Principal Engineer, Cyber Defence

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Optus is an Australian telecommunications company, delivering more than 11 million services to our customers every day across mobile, broadband and digital solutions.

The Principal Cyber Defence Engineer is a critical technical leadership role within our Cyber Defence team. You’ll drive the evolution of Optus’ defensive cyber capabilities, shaping strategy, architecture, and execution across threat hunting, detection engineering, incident response, and threat intelligence. This role is central to building a proactive, intelligence-led defence posture that protects our customers and critical infrastructure.

You’ll work closely with senior leaders across the business, challenge assumptions, and influence strategic decisions to ensure our cyber defence initiatives deliver real impact. This is a hands-on leadership role that blends deep technical expertise with strategic vision and stakeholder engagement.

What you’ll be doing

- Lead the technical transformation and strategy of the Cyber Defence program.
- Own the Cyber Defence technology roadmap, ensuring visibility of progress, risks, dependencies, and outcomes.
- Provide technical oversight across threat hunting, purple teaming, detection engineering, incident management, and threat intelligence.
- Shape and integrate defensive capabilities with Threat & Attack Research and Offensive Security functions.
- Drive continuous improvement in operational and engineering excellence through process refinement and innovation.
- Develop business cases for investment in cyber defence capabilities and lead resulting initiatives.
- Foster a culture of excellence, integrity, and professionalism across the cyber defence team.
- Provide technical coaching and mentorship to uplift engineering and investigative capability.
- Collaborate with senior stakeholders across business units to align cyber initiatives with strategic priorities.
- Influence and support change across the organisation, enabling transformation through cyber resilience.

What you’ll bring

- Proven leadership in cyber defence, with experience across threat intelligence, detection engineering, incident response, and forensics.
- Deep understanding of adversary TTPs, malware evolution, and threat modelling frameworks (e.g., MITRE ATT&CK, Pyramid of Pain).
- Strong technical expertise in cyber threat landscape including state actors, cybercrime, insider threats, and hacktivism.
- Experience with automation, scripting (Python), and engineering deployment pipelines.
- Demonstrated ability to lead complex, cross-functional initiatives and manage ambiguity.
- Strategic thinking with the ability to translate technical risk into business impact.
- Strong stakeholder engagement and influencing skills across all levels of the organisation.
- Experience in financial management (capex/opex) and business case development
- Ability to work autonomously, make proactive decisions, and drive change
- Strong people leadership, coaching, and mentoring capability
- Tertiary qualifications in computer science, cyber security, engineering, or related disciplines

The good stuff …

- Competitive remuneration and employee discounts. Make life easier (and more affordable) with $80 monthly credit and 25% off Optus products and unique shopping discounts with our retail partners.
- Flexible working arrangements with opportunities to work three days in the office, two days remote or home.
- Vibrant and collaborative office campus that includes cafes, convenience store, chill out zones, GP, post office, gym and on-site childcare centre.
- Competitive leave policies, including additional 'Connected’ days to focus on culture, family, health, community, or whatever’s important to you.
- We support growing families with inclusive, carer-neutral paid Parental Leave of up to 16 weeks.
- Direct your own development and build future-ready skills with Optus U’s industry-focused micro-credentials, developed with La Trobe and Macquarie Universities.
- Build meaningful connections through employee-led networks and diversity initiatives including Culture Connect, Elevate Women, Disability Network and Express Yourself (LGBTQIA+).
- Put your wellbeing first with free access to counselling and support services, 24/7 — in-person, by phone, SMS, or video.
- Free Optus bus from Macquarie University Metro Station (every 6-8 minutes); morning and afternoon.

At Optus, we are strengthened by others and that means valuing diversity and saying ‘yes’ to embracing individual differences. We are committed to ensuring that our application process provides an equal employment opportunity to all job seekers, including individuals from diverse gender, cultural and linguistic backgrounds, individuals with a disability, individuals identifying as being part of the LGBTQIA+ community, individuals who may have served in the armed forces or who identify as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander. We also want to do our best to make our recruitment process inclusive. If you require any adjustments or accessibility support to participate fairly and equitably in the recruitment process, please email AccessibleRecruitment@optus.com.au or call 1800 309 170. We're here to help. When you contact us, please advise your preferred method of contact and we will be in touch within 48 hours.

For more information on Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging at Optus, please visit https://www.optus.com.au/about/inclusion-diversity

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