Senior Product Manager

Cisco Systems, Inc.; Milpitas (CA); On-site; USD 155,000 - 225,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco Systems, Inc. is hiring a Senior Product Manager to lead the campus threat defense portfolio across Catalyst and Meraki switching platforms from its Milpitas, CA campus.

You will set the strategy for distributed firewalling at the access layer and design security workflows that convert switch telemetry into SOC-ready actions. The role requires extensive product management experience in cybersecurity, owning end-to-end portfolios, and collaborating with silicon, platform, and security

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent in technical or business field; advanced degree is a plus.
• 8+ years in product management with cybersecurity products experience.
• Experience owning end-to-end portfolio including strategy, roadmap, launch and adoption.
• Experience with security operations such as detection, triage, investigation, containment and related tooling.

Responsibilities

• Own strategy, roadmap, business case, and launch for campus firewalling across campus, branch, healthcare, and industrial environments.
• Partner with silicon and platform engineering to improve secure capabilities of switching hardware.
• Define security workflows connecting the access layer to detection and response.
• Lead Splunk integration path for access-layer investigation inside Cisco Cloud Control.
• Define governance for registered non-human identities and AI security threat models.
• Own sizing, pricing input, and competitive positioning for campus security.
• Represent the portfolio in executive reviews, customer briefings, and industry events to steer the roadmap.
• Set AI-native product execution standards across discovery, analysis, and launch.
• Mentor other product managers and raise the standard of product craft.

Skills

8+ years in product management

Cybersecurity product delivery

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS/Engineering

MBA or advanced degree a plus

Job description

Meet the Team

Cisco's Enterprise Networking team is hiring a Senior Product Manager to lead the campus threat defense portfolio end to end across the Catalyst and Meraki switching platforms. You will set the strategy for distributed firewalling at the access layer and for the security operations workflows that turn switch-level telemetry and enforcement into outcomes a SOC can act on. This is a senior security product role inside the network business, with the latitude to define the category rather than complete someone else's roadmap.

Your Impact

• Own strategy, roadmap, business case, and launch for distributed campus firewalling: policy enforcement pushed into the access switch, spanning hardware-accelerated controls and containerized inspection services, across campus, branch, healthcare, and industrial environments.

• Partner with silicon and platform engineering to improve secure capabilities of next-generation switching hardware, including requirements that cross business unit boundaries and need to be won on merit rather than directive.

• Define the security operations workflows that connect the access layer to detection and response, spanning Secure Network Analytics, XDR, and AI-driven defensive agents, so that what the switch both sees and does become usable inside an analyst workflow.

• Lead the Splunk integration path for access-layer investigation inside Cisco Cloud Control: what telemetry lands, what context attaches to a case, and which closed-loop actions are pre-validated rather than merely possible through an API.

• Lead agentic security for the campus. Define governance and policy for registered non-human identities, and set the detection strategy for unregistered agent activity that authenticates as a human user and looks like ordinary traffic on the wire. Be clear about which half is deterministic and which is probabilistic, and build toward closing the gap.

• Be responsible for the business: sizing, attach and adoption targets, pricing and packaging input, competitive positioning, and the analyst narrative for campus security.

• Represent the portfolio in executive forums, product gate reviews, customer and partner briefings, and industry events, and carry decisions back into the roadmap.

• Set the bar for AI-native product execution on the team, using AI tools across discovery, requirements, competitive analysis, and launch to move faster than the org is used to moving.

• Mentor other product managers and raise the standard of product craft across the group.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience in computer science, engineering, or a related technical or business field, or equivalent practical experience. Advanced degree or MBA a plus.

• 8+ years of product management experience, including 4+ years delivering cybersecurity products: firewall, network detection and response, XDR, SIEM or SOC tooling, or zero trust and identity.

• Experience being responsible for a portfolio end to end rather than a single feature area, including strategy, business case, roadmap, launch, and adoption against a number.

• Experience security operations such as detection engineering, triage, investigation, containment, and the tooling and data that supports each.

• Experience with enterprise campus networking and access-layer architecture sufficient to partner credibly with switching platform and silicon engineering teams.

Preferred Qualifications

• Clear, concise executive communication and the judgment to know which decision belongs in which forum.

• Experience delivering outcomes across organizational boundaries, including alignment with teams whose priorities are set elsewhere.

• Product experience with firewall, NDR, XDR, or SOC platforms at any major vendor, for example Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Fortinet, CrowdStrike, Splunk, Microsoft, Zscaler, or Arista.

• Experience defining hardware-accelerated security enforcement, or product ownership adjacent to silicon roadmaps.

• Familiarity with non-human identity, agentic AI security, and the emerging control models for AI agent traffic.

• Understanding of SASE architecture and how campus and branch enforcement relate to cloud-delivered security services.

• Experience with industry analyst engagement, including Gartner Magic Quadrant and Critical Capabilities cycles.

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 $154,900.00 to $225,300.00 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:

$154,900.00 - $259,100.00

Non-Metro New York state & Washington state:

$136,500.00 - $228,300.00

* 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.