Senior Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) (Hybrid)

Cisco; San Jose (CA); Hybrid; USD 168,000 - 245,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco is seeking a Senior Site Reliability Engineer to build, operate, and continually improve the reliability and scalability of our deployment platform and production infrastructure. You will own deployments across cloud and air-gapped environments, automate workflows, and partner with engineering teams to deliver secure, scalable systems.

You will work in a hybrid role, coordinating on-site days in Cisco offices and remote collaboration with global teams, focusing on observability, incident

Qualifications

• 7+ years’ experience with a Bachelor’s degree or 4+ yrs with a Masters or 1 year with a PhD, or equivalent related experience; experience to include at least 4 years in Site Reliability Engineering, Platform / Cloud / Infrastructure Engineering, or related fields
• 3+ years’ operating Kubernetes in production; experience with Helm
• Experience building and maintaining CI/CD platforms and deployment automation
• Experience working with AWS, GCP, or similar cloud platforms

Responsibilities

• Operate and improve Kubernetes-based production infrastructure and deployment systems
• Own customer deployments across cloud and air-gapped environments, including installation, upgrades, troubleshooting, and lifecycle management
• Build and improve deployment observability, monitoring, logging, and alerting
• Improve reliability, scalability, and operational efficiency through automation and performance optimization
• Participate in production incident response, root cause analysis, and reliability improvements
• Tune infrastructure components—including databases and services—to improve performance and resilience
• Design and develop internal tooling using Python and/or Go
• Debug complex production issues spanning Kubernetes, networking, storage, and application layers
• Manage infrastructure using Terraform or similar Infrastructure as Code tools
• Collaborate with software engineers and customers to design secure, scalable, and reliable deployment architectures

Skills

Kubernetes

CI/CD

AWS/GCP

SRE experience

Education

Bachelor’s degree

Master’s degree

PhD

Tools

Terraform

Helm

Job description

The application window is expected to close on: 09/29/2026

This is a Hybrid position requiring approximately 2 days per week on-site at Cisco offices in either San Francisco, San Jose, or New York City.

The Splunk Agent Resilience team is defining the future of AI resilience. Our team provides scalable, cost-effective evaluation and guardrails that ensure AI agents behave as intended, improving reliability and reducing risks. This unified approach empowers our customers to confidently deploy and manage AI-powered applications with enhanced observability and control.

As a Senior Site Reliability Engineer (SRE), you will build, operate, and continuously improve the reliability, scalability, and operational excellence of Splunk Agent Observability's deployment platform and production infrastructure. You will own the operational backbone supporting both cloud and air-gapped customer deployments, develop automation to improve operational efficiency, and partner closely with engineering teams to deliver reliable, secure, and scalable systems.

Your Impact

• Operate and improve Kubernetes-based production infrastructure and deployment systems
• Own customer deployments across cloud and air-gapped environments, including installation, upgrades, troubleshooting, and lifecycle management
• Build and improve deployment observability, monitoring, logging, and alerting
• Improve reliability, scalability, and operational efficiency through automation and performance optimization
• Participate in production incident response, root cause analysis, and reliability improvements
• Tune infrastructure components—including databases and services—to improve performance and resilience
• Design and develop internal tooling using Python and/or Go
• Debug complex production issues spanning Kubernetes, networking, storage, and application layers
• Manage infrastructure using Terraform or similar Infrastructure as Code tools
• Collaborate with software engineers and customers to design secure, scalable, and reliable deployment architectures

Minimum Qualifications

• 7+ years’ experience with a Bachelor's degree or 4+ yrs with a Masters or 1 year with a PhD, or equivalent related experience; Experience to include at least 4 years in Site Reliability Engineering, Platform / Cloud / Infrastructure Engineering, or related fields
• 3+ years’ operating Kubernetes in production; experience with Helm
• Experience building and maintaining CI/CD platforms and deployment automation
• Experience working with AWS, GCP, or similar cloud platforms

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience improving production reliability, scalability, and availability
• Experience with monitoring, logging, observability, and alerting platforms
• Strong scripting or programming skills in Python and/or Go
• Experience with Infrastructure as Code tools such as Terraform
• Experience with MLOps preferred
• Solid understanding of networking fundamentals (VPCs, DNS, routing, load balancing)
• Experience operating databases and tuning them for performance and reliability
• Experience deploying and supporting cloud and air-gapped/on-prem environments
• Strong debugging and troubleshooting skills across distributed systems starts with you.

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 $167,700.00 to $245,200.00 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.

• 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 of unused sick time carried forward from one calendar year to 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

$167,700.00 - $282,000.00

Non-Metro New York State & Washington State

$149,100.00 - $250,900.00

• 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.