It Network Engineer - Chicago, Il

1099 Independent Contractor

Contract duration: 6 months (extendable)

Schedule: Full-time business hours with potential travel to different sites

Network Engineer duties and responsibilities:

• Network Engineer L3/Arch to work on projects in the Chicago area for Data Centres

• Travelling to sites across the Americas while working as part of the Central AP team

• Maintaining computer networks including mainframes, VPNs, routers, and other physical hardware

• Installing and configuring network equipment

• Creating firewalls and updating virus protection software and data security systems to keep data and communications protected.

• Monitoring computer systems to improve network performance for all systems.

• Troubleshooting, resolving, and communicating networking issues to other employees and management.

• Implementing disaster recovery procedures

• Maintaining current knowledge and understanding of security and networking best practices to offer the best solutions and protection to company systems.

Network Engineer skills and qualifications

• Comprehensive understanding of network services and networks such as TCP/IP, OSPF, and EIGRP

• In-depth understanding and practical knowledge of networking systems such as LAN, firewalls, routers, and printers

• Ability to analyze and evaluate networks, identify issues, and provide solutions to ensure networks are operating efficiently.

• Ability to design, implement, and troubleshoot Wi-FI and security infrastructure

• Time management

• Ability to manage several projects simultaneously from design to implementation.

• Ability to communicate technical information to other technical team members but also to coworkers in other departments who may not know networking technical terminology.

Network Engineer education and training requirements

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, Information Technology, or a related field
• Cisco Certification is preferred (CCNP, CCIE, CISSP)
• At least 3 years of experience as an IT Network Engineer
• Deep understanding of networking protocols (e.g., IPSEC, HSRP, BGP, OSPF, 802.11, QoS)
• Solid understanding of the OSI or TCP/IP model
• Hands-on experience with monitoring, network diagnostic, and network analytics tools