Software Engineering Technical Leader

Cisco; Milpitas (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 320,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco is seeking a Tech Lead for the Datacenter Switching team to design and develop high‑performance networking software for AI and cloud environments. You will work on Nexus 9K architectures, driving secure, scalable software with a strong focus on UX, documentation, and production support.

Lead features, mentor engineers, and shape the software lifecycle across multiple teams. You will collaborate with design and product management, craft technical designs, and contribute to end‑user

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree required with 6–8+ years of related experience.
• Experience with Datacenter Switches and Networking.
• Experience handling customer escalations and L2/L3 technologies.

Responsibilities

• Interpret business issues and recommend standard software processes.
• Lead small-to-medium features from design through completion.
• Guide SDLC and agile engineering strategies across teams.
• Mentor others and influence architectural decisions.
• Design robust monitoring and observability tools.
• Contribute to threat modeling and security practices.

Skills

Datacenter networking

L2/L3 networking

VXLAN forwarding

Python scripting

Automation

Security

Technical communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in a related field

Tools

NXOS infrastructure

Job description

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

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 fabrics.

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 procedures. 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

• Uses specialized expertise in one or more areas to interpret internal or external business issues and recommends standard processes.
• Solves complex problems and takes abroad perspective to identify innovative solutions. May lead small-to-medium features from technical design through completion.
• May lead projects that span multiple teams; manages workload and workstreams holistically.
• Influences a defined software engineering roadmap.
• May lead medium-to-large features from technical design through completion.
• Guides in the development and implementation of the software development lifecycle, and agile engineering strategies across applicable teams and partners.
• Leads and mentors others, and improves the technical design of solutions Advocates for new features within a product to address customer needs.
• Articulates design choices based on an expert understanding of market awareness, product adoption, and competition.
• Innovates new products to address unmet customer needs
• Influences and tracks metrics to measure success
• Writes functional clean code and unit tests at a level that sets the standard for coding across teams.
• Influences architectural decisions with a focus on security, scalability and reliability.
• Contributes to threat modeling of a product.
• Proactively identifies, prioritizes, and resolves risk and issues in production systems.
• Designs and implements robust monitoring tools that provide visibility and reliability and acts on the data and alerts to increase future performance.
• Leads postmortems and reviews root cause analysis, ensures on call coverage.
• Expert on multiple functional components
• May contribute to knowledge sharing among the wider professional community with technical blogs or publications.
• Scopes work accurately and provides reliable estimates for project milestones and completion.
• Communicates delivery trade-offs and negotiates with multi-functional partners to align on direction and outcomes.
• Mentors peers or others on the team
• Facilitates/encourages knowledge sharing in the team (e.g., brownbags, demos, design sessions)

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelors + 8 years of related experience, or Masters + 6 years of related experience, or PhD + 3 years of related experience.
• Experience with Datacenter Switches and Networking.
• Experience in dealing with customer escalations, solving issues, on L2/L3 technologies, NXOS infrastructure

Preferred Qualifications

• L2/L3/VXLAN forwarding, AI-Networking - Customer Support/Escalation handling experience, with scripting/development knowledge in networking.
• 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 $186,900.00 to $267,700.00 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 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

$186,900.00 - $307,800.00

Non-Metro New York State & Washington State

$166,300.00 - $274,100.00

• 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.