Senior Competitive Strategy Analyst

Our Mission

At Palo Alto Networks® everything starts and ends with our mission:

Being the cybersecurity partner of choice, protecting our digital way of life.
Our vision is a world where each day is safer and more secure than the one before. We are a company built on the foundation of challenging and disrupting the way things are done, and we’re looking for innovators who are as committed to shaping the future of cybersecurity as we are.

Who We Are

We take our mission of protecting the digital way of life seriously. We are relentless in protecting our customers and we believe that the unique ideas of every member of our team contributes to our collective success. Our values were crowdsourced by employees and are brought to life through each of us everyday - from disruptive innovation and collaboration, to execution. From showing up for each other with integrity to creating an environment where we all feel included.

As a member of our team, you will be shaping the future of cybersecurity. We work fast, value ongoing learning, and we respect each employee as a unique individual. Knowing we all have different needs, our development and personal wellbeing programs are designed to give you choice in how you are supported. This includes our FLEXBenefits wellbeing spending account with over 1,000 eligible items selected by employees, our mental and financial health resources, and our personalized learning opportunities - just to name a few!

At Palo Alto Networks, we believe in the power of collaboration and value in-person interactions. This is why our employees generally work full time from our office with flexibility offered where needed. This setup fosters casual conversations, problem-solving, and trusted relationships. Our goal is to create an environment where we all win with precision.

Your Career

Palo Alto Networks has a world-class product management organization and continues to look for top-notch talent to expand the team. As a Senior Competitive Strategy Analyst at Palo Alto Networks, you will be responsible for defining the future of Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) and continuing to drive innovation into our network security portfolio. This role provides an opportunity to define the future of SASE by deeply analyzing competitor products and translating those insights into actionable recommendations for our product roadmap.

You will perform hands-on technical evaluations to provide product managers and engineering leadership with an objective assessment of Palo Alto Networks’ market position. Your analysis will go beyond feature comparisons and delve into the architectural and implementation details of competing solutions. You will help maintain our position as the market leader and educate internal teams on the competitive landscape. 

To be successful in this position, you must possess a deep understanding of networking and security technologies, demonstrated through hands-on experience configuring, deploying, and troubleshooting security products. Strong analytical skills and a passion for cybersecurity are essential, as is the ability to bridge customer business requirements with key competitive and market trends. You have a proven track record of performing detailed technical competitive analyses, demonstrating hands-on experience with security products, specifically within the SASE domain, and collaborating with key stakeholders.

Your Impact

• This role reports to the Director of Competitive Strategy for our Network Security business unit and provides insights on competitor strategies, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats, and strategic plans

• This strategic role is centered around maintaining and accelerating Palo Alto Networks’ advantages in a highly competitive network security industry through deep technical understanding of the competitive landscape.

• This hands-on role requires analyzing product functionality, capabilities, and platforms at a deep technical feature level, including performing detailed configurations and testing of products.

• The successful candidate will be very clear-minded, inventive, collaborative, data-driven, objective, and able to see trends before they happen by staying deeply engaged with the technical aspects of the market.

• You’ll help develop our forward-looking product strategies with the product leaders, providing objective technical insights and competitive analysis to pressure test the strategy, ensuring a great outcome while remaining collaborative to arrive at unified recommendations.

Your Experience 

• BS/MS in computer science, engineering, networking, or related technical field, or equivalent experience or equivalent experience required 

• 8+ years in the cybersecurity industry, with a strong focus on network security and hands-on experience with security products.

• 2+ years of experience designing, deploying, configuring, and managing SASE products (e.g., SSE, SD-WAN, DEM, ZTNA, Enterprise Browser, etc.) in a production or lab environment. Demonstrable experience with at least two different vendor solutions is preferred.

• Experience with AI technologies (e.g., Security co-pilots, LLMs, etc.) within the context of security products.

• Preferred candidates will have exposure to both competitive intelligence and cybersecurity

• Strong (written and verbal) communication and presentation skills, with the ability to address audiences of differing technical backgrounds

• Strong interpersonal skills contributing to cross-functional teams

• Experience in fast-paced environments with overlapping projects/deliverables

• Passion for working with technical individuals and a proven ability to distill complex concepts into easy-to-understand stakeholder briefings

• A consultative approach and an aptitude for translating market dynamics and technical findings into actionable recommendations.

• Proven analytical and problem-solving skills required

The Team

To stay ahead of the curve, it’s critical to know where the curve is, and how to anticipate the changes we’re facing. For the fastest growing cybersecurity company, the curve is the evolution of cyberattacks, and the products and services that proactively address them. Our Product Management Team helps us do just that. 

Our organization and employees are committed to changing as rapidly as our industry’s threats do, and to do that, we need creative product teams to address emerging cyber threats. They provide the behind-the-scenes support for our products by being a source of information on our products for our systems engineers, staying on top of the environment we sell in, and help in implementing product wide technical solutions based on our client’s feedback and needs. As threats and technology evolve, we stay ahead to accomplish our mission.

Compensation Disclosure

The compensation offered for this position will depend on qualifications, experience, and work location. For candidates who receive an offer at the posted level, the starting base salary (for non-sales roles) or base salary + commission target (for sales/commissioned roles) is expected to be between $121000 - $196000/YR. The offered compensation may also include restricted stock units and a bonus. A description of our employee benefits may be found here.

Our Commitment

We’re problem solvers who take risks and challenge cybersecurity’s status quo. It’s simple: we can’t accomplish our mission without diverse teams innovating, together.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for all qualified individuals with a disability. If you require assistance or accommodation due to a disability or special need, please contact us at  [email protected].

Palo Alto Networks is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity in our workplace, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or other legally protected characteristics.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

Our Commitment

We’re problem solvers that take risks and challenge cybersecurity’s status quo. It’s simple: we can’t accomplish our mission without diverse teams innovating, together.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for all qualified individuals with a disability. If you require assistance or accommodation due to a disability or special need, please contact us at  [email protected].

Palo Alto Networks is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity in our workplace, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or other legally protected characteristics.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.