada locations, not including incentive compensation*, equity, or benefits.

Individual pay is determined by the candidate's hiring location, market conditions, job-related skillset, experience, qualifications, education, certifications, and/or training. The full salary range for certain locations is listed below. For locations not listed below, the recruiter can share more details about compensation for the role in your location during the hiring process.

U.S. employees are offered benefits, subject to Cisco’s plan eligibility rules, which include medical, dental and vision insurance, a 401(k) plan with a Cisco matching contribution, paid parental leave, short and long-term disability coverage, and basic life insurance. Please see the Cisco careers site to discover more benefits and perks. Employees may be eligible to receive grants of Cisco restricted stock units, which vest following continued employment with Cisco for defined periods of time.

U.S. employees are eligible for paid time away as described below, subject to Cisco’s policies:

• 10 paid holidays per full calendar year, plus 1 floating holiday for non-exempt employees
• 1 paid day off for employee’s birthday, paid year-end holiday shutdown, and 4 paid days off for personal wellness determined by Cisco
• Non-exempt employees** receive 16 days of paid vacation time per full calendar year, accrued at rate of 4.92 hours per pay period for full-time employees
• Exempt employees participate in Cisco’s flexible vacation time off program, which has no defined limit on how much vacation time eligible employees may use (subject to availability and some business limitations)
• 80 hours of sick time off provided on hire date and each January 1st thereafter, and up to 80 hours ofunused sick timecarried forwardfrom one calendar yearto the next
• Additional paid time away may be requested to deal with critical or emergency issues for family members
• Optional 10 paid days per full calendar year to volunteer

For non-sales roles, employees are also eligible to earn annual bonuses subject to Cisco’s policies.

Employees on sales plans earn performance-based incentive pay on top of their base salary, which is split between quota and non-quota components, subject to the applicable Cisco plan. For quota-based incentive pay, Cisco typically pays as follows:

• .75% of incentive target for each 1% of revenue attainment up to 50% of quota;
• 1.5% of incentive target for each 1% of attainment between 50% and 75%;
• 1% of incentive target for each 1% of attainment between 75% and 100%; and
• Once performance exceeds 100% attainment, incentive rates are at or above 1% for each 1% of attainment with no cap on incentive compensation.

For non-quota-based sales performance elements such as strategic sales objectives, Cisco may pay 0% up to 125% of target. Cisco sales plans do not have a minimum threshold of performance for sales incentive compensation to be paid.

The applicable full salary ranges for this position, by specific state, are listed below:

New York City Metro Area:

$214,100.00 - $356,300.00

Non-Metro New York state & Washington state:

$192,400.00 - $317,200.00

* For quota-based sales roles on Cisco’s sales plan, the ranges provided in this posting include base pay and sales target incentive compensation combined.

** Employees in Illinois, whether exempt or non-exempt, will participate in a unique time off program to meet local requirements.