Lead Network Engineer

Job Summary

• We are seeking a Lead Network Engineer with deep expertise in F5 BIG-IP DNS (GTM), BIG-IQ, NGINX Plus, Azure networking, and Infrastructure-as-Code automation.
• The Lead Engineer will support a multi-site enterprise load balancing and DNS environment, including provisioning and configuration of two new F5 BIG-IP DNS standalone nodes, software upgrades on four BIG-IP DNS nodes and one BIG-IQ management platform, validation of Wide IP and DNS configurations, and integration with an Arista-based BGP Anycast architecture.
• The ideal candidate will have strong hands-on experience with F5 BIG-IP DNS/GTM administration, BIG-IQ lifecycle management, BGP routing, and Arista switching environments.
• In addition to F5 expertise, the consultant must possess extensive NGINX Plus experience, including NGINX as a Service (NGINXaaS) in Azure, Azure Load Balancers, high-availability NGINX deployments, custom server farms, and production application delivery environments.
• This is a highly automated infrastructure, requiring advanced experience with Terraform, Ansible, YAML, Jinja2 templates, GitHub-based workflows, Infrastructure-as-Code methodologies, and operational automation.
• The consultant should be comfortable reviewing, troubleshooting, enhancing, and maintaining existing automation frameworks while providing recommendations for scalability, resiliency, and operational best practices.

Environment Overview

• Four F5 BIG-IP DNS standalone nodes across two data center locations; one BIG-IQ management platform; Arista-based BGP Anycast architecture; NGINX Plus deployed as a front end to Azure Load Balancers; approximately 20 production NGINX Plus clusters deployed as HA pairs supporting enterprise LTM services; infrastructure managed through Terraform, Ansible, YAML, Jinja2 templates, GitHub, and VS Code.
• The ideal Lead Engineer will be capable of independently leading provisioning, upgrades, integration, automation, troubleshooting, and operational optimization efforts across F5, NGINX Plus, Azure, and network infrastructure platforms.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

• Potential for contract extension.
• Will consider candidates within 50 miles of Evansville IN or Baltimore MD.

Mandatory Skills

• F5 BIG-IP DNS (GTM) Administration Provisioning and configuration of BIG-IP DNS/GTM Wide IP configuration and validation NGINX Plus NGINX Plus administration and support High-availability (HA) NGINX deployments Production application delivery environments Custom server farm configuration NGINX troubleshooting and optimization DNS load balancing and traffic management Troubleshooting DNS and GTM services BIG-IP DNS software upgrades