Security Automation & Orchestration Specialist

Cognizant; Springfield (IL); On-site; USD 115,000 - 134,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical/Dental/Vision/Life Insurance

Paid holidays + PTO

401(k) plan

Long-term/Short-term Disability

Paid Parental Leave

Employee Stock Purchase Plan

Job summary

Cognizant’s Cloud Infrastructure & Security Services (CIS) Practice seeks an Automation / Orchestration / Security Engineer to design, build, and maintain security automation reducing manual effort and improving response efficiency. You will work with Security Operations, Incident Response, IT, and Cloud/Platform teams to integrate tools and automate workflows.

This role emphasizes scalable, auditable security processes, governance with RBAC and change management, and secure coding practices,

Qualifications

• 3+ years of experience in Automation Engineering, Security Engineering, Security Operations Engineering, or related roles.
• Strong programming/scripting experience with Python (preferred), PowerShell, or JavaScript.
• Experience with automation and orchestration platforms such as Ansible, Itential, VMware Aria Orchestrator, or similar tools.
• Hands-on experience with REST APIs, JSON, webhooks, OAuth2, token-based authentication, and mutual TLS.
• Working knowledge of SIEM concepts including log ingestion, correlation, querying, and SOC operations such as incident triage, escalation, and response.
• Strong understanding of IAM, endpoint security, network security, vulnerability management, and cloud security fundamentals.
• Experience with Git workflows, code reviews, branching strategies, and software testing practices.
• Strong documentation and communication skills with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Preferred Qualifications: vulnerability management automation, remediation tracking, workflow automation, SLA reporting, cloud security across AWS/Azure/GCP, Kubernetes security, EDR/XDR integrations, ITSM tools like ServiceNow and Jira.

Responsibilities

• Design and deliver security automation and orchestration capabilities to improve response times and operational efficiency.
• Develop and maintain SOAR playbooks for alert triage, enrichment, containment, remediation, and response workflows.
• Build integrations with security tools including SIEM, EDR/XDR, IAM, vulnerability management, ticketing platforms, and cloud security solutions using APIs, webhooks, and event-driven architectures.
• Create reusable automation components such as scripts, libraries, and templates with proper logging, monitoring, error handling, and observability.
• Work with SOC and Incident Response teams to automate operational procedures and runbooks while implementing approval gates where required.
• Implement governance controls including RBAC, change management, audit logging, and documentation.
• Collaborate with infrastructure and engineering teams to automate security controls, compliance checks, policy-as-code, system hardening, and configuration drift remediation.
• Support incident response activities through automation for evidence collection, containment, and remediation while maintaining logging and chain-of-custody requirements.
• Ensure secure coding practices and implement safeguards to prevent misuse of automation workflows.
• Create and maintain documentation, operating procedures, runbooks, and knowledge transfer materials.

Skills

Python

PowerShell

JavaScript

Git workflows

Documentation

Tools

Ansible

Itential

VMware Aria Orchestrator

ServiceNow

Jira

Job description

Cognizant’s Cloud Infrastructure & Security Services (CIS) Practice seeks an Automation / Orchestration / Security Engineer to design, build, and maintain security automation reducing manual effort and improving response efficiency. You will work with Security Operations, Incident Response, IT, and Cloud/Platform teams to integrate tools and automate workflows.

This role emphasizes scalable, auditable security processes, governance with RBAC and change management, and secure coding practices,