Principal Network Engineer

Leidos is seeking an experienced Network Engineer to join our Defense Enclave Services (DES) team, supporting an extensive digital modernization program critical to the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) and Department of Defense (DoD) Fourth Estate Agencies (DAFAs).

Must be willing to commute to Ft. Meade, MD 2 days per week. This position requires an active DoD Secret clearance.

• Principal network engineer responsible for planning, designing, and implementing enterprise network segmentation and Comply-to-Connect. This will include data‑flow mapping, firewall rule set and ACL review, routing and security policy coordination, cutover sequencing, validation, and stakeholder approval.
• Drive strategic engineering projects from concept through implementation, including architecture evaluation, requirements analysis, dependency identification, design coordination, planning, execution, validation, and transition to operations.
• Develop and manage implementation plans, schedules, cutover strategies, contingency plans, rollback procedures, validation steps, stakeholder communications, and change documentation for mission‑critical network changes.
• Provide technical leadership, mentoring, and day‑to‑day direction to network engineers, administrators, and analysts while organizing team priorities, maintaining accountability, and ensuring execution against aggressive timelines.
• Provide thoughtful technical information to government stakeholders.
• Evaluate current network architecture, identify gaps or improvement opportunities, estimate level of effort, assess implementation risk, and develop practical engineering plans to improve enterprise capabilities.
• Partner with architecture, cybersecurity, operations, project management, and technical SME teams to resolve blockers, manage dependencies, reduce delivery risk, and ensure network projects are executed end‑to‑end.
• Continuously improve engineering processes, documentation standards, implementation playbooks, and execution models to accelerate delivery, reduce rework, improve operational handoff, and lower sustainment burden.

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience and 12+ years of prior relevant experience, or Master's degree with 10+ years of experience. Specific experience, education, and training may be considered in lieu of degree.
• Significant experience leading or managing technical teams of network engineers, administrators, analysts, or implementation resources in complex enterprise environments.
• Experience leading network engineering projects from planning through implementation, including requirements analysis, dependency management, risk reduction, contingency planning, execution oversight, validation, and operational transition.
• Experience evaluating enterprise network architectures and developing improvement plans across LAN, WAN, WLAN, routing, switching, firewalls, VPN, proxies, security stacks, software‑defined networking, and cloud‑connected environments.
• Experience with Network Segmentation/C2C or similar secure connectivity efforts, including data‑flow analysis, firewall and ACL policy review, routing changes, security‑zone design, stakeholder coordination, and implementation planning.
• Demonstrated ability to organize teams, track details, manage competing priorities, meet aggressive schedules, and drive complex technical efforts to completion with a high degree of accountability.
• Experience documenting logical and physical network designs, implementation plans, risks, dependencies, decision points, and technical recommendations using tools such as Visio, PowerPoint, Cameo, or similar tools.
• Experience working with two or more of the following network technologies:
  Cisco, Aruba, Palo Alto, Dell, Infoblox, and Brocade.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including experience presenting architecture recommendations, implementation plans, risks, dependencies, and status to technical leadership, stakeholders, and approval boards.
• Current IAT Level II or higher certification, such as Security+ or CISSP.
• Requires an active DoD Secret clearance.

• Certified Cisco Network…