Network Team Lead: Office of Innovative Technologies - UTK

The University of Tennessee, Knoxville is seeking a Network Services Team Lead to lead and manage a respective team responsible for maintaining and improving the university’s wired and wireless network systems. This position will provide a specific network specialization in network engineering. This position plays a vital role in ensuring fast, secure, and reliable network connectivity that supports research, education, and administrative excellence across campus. 

This position is a senior-level expert in deploying, managing, and evolving wired and wireless network projects and solutions across a production network enterprise architecture. Supervises and manages a work team under the direction of senior staff for large scale projects, new implementations, system upgrades, etc.  Operates independently for all sizes of systems, networks, and/or databases. Designs, collects, analyzes, and creates professional written and oral reports to senior staff. Focuses on short to intermediate strategic priorities within the network transport function and contributes to the identification of areas for evolution. Work is completed with minimal oversight with a high level of accuracy and quality. Must have the ability to learn, implement, and operate new technologies. Participation in on-call rotation, which covers non-business hours including the weekend. On-call support is for one week and may be required for three to four weeks within a year.

• Lead and supervise a technical team that supports wired and wireless network infrastructure.

• Manage daily team operations, including task assignments, prioritization, and escalation.

• Promote consistent processes and communication across all network activities.

• Oversee wired and wireless network projects through discovery, design, implementation, and closure phases.

• Research and deploy new networking technologies and tools to enhance university systems.

• Coordinate with departments and vendors for major network deployments and upgrades.

• Analyze technical data to assess network risks and recommend improvements.

• Maintain accurate documentation of network designs, configurations, and inventories.

• Develop solutions to meet evolving university network needs and new technology trends.

• Respond to and resolve network service requests efficiently through the ticketing system.

• Communicate clearly with both technical and non-technical staff during troubleshooting.

• Monitor and interpret network performance and telemetry data to identify issues.

• Facilitate and participate in meetings regarding network operations and readiness.

• Collaborate with on- and off-campus partners during planned or emergency outages.

• Ensure network services meet high standards of reliability, scalability, and security.

Required Qualifications

• Education: Associate degree
• Experience: Eight (8) years of direct industry-related experience as a network engineer or leading a technical team.
• Knowledge, Skills, Abilities: 
  • Strong ability to work independently of direct supervision and in line with strategic direction.
  • Intermediate ability to manage projects. 
  • Strong verbal and written communication skills.
  • Intermediate working knowledge of networking concepts: WAN/LAN, DNS/DHCP, Layer 3/2, TCP/IP, Wi-Fi, firewalls, and security policies such as access control lists.
  • Ability to glean network requirements from users, technical and conceptual drawings. 
  • Strong working knowledge of network planning tools and processes: Aruba Central/VisualRF, databases, Microsoft Visio.
  • Intermediate working knowledge of network infrastructure and supporting systems: routers, switches, wireless controllers, wireless access points, IDS/IPS, gateways, firewalls, NAC, virtual private clouds, structured cabling.

Preferred Qualifications

• Education: Professional certifications such as PMP, CCNA, CCNP, ACMA, AZ-900, AZ-700, CWNA, or CWDP
• Experience: Experience in large-scale campus area wired and wireless networks environments. Experience with hybrid cloud infrastructure. Experience as a project manager. Experience in a higher education environment. 
• Knowledge, Skills, Abilities: 
  • Ability to effectively perform in a hybrid environment. 
  • Intermediate working knowledge of automation tools and their application to this role: scripting, API integration, authentication, version control systems, and others.
  • Intermediate working knowledge of network diagnostic, monitoring, and performance