João Pires is a Technical Consulting Engineer (TCE), part of the Core Architecture and Technology Solutions (CATS) team at CX Centers Lisbon. Since 2019 João has been part of our Cisco family. After two years, he decided to have a new experience and explore other areas. However, a few months later, João rejoined Cisco realizing how unique our culture is. Cisco is the company where he wants to continue to grow and develop a career. Continue reading to know more about his story and the role of a TAC engineer at Cisco.
My name is João Pires and I am a Technical Consulting Engineer (TCE), part of the Core Architecture and Technology Solutions (CATS) team in Lisbon, Portugal. I started my career at Cisco in June 2019; it was the best experience I could have asked for, as a first job in Networking Hardware and Software. I already knew a little about Cisco’s technologies and products from university classes, but I was amazed to discover that working in this company was even better than I had ever expected. However, I did leave Cisco in January 2022 to try something quite different in the Financial Technology area, but returned some months after leaving, in August 2022. During my seven months away, I realized that Cisco’s culture is simply unique. The sense of community, concern for its employees and the support Cisco gives was something I was missing and made me want to come back without a second thought. Now, let me share a bit about what it is like to be a TAC engineer and some curiosities about our role:
Could you explain what you do and what your primary responsibilities are?
The most important part of my job is fixing what is broken, simply put. One of the tasks I perform almost every day is accepting Service Requests, raised by Cisco customers. I am expected to drive each of them to resolution, based on analysis of data provided by customers and consulting as many resources as necessary, being that Cisco documentation or, for instance, escalation engineers, to aid in resolving the problem at hand. Another very important part of the job is being ready to assist customers via Webex meetings, as they may call in with a severe case that will need immediate attention.
What is the biggest misconception about your position/role/job?
I would say that the biggest misconception about a Technical Assistance Center (TAC) engineer is that I will know everything that there is to know about the technology I support. There is no doubt that, most of time, TAC engineers will be the ones most prepared to fix problems in customers’ environments, based on their technical skills; but having a whole team, documentation and knowledge base behind-the-scenes is key to be able to resolve problems.
What are your biggest challenges as a Technical Consulting Engineer?
One of the biggest challenges I face, as a support engineer, is knowing how to prioritize my work. It is crucial to be able to decide what is the next most important case to take care of, when having multiple situations to deal with at a given time. I never get it 100% right; I think that is impossible given the unpredictable nature of this job, but it gets easier, as most things do, with time and experience. Due to this challenge, having good time management skills is, I would say, one of the most important skills a support engineer can have.
What helps you to concentrate during a workday?
This is a great question, because my answer varies: some days I will need full silence to be able to concentrate on reading log files and performing research; some other days I can perform the same tasks while listening to music, being fully focused, but in a different way when compared to being in silence; this is why I feel that I need to evaluate myself every day to understand if I will need one thing or the other. Irrespective of any of these approaches, I always feel that I need one espresso to start my mornings, and another one in the middle of the day, to really help me concentrate.
Do you have any advice you would like to give a future Technical Consulting Engineer joining Cisco?
If I can give any advice from my experience in the past 3 years at Cisco, as a support engineer, is that communication skills, both written and verbal, are fundamental for this role, and I consider them to be as important as technical skills. Being able to pass a clear message to a customer, as well as having a clear understanding of the problem at hand, through communication via phone calls or emails with customers, is vital to be able to perform a good job in TAC. Communicating clearly also passes a message of competence and dedication to our customers, which can be very reassuring to them, especially in more stressful situations.
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