Leader, Solutions Engineer

LOCATION: CAIFORNIA OR ARIZONA

Our team sits at the intersection of innovation and customer success. We are a collective of strategic thinkers, technical experts, and collaborative partners dedicated to transforming Cisco’s complex architectures into tangible business value for our customers. We thrive on cross-functional alignment—partnering closely with Engineering, CX, Marketing, and our partner ecosystem—to bridge the gap between emerging technology and critical industry challenges. We don't just solve immediate technical problems; we shape the future of IT infrastructure by building enduring, high-level relationships with CXOs and key decision-makers, ensuring our technology roadmap is always aligned with our customers' long-term vision.

As a leader in this space, you will be the driving force behind our technical sales strategy. Your influence will be felt from initial discovery to final deployment, directly impacting Cisco’s market position and revenue growth.

• Strategic Leadership: You will unify technical sales strategies with account planning, streamlining the sales cycle and ensuring that high-level organizational goals are translated into actionable, successful initiatives.
• Driving Growth & Market Expansion: You will identify new revenue opportunities and design demand-driving events that showcase the power of Cisco’s technology, ensuring we remain at the forefront of the market.
• High-Stakes Engagement: You will manage complex, large-scale client engagements, providing the expert consultation necessary to win trust and forge long-term partnerships with high-level stakeholders.
• Coaching & Team Excellence: By unifying cross-functional feedback and fostering a culture of mentorship, you will develop your team’s leadership capabilities and coach them toward sustainable quota achievement and operational efficiency.
• Cross-Functional Orchestration: You will leverage your ability to influence internal and external partners to break down silos, ensuring every solution we deliver is client-focused, technically sound, and strategically aligned with our corporate vision.

• Industry Experience: Minimum of 10 years of professional experience in a technology, software, or networking industry environment.
• Pre-Sales Experience: Minimum of 10 years of direct experience working in a technical pre-sales, solutions engineering, or customer-facing technical architecture environment.
• Education: Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field; OR equivalent practical work experience (defined as 4+ years of additional professional experience in technical pre-sales or networking engineering).

• Industry & Business Acumen: Demonstrated experience analyzing market trends, business economics, and industry verticals to align technology solutions with customer financial and strategic goals.
• Technical & Competitive Knowledge: Experience communicating internetworking industry trends, product lifecycles, and technical differentiators between networking solutions and competitor offerings.
• Account Planning & Strategy: Experience contributing to account or territory resource planning, collaborating with regional leadership to track milestones, and communicating strategic execution plans to cross-functional teams.
• Methodology & Execution: Experience applying structured business methodologies and standard tools to track deliverables and drive operational results.
• Talent & Capability Development: Experience participating in team capability-building, mentorship, or identifying talent pipelines to support short- and long-term team objectives.
• Executive Communication: Demonstrated experience delivering presentations, technical briefings, and strategic proposals to executive-level stakeholders (Director level and above).

At Cisco, we’re revolutionizing how data and infrastructure connect and protect organizations in the AI era – and beyond. We’ve been innovating fearlessly for 40 years to create solutions that power how humans and technology work together across the physical and digital worlds. These solutions provide customers with unparalleled security, visibility, and insights across the entire digital footprint.

Fueled by the depth and breadth of our technology, we experiment and create meaningful solutions. Add to that our worldwide network of doers and experts, and you’ll see that the opportunities to grow and build are limitless. We work as a team, collaborating with empathy to make really big things happen on a global scale. Because our solutions are everywhere, our impact is everywhere. 

We are Cisco, and our power starts with you. 

Individual pay is determined by the candidate's hiring location, market conditions, job-related skillset, experience, qualifications, education, certifications, and/or training. The full salary range for certain locations is listed below. For locations not listed below, the recruiter can share more details about compensation for the role in your location during the hiring process.

U.S. employees are offered benefits, subject to Cisco’s plan eligibility rules, which include medical, dental and vision insurance, a 401(k) plan with a Cisco matching contribution, paid parental leave, short and long-term disability coverage, and basic life insurance. Please see the Cisco careers site to discover more benefits and perks.  Employees may be eligible to receive grants of Cisco restricted stock units, which vest following continued employment with Cisco for defined periods of time.

U.S. employees are eligible for paid time away as described below, subject to Cisco’s policies:

• 10 paid holidays per full calendar year, plus 1 floating holiday for non-exempt employees

• 1 paid day off for employee’s birthday, paid year-end holiday shutdown, and 4 paid days off for personal wellness determined by Cisco

• Non-exempt employees** receive 16 days of paid vacation time per full calendar year, accrued at rate of 4.92 hours per pay period for full-time employees

• Exempt employees participate in Cisco’s flexible vacation time off program, which has no defined limit on how much vacation time eligible employees may use (subject to availability and some business limitations)

• 80 hours of sick time off provided on hire date and each January 1st thereafter, and up to 80 hours of unused sick time carried forward from one calendar year to the next

• Additional paid time away may be requested to deal with critical or emergency issues for family members

• Optional 10 paid days per full calendar year to volunteer

For non-sales roles, employees are also eligible to earn annual bonuses subject to Cisco’s policies.

Employees on sales plans earn performance-based incentive pay on top of their base salary, which is split between quota and non-quota components, subject to the applicable Cisco plan. For quota-based incentive pay, Cisco typically pays as follows:

• .75% of incentive target for each 1% of revenue attainment up to 50% of quota;

• 1.5% of incentive target for each 1% of attainment between 50% and 75%;

• 1% of incentive target for each 1% of attainment between 75% and 100%; and

• Once performance exceeds 100% attainment, incentive rates are at or above 1% for each 1% of attainment with no cap on incentive compensation.

For non-quota-based sales performance elements such as strategic sales objectives, Cisco may pay 0% up to 125% of target. Cisco sales plans do not have a minimum threshold of performance for sales incentive compensation to be paid.

The applicable full salary ranges for this position, by specific state, are listed below:

New York City Metro Area:

Non-Metro New York state & Washington state:

* For quota-based sales roles on Cisco’s sales plan, the ranges provided in this posting include base pay and sales target incentive compensation combined.

** Employees in Illinois, whether exempt or non-exempt, will participate in a unique time off program to meet local requirements.