
Senior Security Network Engineer
- Wellington Auckland
- Permanent
- Full-time
- Develop, implement and manage scalable, reliable and secure network architectures such as SASE, ZTNA, DLP, CASB, SWG and SD-WAN.
- Assess, design and enforce security protocols to protect the network from potential threats and meet compliance requirements (SOC2 and ISO27001).
- Automate security configurations and infrastructure-as-code (IaC) practices to reduce operational overhead and improve reliability.
- Perform routine assessments and optimize network devices (firewall, switches, access points) to enhance performance and reliability.
- Perform capacity planning and implement upgrades to accommodate future network growth.
- Drive troubleshooting efforts and manage incident response to minimise downtime and disruptions to Xero's operations.
- Ensure network documentation is up to date along with periodic reviewing of network configuration and analyzing performance reports.
- Engage in stakeholder and relationship management, working closely with security, IT, work experience teams and associated vendors.
- Apply a strong background in supporting high-availability network security for BAU operations and delivering solutions in project-driven environments.
- Lead incident response efforts related to network security breaches, misconfigurations, and policy violations, ensuring minimal downtime and risk exposure.
- Provide coaching and mentorship, helping teach small groups of engineers and contributing to Xero's shared knowledge base.
- Participate in the 24/7 on-call roster as required.
- SASE, ZTNA, and SD-WAN solutions are deployed and optimised for secure and scalable access.
- Zero Trust principles are enforced across network access and segmentation.
- Network security automation reduces operational overhead and improves response times.
- Network security monitoring, logging, and alerting are fully operational, providing real-time insights into security posture.
- Incident response times are minimised, with clear remediation processes and root cause analysis.
- SOC2, ISO 27001, and compliance requirements are continuously met through automated controls.
- Teams across Xero actively engage with network security best practices and understand their role in securing cloud-based connectivity.
- Security is seen as an enabler rather than a blocker, allowing teams to innovate securely.
- Security awareness and best practices are embedded into IT and network engineering workflows.
- You are a proactive champion of agile and delivery practices who coaches and develops others in this space to ensure a consistent approach to ways of working.
- You have a strong drive to work in a team-oriented and collaborative environment.
- You have a passion for delivering high quality products to your customers.
- Strong engineering experience in network security, cloud-based security solutions, and Zero Trust architectures.
- Experience with well known products in the field of VPN, Firewalls, Switches, Routers and Wireless Controllers and Access Points.
- Experience using network tools and SD-WAN would be advantageous.
- Deep understanding of network security compliance frameworks (SOC2, ISO 27001, NIST, CIS Benchmarks).
- Excellent grasp of modern software delivery practices and life cycle.
- Strong stakeholder management skills, with the ability to influence without authority and align security priorities with business needs.
- Proficiency in scripting and automation (Python, Terraform, or other infrastructure-as-code tools).
- Ability to design secure, scalable, and resilient network architectures in a fast-paced environment.
- Strong incident response and troubleshooting skills, ensuring rapid recovery and remediation of network security threats.
- A growth mindset, continuously learning and adapting to emerging network security threats and technologies.
- Experience working in high-availability network security environments, balancing BAU operations with project-driven security initiatives.
- Strong understanding of network and system administration security.