Sr. Technical Support Engineer, Focused Services - job 1 of 4

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

You will work firsthand with our valued customers to address their complex post-sales concerns where analysis of situations or data requires an in-depth evaluation of many factors. You’re a critical thinker in understanding the methods, techniques, and evaluation criteria for obtaining results. You’ll enjoy networking with key contacts outside your own area of expertise, with a strong capability of detailing difficult technical issues to both non-technical and technical professionals.  

Under Focused Services, you will be a designated customer advocate who will assist in providing tailored support, weekly reviews, root cause analysis for critical issues, release review and upgrade planning, and a quarterly business review. You will provide personalized support and become deeply familiar with your implementation and business priorities to proactively drive best practices and help you continuously improve your security posture.

You will regularly participate in technical discussions with multi-functional teams, creating an environment of transparency that ultimately leads to better products, better working environments, and better cybersecurity. Your quick thinking and support to our clients provides the fast assistance they need to keep their environments secure – which means you’ll need to move quickly, thoughtfully, and provide technical assistance as needed (often, in high pressure situations).

Your Impact

• Offer advanced-level technical assistance to our top-tier customers, ensuring prompt resolution of complex issues and providing tailored solutions to optimize their security infrastructure
• Effectively communicate technical solutions to technical and executive stakeholders, fostering trust and credibility at the highest levels of our customers' organizations
• Provide tailored troubleshooting, configuration guidance, and best practices
• Take ownership of support cases from initiation to resolution, ensuring meticulous documentation of all troubleshooting steps, timely updates, and comprehensive closure summaries in the ticketing system
• Effectively manage critical and challenging customer support cases for multi-vendor troubleshooting on complex customer engagements and build positive external customer experience by working closely with Account, Sales, and Marketing teams
• Utilize fault isolation and root cause analysis skills to provide post-sales technical support, configuration, troubleshooting, and standard methodologies to customers
• Be the subject matter expert on core technologies of Palo Alto Networks product line
• Identify product defects (code, environment) via lab replication using network simulation, lab automation, performance testing, and validation tools
• File bug reports with the engineering team and develops test plans and best practices with Quality Assurance teams to improve overall software and hardware quality per release cycle
• Facilitate the hiring and onboarding process with technical screens, train new hires on technical and soft skills, and enable process and tools knowledge for readiness
• Author Technical Support Bulletins and technical documentation in the Knowledge Base for training materials, marketing collateral, manuals, and problem-solving guides
• Travel to customer sites in the event of a critical situation to expedite resolution as required

Your Experience

• Minimum of 7 years of network security experience
• Expertise in TCP/IP and advanced knowledge of LAN/WAN technologies, expertise with general routing/switching, Routing protocols (e.g BGP, OSPF, EIGRP), branch, and center architectures
• Advanced understanding of packet flow across multiple OSI layers
• Extensive experience with troubleshooting Remote Access VPN solutions including IPSEC, PKI & SSL technologies
• Ability to independently debug broad, complex, and unique networks with mixed media and protocols required
• In-depth knowledge of networking operations - TCP and UDP, SNMP, IPv6, VLSM, CIDR, and NAT - Static, Dynamic, and PAT
• Proficiency with network troubleshooting tools - Wireshark, GNS3  
• Strong grasp authentication protocols - LDAP, TACACS+, Radius
• Skilled in engaging executive-level stakeholders with clear technical communication
• Proven track record of effectively communicating technical concepts to diverse audiences
• Consistently maintains rigorous case management practices, ensuring thorough documentation and timely updates
• The below skills are a plus
  • Virtualization experience (AWS, Azure, VMWare, OpenStack) 
  • Experience with Windows, MAC OS, and Linux (Debugging, Editing Registries, Plist etc.)
  • Experience with Python or Shell scripting a plus
  • Multi-Vendor Exposure - Cisco Advanced Security Appliances, Palo Alto Next-Generation Firewalls, Prisma Access, Cisco Firepower, Checkpoint Firewalls, Cisco Switches, and Intrusion Detection/ Intrusion Prevention Systems
• BS in computer science, information technology, computer architecture, electrical engineering, mathematics or related experience or equivalent military experience required
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Willingness to work outside of normal business hours (As business needs dictate)

The Team

Our technical support team is critical to our success and mission. As part of this team, you enable customer success by providing support to clients after they have purchased our products. Our dedication to our customers doesn’t stop once they sign – it evolves. As threats and technology change, we stay in step to accomplish our mission.

You’ll be involved in implementing new products, transitioning from old products to new, and will fix integrations and critical issues as they are raised – in fact, you’ll seek them out to ensure our clients are safely supported. We fix and identify technical problems, with a pointed focus of providing the best customer support in the industry.

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 $0 - $0/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 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.