Network Engineer - Patching

Network Patching Engineer – Contract

Location: Sheffield, Leeds or Manchester
Contract: Initial 3 months, likely extension to 6 months or longer
Working arrangement: Flexible hybrid working, with potential out-of-hours work that can be completed remotely.

The Opportunity

We are looking for experienced Network Patching Engineers to support software and firmware patching activities across a large, complex enterprise network environment.

We have opportunities across three areas:

• Datacentre Networks

• Branch & Campus Networks

• Network Appliances

You will be responsible for supporting the technical delivery of network patching, upgrades and maintenance activities, ensuring changes are safely implemented, tested and validated with minimal disruption to live services.

Key Responsibilities

• Carry out software and firmware patching across enterprise network infrastructure.

• Support the planning, preparation and execution of network patching and upgrade activities.

• Review technical prerequisites, dependencies and potential risks before implementation.

• Develop and execute implementation, validation and rollback scripts.

• Perform pre-change health checks and post-change testing to confirm successful deployment.

• Troubleshoot failed changes, support recovery activities and escalate technical issues where required.

• Work closely with Network Operations, Engineering, Change Management and platform teams.

• Maintain accurate technical documentation, patching records and implementation evidence.

• Identify recurring issues and opportunities to improve patching processes, testing and automation.

• Ensure changes follow agreed security, operational and change-management standards.

What We're Looking For

• Strong hands-on experience in network engineering, network operations, patching or infrastructure upgrades .

• Experience implementing software or firmware updates within live enterprise network environments.

• Good understanding of routing, switching, LAN, WAN, firewalls and network resilience .

• Experience with change implementation, technical testing, troubleshooting and rollback procedures.

• Ability to identify technical risks, dependencies and potential service impacts.

• Experience working with network monitoring, configuration and troubleshooting tools.

• Strong communication skills and the ability to work collaboratively with technical teams.

• Comfortable supporting out-of-hours maintenance and patching activities where required.

Platform-Specific Experience

Datacentre Network Engineer

Experience with core routing and switching, datacentre interconnects, spine-and-leaf architectures, WAN connectivity, redundancy, failover and maintenance across resilient network infrastructure.

Branch & Campus Network Engineer

Experience with branch connectivity, WAN, campus switching, wireless networks, network resilience, large-scale device upgrades, staged deployments and remote troubleshooting.

Network Appliances Engineer

Experience with firewalls, load balancers, VPNs, NAT, high-availability clusters, traffic policies, certificates, licensing and application/security validation.

Candidates do not need experience across all three areas, but should have strong technical knowledge and hands-on experience within at least one.

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