Network Analyst

Location: Houston, TX 77056
Pay Rate: $55/hr
Duration: Contract-to-Hire
Work Schedule: Hybrid – Monday through Thursday onsite (7:30 AM – 5:30 PM), Friday remote (7:30 AM – 11:30 AM)

Position Overview

We are seeking an experienced Network Analyst to join a global enterprise networking team supporting critical business operations and infrastructure. This role will be responsible for maintaining, troubleshooting, and optimizing enterprise network environments while serving as a key escalation point for complex networking and application performance issues. The ideal candidate will have extensive experience with routing, switching, firewalls, data center networking, and network monitoring technologies within large-scale enterprise environments.

Key Responsibilities

• Serve as an escalation resource for network and application performance issues.
• Support and manage network monitoring and configuration management platforms.
• Provide technical support for field network infrastructure, including industrial switches, routers, and wireless bridge technologies.
• Utilize service management tools to create and manage service requests, outages, incidents, and change requests.
• Troubleshoot and resolve complex network connectivity, security, and performance issues.
• Assist with network-related projects and infrastructure initiatives.
• Evaluate and recommend new technologies, solutions, and best practices.
• Identify opportunities to improve utilization of existing technologies and applications.
• Coordinate network changes and scheduled maintenance activities.
• Communicate effectively with internal teams, field personnel, and stakeholders globally.
• Perform packet-level analysis and root cause investigations for network and application performance issues.

Required Qualifications

• Extensive experience designing, deploying, and troubleshooting large enterprise network environments.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills with the ability to explain complex technical concepts.
• Experience supporting projects and working directly with business stakeholders and end users.
• Hands-on experience with Palo Alto technologies including Panorama, Next-Generation Firewalls, and Prisma.
• Strong experience supporting Cisco routing, switching, wireless, and firewall technologies.
• Experience with SolarWinds Network Management Suite.
• Proficiency using Wireshark for packet analysis and troubleshooting.
• Advanced troubleshooting experience with:
  • OSPF
  • EIGRP
  • BGP
  • Firewalls
  • IPSEC VPNs
  • SSL VPNs
  • DMVPN
  • Spanning Tree
  • Network Security
• Strong experience with Cisco Nexus Data Center Architecture.
• Experience with Cisco Client and Network Access Control (NAC).
• Working knowledge of SNMP, NetFlow, IP SLA, and related network management protocols.
• Extensive routing and switching experience with strong troubleshooting capabilities.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supporting field operations within the Oil & Gas industry.
• Experience working alongside field support technicians and remote operational environments.
• Familiarity with enterprise network monitoring, automation, and configuration management best practices.
• Project management experience supporting network infrastructure initiatives.