Principal Engineer- Network Engineering

About the role

The Global Technical Facilities Planning group leads the strategic planning, development, and enhancement of Verizon Technical sites in support of network growth across next-generation architectures. We partner closely with Network Equipment owners, Standards, Implementation, and Technology teams to develop, assess, and optimize PSC (Power, Space, and Cooling) capacity loads while integrating Artificial Intelligence, machine learning automation, and intelligent bot-driven workflows that accelerate decision-making and reduce manual effort across our nationwide portfolio.

Responsibilities

• Develop resolutions to complex problems requiring frequent use of creativity and in-depth evaluation of variable factors.
• Mentor team members on networking, application design, engineering, and automation; act as the final escalation point for production service issues.
• Lead performance meetings with vendors, planning, and maintenance engineering; create detailed project plans.
• Provide input on status calls with teams across multiple organizations.
• Complete projects independently under tight timelines without impacting critical services.
• Develop excellent working relationships with other departments and vendors to establish best practices for engineering and operations.
• Technical Facilities Planner:
  • Develop, maintain, assess, and calculate PSC (Power, Space, and Cooling) capacity loads across a national portfolio of sites to approve network gear installation.
  • Leverage 1-, 3-, and 5-year PSC capacity and utilization forecasts to model future facility exhaust, informing build and decommission plans aligned to network roadmaps.
  • Plan and design short- and long-term equipment layouts of technical facilities based on Verizon Standards; produce AutoCAD space-planning deliverables.
  • Manage DC power plants, generators, and HVAC systems; perform AC/DC electrical analysis including rectifiers, batteries, BDFBs/PDFs, and generator capacity calculations.
  • Participate in market reviews and/or site visits to monitor implementation progress and ensure PSC compliance.
  • Identify, lead, and implement PSC solutions involving construction, modification, or decommissioning of equipment based on fiduciary and network priorities.
  • Partner with Technical Facilities Engineer and Implementation team on capacity solutions including construction design, scope, vendor management, bidding, permitting, and capital budget requests.
  • Maintain adequate build-ahead margins with attention to technology transformation initiatives (e.g., iEN, OpenRAN, vRAN, edge compute).
• AI Development, Automation & Bot Engineering:
  • Design, develop, and deploy AI-powered bots and automated agents that streamline PSC capacity workflows, data ingestion pipelines, and reporting cycles across UNIX-based environments.
  • Build and fine-tune large language model (LLM) integrations (e.g., Claude, GPT-4, Gemini) using prompt engineering, Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG), and function/tool-calling frameworks.
  • Develop agentic AI workflows to orchestrate multi-step capacity planning tasks end-to-end with minimal human intervention.
  • Create Python-based automation scripts, ETL pipelines, and REST/GraphQL API integrations to pull data from COEP, 1ERP/NSAP/vSAP, dcTrack, Canvas, Clarity, and other network management systems.
  • Engineer Robotic Process Automation (RPA) solutions to replace high-volume, repetitive manual tasks across PSC planning workflows.
  • Design and maintain vector databases and semantic search capabilities for intelligent retrieval of historical capacity data, site records, and engineering standards.
  • Develop and deploy chatbot interfaces (Teams, web-based) for non-technical stakeholders to query PSC capacity data using natural language.
  • Implement MLOps practices: model versioning, automated retraining pipelines, performance monitoring, and drift detection for predictive capacity models using AWS, Azure, and Kubernetes.
  • Produce machine learning forecasting models (regression, time-series, ensemble methods) to predict power/cooling exhaust dates with quantified confidence intervals.
  • Partner with TIES teams to define AI/automation roadmaps, author technical user stories, and participate in Agile/Scrum ceremonies.
• Data Analytics, Dashboards & Reporting:
  • Build interactive dashboards in Looker and Tableau, surfacing real-time PSC utilization, risk heat maps, and forecast accuracy KPIs.
  • Develop KPIs with planning and construction teams to deliver reporting on forecasting accuracy and capacity program health.
  • Prepare and deliver polished executive readouts to all audience levels, including senior and C-suite leadership.
  • Partner with planning organizations and stakeholders to identify process improvement opportunities and cost-savings solutions.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree or four or more years of equivalent work experience.
• Six or more years of relevant work experience in technical facilities planning, facility engineering, Network Systems, or a related technical discipline.
• Power, Space, and Cooling design and/or construction experience in a telecommunications or data center environment.
• Experience with Python for data analysis, automation, and model development.
• Hands-on experience integrating or building with LLM APIs (Anthropic Claude, OpenAI, or equivalent) including prompt engineering and tool/function calling.
• Experience building automated workflows, bots, or scripts that replace or augment manual operational processes.
• Proficiency with SQL, Oracle, and SQL Server for data modeling, and visualization tools including Looker and Tableau.
• Experience leading through influence in a cross-functional team environment across engineering, IT, and operations.
• Strong presentation and communication skills with a proven ability to influence and present to all levels of the organization.
• Basic understanding of electrical systems, DC power design, and telecommunications network architecture.

Preferred Qualifications

• Proficiency with agentic AI frameworks, with development experience in Python and deployment on AWS and Azure.
• Experience with Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG), vector databases including PostgreSQL with pgvector, and semantic search.
• Robotic Process Automation (RPA) experience using custom Python-based automation.
• MLOps experience: deploying and monitoring ML models in production on AWS and Azure using Kubernetes for orchestration and Git/SVN for version control.
• Experience with cloud platforms, specifically AWS and Azure, for hosting AI/ML workloads, APIs, and data pipelines.
• REST API design and consumption; experience building internal tool backends using Python, Java, or JavaScript in UNIX-based environments.
• AutoCAD experience for Central Office and technical facility space planning.
• Familiarity with systems including 1PSC-UNO, NPP, dcTrack, DRAAS, AutoCAD, CCP, Canvas, Clarity, vSAP GUI, ERP-SAP Portal.
• Electrical, Mechanical, or Civil Engineering degree.
• Experience with Verizon network architecture.
• Project Management certification (PMP, PgMP) or Agile/Scrum certification (CSM, SAFe).
• Experience developing user stories, defining acceptance criteria, and participating in sprint ceremonies as a technical lead.
• Proven track record of identifying and driving cross-functional cost, quality, and time improvement initiatives with measurable results.
• Strong negotiation and written communication skills for influencing multiple technical and non-technical organizations.

Schedule

This is a hybrid role with a defined work location that includes both remote work and assigned office days as set by the manager. Employees are responsible for maintaining compliance with hybrid work policies. Scheduled weekly hours: 40.

Benefits

• Health and wellness benefits: medical, dental, vision, short and long term disability, basic life insurance, supplemental life insurance, AD&D insurance, identity theft protection, pet insurance, and group home & auto insurance.
• Retirement and financial benefits: matched 401(k) savings plan.
• Time off: up to 8 company-paid holidays per year and up to 6 personal days per year; newly hired employees receive up to 15 days of vacation per year, which grows with additional service.
• Additional benefits: paid parental leave, adoption assistance, tuition assistance, and other incentives.
• For part-timers, coverage varies based on individual circumstances.

Pay

The annual salary range for this full-time position is $107,000.00 - $205,000.00, depending on location and confirmed job-related skills and experience. This role is incentive-based with potential for additional earnings. For Colorado and Illinois locations, the annual salary range is $118,000.00 - $205,000.00. For part-time roles, compensation will be adjusted to reflect hours worked.