Description
We are seeking an energetic and self-driven Partner Systems Engineer to join our Germany-based team. In this role, you will act as a trusted technical advisor, driving Cisco preference through proactive enablement, solution design, and relationship management.
As a technical field sales professional, you will partner closely with Partner Account Executives (PAEs) to drive partner-led bookings, pipeline acceleration, and competitive wins in the field. By combining hands-on technical expertise with consultative enablement, you will help scale Cisco’s market reach, position our portfolio competitively, and accelerate partner practice development.
Key Responsibilities:
- Solution Architecture & Design: Translate partner and customer business requirements into robust technical solutions, leveraging the breadth of Cisco’s portfolio (with a focus on Secure Networking, Collaboration, and AI-ready infrastructure).
- Partner Enablement & Practice Development: Contribute to the technical track of the Partner Account Plan. Equip partner technical teams with the skills, blueprints, and battle cards needed to independently qualify, design, and close opportunities.
- Joint Solution Co-Creation: Collaborate with partners to integrate Cisco technologies with partner services and intellectual property (IP), creating differentiated, high-value offerings.
- Demonstrations & Solution Validation: Guide partners through solution validation, leveraging Cisco dCloud, interactive labs, and proof-of-concept (POC) environments to showcase technical superiority.
- Cross-Architecture Expansion: Proactively identify cross-sell and upsell opportunities within the partner’s pipeline and installed base to drive quarterly technology adoption.
- Competitive Defense & Positioning: Equip partners with competitive insights and differentiation strategies to successfully defend and win Cisco proposals in competitive bids.
- One Cisco Collaboration: Partner closely with Cisco Portfolio SEs and Account Teams to present a unified "One Cisco" technical front, while gathering partner field insights to share with internal stakeholders.
- Event & Community Leadership: Represent Cisco at regional partner webinars, technical workshops, hackathons, and community forums across Germany.
Minimum Qualifications:
- 4–6+ years of technical pre-sales, systems engineering, or technical consulting experience in the networking/IT industry.
- Demonstrable expertise in core networking domains (Routing, Switching, Wireless) and fundamentals of Security (Firewalls, Zero Trust/ISE) or Data Center / Cloud infrastructure.
- Proven experience engaging with channel partners, systems integrators, or enterprise technical teams and decision-makers.
- Strong presentation and communication skills with the ability to deliver engaging technical workshops and solution demos.
- Self-driven mindset with a structured approach to building relationships, formulating account plans, and executing independently within the German market.
- Ability and willingness to travel (up to 40–50%) to support partner engagements, workshops, and regional activities across Germany.
- Fluent/Native language skills in German and English (written and verbal).
Preferred Qualifications:
- Relevant industry certifications (e.g., Cisco CCNP/CCNA, AWS Certified Solutions Architect, Microsoft Certified: Azure Network Engineer Expert, or equivalent).
- Practical knowledge of Cisco’s Secure Networking portfolio (Catalyst, Meraki, Hybrid Mesh Firewalls, Secure Routers) or Workplace Experience / Collaboration solutions.
- Understanding of modern IT trends, such as AI infrastructure networking requirements, observability, or API-driven automation.
- Experience utilizing Cisco dCloud or building lab proof-of-concept environments for partner/customer demonstrations.
- Familiarity with the German partner ecosystem and 1-Tier / 2-Tier distribution models.