Cisco Secure Network Analytics Consultant

Cambridge (Hybrid) | £400-£440 per day | Inside IR35 | 12-Month Contract

We are seeking an experienced Cisco Secure Network Analytics (SNA) Consultant to support a major network visibility and security analytics improvement programme for a leading global technology organisation.

This is an exciting opportunity for a specialist with strong Cisco SNA, NetFlow and network security analytics experience to lead the redesign, implementation and optimisation of a global monitoring environment.

You will play a key role in improving network traffic visibility, strengthening security analytics and developing a scalable, resilient architecture across a complex global network.

The Role

You will take ownership of assessing and enhancing the existing Cisco Secure Network Analytics environment, delivering a replacement platform and developing a strategy to expand NetFlow and syslog coverage across the global network.

A particular focus will be improving east-west traffic visibility across campus, data centre and cloud environments.

Key Responsibilities

Cisco SNA Architecture & Implementation

• Assess the existing Cisco SNA architecture, configurations, integrations and telemetry collection.

• Design and deploy a replacement Cisco SNA infrastructure using procured hardware and software.

• Configure and optimise Flow Managers, Flow Collectors and UDP Directors.

• Migrate existing configurations and data sources, ensuring platform functionality and resilience.

• Evaluate load-balancing and high-availability solutions, including HAProxy and alternative technologies.

Network Visibility & Telemetry

• Review existing global NetFlow and syslog coverage, identifying gaps and opportunities for improvement.

• Develop strategies to improve network traffic visibility, particularly east-west traffic flows.

• Design scalable collection, forwarding and distribution architectures.

• Assess telemetry coverage across campus, data centre and hybrid cloud environments.

• Identify opportunities to automate NetFlow and syslog deployment.

Security Analytics & Optimisation

• Tune Cisco SNA security policies, behavioural analytics, alarms and detection thresholds.

• Establish traffic baselines, host groups and network classifications.

• Reduce false positives and alert fatigue while improving threat detection.

• Optimise telemetry ingestion, data retention and overall platform performance.

• Collaborate with Network Reliability Engineering and Security teams to develop meaningful monitoring use cases.

Documentation & Knowledge Transfer

• Produce architecture diagrams, technical documentation and operational procedures.

• Deliver knowledge transfer and operational handover to internal engineering teams.

Essential Skills & Experience

• Proven experience designing, deploying and optimising Cisco Secure Network Analytics (SNA) environments.

• Strong technical knowledge of NetFlow, syslog, Flow Managers, Flow Collectors and UDP Directors.

• Experience with network traffic analytics, security monitoring and behavioural detection.

• Strong Cisco enterprise networking and network security expertise.

• Experience improving telemetry collection, network visibility and monitoring architectures.

• Ability to design scalable, resilient and highly available network analytics platforms.

Desirable Experience

• Network automation using Python, Ansible, Terraform or REST APIs.

• Automation of NetFlow and syslog configuration and deployment.

• Experience with Git and CI/CD workflows.

• HAProxy, load balancing and high-availability architectures.

• UDP traffic distribution and Flow Collector scalability.

• Hybrid cloud networking and east-west traffic monitoring.

Project Deliverables

You will be expected to deliver:

• A comprehensive assessment of the existing Cisco SNA environment.

• A redesigned and fully operational Cisco SNA platform.

• Optimised security analytics, monitoring policies and alerting.

• Improved global NetFlow and syslog coverage.

• A strategy and roadmap for enhanced east-west traffic visibility.

• Recommendations for Flow Collector load balancing and high availability.

• Complete technical documentation and knowledge transfer.

Contract Details

• Location: Cambridge - Hybrid working

• Rate: £400-£440 per day

• IR35 Status: Inside IR35

• Contract Length: 12 months

Interested? If you have hands-on Cisco Secure Network Analytics experience and a strong background in network visibility and security analytics, we'd be keen to hear from you.