Director, Engineering Project & Program Management (Security Escalations)

Job description

The application window is expected to close on: 08/28/2026Job posting may be removed earlier if the position is filled or if a sufficient number of applications are received. Meet the Team Splunk is looking for a Director, Engineering Project and Program Management to own and scale our Security Escalation Management (SEM) organization within the Security org. SEM is a human-led coordination and recovery function built to resolve complex customer situations that cut across front-line support, engineering, product, account management, and formal account escalation teams. Recovery means full resolution—that includes driving engineering analysis, code fixes, bug remediation, configuration corrections, workaround validation, and Root Cause Analysis, not just routing a ticket to the right inbox. The team protects customer confidence, absorbs preventable escalation to executive leadership, and surfaces the operational intelligence that helps Splunk's Security leaders make faster, better decisions. Your Impact This is not a technical support director role. It is a recovery leadership and program management role for someone who runs disciplined operations, influences without authority across a large matrixed organization, and holds a customer outcome standard—including engineering outcomes—that others will follow. Escalation Engagements and Recovery Own the SEM charter, operating model, and all customer-facing Security escalation engagements across Splunk's Enterprise Security suite (ES Core, ES Premier, and associated capabilities), Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR), Extended Detection and Response (XDR), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR), User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA), and related Security products. Hold final accountability for engagement quality and resolution outcomes: recovery plans, code fix coordination, bug escalation through engineering, workaround validation, customer communication cadence, sentiment, and post-engagement learning. Drive full-cycle resolution—from intake and triage through engineering partner engagement, fix delivery or validated workaround, and confirmed customer recovery. Set and enforce the admission model—severity standards, concurrent Priority 1 ceilings, cross-team ownership rules, and handoff protocols including follow-the-sun and after-hours on-call activation. Partner with the Account Escalation team on formally escalated accounts where SEM owns the Security workstream. Build and maintain a Sales Intake coordination function: a single, human-supervised channel that fields requests from Sales and leadership, routes them to the correct owner, confirms acceptance, and monitors outcomes through to closure. Engineering and Product Partnership Hold engineering teams accountable for analysis, code fixes, and internal Root Cause Analysis (RCA) on SEM-led engagements; track action completion and escalate blockers. Work directly with Product and Engineering leadership to surface systemic patterns—recurring defects, missing capabilities, or architectural gaps—that generate escalation volume. Coordinate customer-facing RCAs in partnership with Engineering and Product; ensure they are accurate, timely, and properly reviewed before release. Governance and Reporting Deliver a monthly Product Management newsletter covering portfolio state, product and engineering dependencies, blockers, fix status, and patterns across all active and closed engagements. Run the governance cadence: weekly operations reviews, monthly leadership reviews, periodic program decision gates, and triggered decision huddles. Build and maintain a success framework tracking Sales Intake health, executive and business issues, customer and engineering outcomes, and operating model performance. Communicate systemic patterns and engineering decision needs clearly to senior leadership. People and Program Manage and develop a team of Engagement Managers; build the staffing model and hiring plan for long-term operation. Establish an AI-assistive tooling posture: AI drafts, humans approve; enforce source traceability and ensure no autonomous customer-facing output. Partner with cross-functional leaders on proactive account nominations, priority conflicts, and escalation disposition. Minimum Qualifications Bachelor’s Degree or 15+ years of industry experience, preferably in security, technical escalation management, customer support engineering, or technical program management within an enterprise software environment with experience managing managers or senior individual contributors. 4+ years experience running cross-functional teams handling customer concerns involving Engineering, Product, Support, and Sales simultaneously. 4+ years experience setting up and managing intake, routing, and tracking systems at the program level. Preferred Qualifications Familiarity with Security products or security operations environments - understanding the technical stakes of a Security outage and the ability to speak credibly to Engineering and Product leaders about resolution risk and timelines. Demonstrated ability to own a customer recovery program end-to-end, including driving engineering partners to deliver code fixes, patches, or validated workarounds under pressure. Experience with executive-level reporting, customer-facing summaries, and recovery plans without editorial support. Why Cisco? 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. Message to applicants applying to work in the U.S. and/or Canada: The starting salary range posted for this position is $233,900.00 to $330,400.00 and reflects the projected salary range for new hires in this position in U.S. and/or Canada locations, not including incentive compensation*, equity, or benefits. 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,