Senior Staff Engineer - Agentic Identity & AI Security

Cisco Systems; Santa Fe (NM); On-site; USD 214,000 - 310,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco Systems is seeking a Technical Leader to define and build core agentic identity capabilities across cloud, on-premises, and hybrid architectures. You will lead technical strategy from concept through production, translating complex identity and access challenges into resilient, enterprise-grade software that powers AI systems.

You will architect scalable identity frameworks, deliver APIs and tooling, and collaborate with Security, AI Platform, Product, and Cloud Operations to ensure

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field with 12+ years of software engineering experience, or a Master’s degree with 8+ years of relevant experience.
• 10+ years of experience designing and building distributed systems, backend services, or security platforms in production environments.
• 5+ years of experience implementing enterprise identity, authentication, or access protocols (such as OAuth 2.0/2.1, OIDC, SAML, SCIM, LDAP, SPIFFE, or mTLS).
• 4+ years of experience with containerization technologies (Docker, containerd, or Kubernetes) and at least one major cloud platform (AWS, Azure, or GCP).
• 3+ years of experience with security engineering principles, including threat modeling, attack-path analysis, or security architecture reviews.

Responsibilities

• Architect and build core identity capabilities for AI agents across cloud, on-premises, and hybrid architectures.
• Deliver developer tooling, APIs, SDKs, CLI tools, and MCP-based access patterns for platform adoption.
• Drive cross-functional alignment with Security, AI Platform, Product, and Cloud Operations teams.
• Lead technical excellence by setting architectural direction, conducting reviews, and mentoring engineers.
• Deliver production MVPs by prototyping and iterating scalable identity and security solutions.

Skills

Distributed systems design

Security architecture

Cloud platforms knowledge

Go/C/C++/Java

containers e.g. Docker/Kubernetes

Education

Bachelor’s degree in CS/CE/EE

Master’s degree

Tools

OAuth 2.0/2.1

OIDC

SAML

SCIM

LDAP

mTLS

Docker

Kubernetes

Job description

Cisco Systems is seeking a Technical Leader to define and build core agentic identity capabilities across cloud, on-premises, and hybrid architectures. You will lead technical strategy from concept through production, translating complex identity and access challenges into resilient, enterprise-grade software that powers AI systems.

You will architect scalable identity frameworks, deliver APIs and tooling, and collaborate with Security, AI Platform, Product, and Cloud Operations to ensure