Sr Associate, Global Technical Support

Ciena is committed to our people-first philosophy. Our teams enjoy a culture focused on prioritizing a personalized and flexible work environment that empowers an individual’s passions, growth, wellbeing and belonging. We’re a technology company that leads with our humanity—driving our business priorities alongside meaningful social, community, and societal impact.

Provide system level pre & post-sales support for CIENA’s Customer base. This includes answering incoming customer calls, testing, troubleshooting and remote technical support for CIENA optical products. An understanding of fiber optic transport and/or switching protocols is essential.  Experience with Element Management or Network Management systems, with Linux and database systems. An understanding of data communications protocols including Ethernet and IP networks.

Specific Responsibilities

• Answer incoming calls from our global customers as well as document, validate, and capture adequate information to facilitate a technical investigation.
• Respond to customer inquiries and provide remote technical support for issues related to our optical products promptly and professionally via various communication channels (phone, email, chat).
• Troubleshoot and resolve network faults, performance issues, and configuration problems in a timely manner. 
• Provide occasional after-hours work to support customer business requirements.
• Recover information necessary to escalate reported issues to senior engineers.
• Utilize debug tools as well as lab research to advance customers’ technical problems.
• Provide Customer feedback to Internal teams as appropriate.
• Contribute to the technical knowledgebase (KCS)

Education and Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in technical field (e.g. Engineering, Communication and Electronic, Computer Science) from a four-year college or university with three to eight years related experience or equivalent combination of education and experience
• Experience in a technical support role with an equipment vendor or a telecommunication company.
• Foundational knowledge of the operation of fiber optic transport and/or switching equipment.
• Basic problem-solving experience with WDM/OTN/SONET/SDH equipment, Carrier Ethernet equipment or associated fiber optic facilities.
• 2 to 4 years of experience in the operation of fiber optic transport and/or switching equipment.
• Exposure to system level troubleshooting on Layer 2/4 networks and associated DCN networks.

•    Familiarity with various types of test equipment for optical and protocol testing.
•    L2: Bridging/Switching, VLANs, QinQ, CFM services, G.8032 architecture, Static MPLS-TP.
•    L3: IPv4 and IPv6 routing (basic understanding), Routing protocols – OSPF, IS-IS, MP-BGP, MPLS-TP and MPLS-TE, L2VPN and L3VPN, Segment Routing, Ethernet VPN, Seamless MPLS, PON.

• Experience on Ciena 6500, 6500 RLS and/or Waveserver, 8700, 51xx, 39xx is an asset.

•    Hands-on knowledge of Linux Operating Systems
•    Knowledge of virtualized and cloud environments (VMware ESXi, OpenStack, GCP), cloud-based application deployment techniques and container services (Docker, Ansible, etc.)
•    Understanding of Micro-Services software architectures
•    Understanding of SDN and Network Management / Automation / Orchestration concepts
•    Understanding of Security, Radius authentication, etc.
•    Domain knowledge of Restful APIs, websockets, python scripting and other open-source systems and tools (Swagger, postman etc.) would be an asset

Candidate Profile

• Must have excellent communications skill with the ability to communicate in the English language both verbal and written
• Excellent interpersonal skills, with the ability to communicate technical concepts to both technical and non-technical stakeholders. 
• Availability for onsite, in-person training and mentoring for a period of approximately 6 months from start date after which a hybrid work model will be possible
• Customer-oriented mindset with a strong commitment to providing exceptional customer service. 
• Ability to work independently and prioritize tasks effectively in a fast-paced environment
• Ability to analyze, troubleshoot and resolve problems
• Motivated self-starter with excellent time management skills with a willingness and ability to learn new concepts
• An understanding of transport and switching systems for telecommunications applications and Optical Networking
• System level trouble shooting on fiber optic telecommunications transport and switching equipment.
• Knowledge of computers, data communications, LINUX, Databases and IP network experience would be a benefit.
• Experience with network management systems would be beneficial.
• Ability to deal with stressful situations.
• Good knowledge and experience of at least two of the following: OSPF, IS-IS, BGP, MPLS, L2VPN and L3VPN, Segment Routing, Ethernet VPN, PON.
• Knowledge of computers, data communications, LINUX, Databases and IP network

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At Ciena, we are committed to building and fostering an environment in which our employees feel respected, valued, and heard.  Ciena values the diversity of its workforce and respects its employees as individuals. We do not tolerate any form of discrimination.

Ciena is an Equal Opportunity Employer, including disability and protected veteran status.

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