Jacob Brown is one of the most electric voices rising in the world of professional speaking.

A former NFL athlete turned serial entrepreneur, best-selling author, and transformational keynote speaker, Jacob has quickly become a go-to expert for companies and conferences that want to shift mindsets, build resilient leaders, and transform workplace culture.

Today, Jacob is a trusted keynote speaker for organizations like Intel, Meta, LinkedIn, UPS, General Motors, the Dallas Cowboys and many more. He’s delivered standing-ovation keynotes at top universities including Notre Dame, Michigan, and Wisconsin, and his insights have been featured in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, and Good Morning America. Jacob is also the author of Fail Forward Mentality, a powerful book designed to help individuals and organizations break free from perfectionism, embrace resilience, and transform setbacks into growth.

His book is a natural extension of his message on stage, equipping readers with actionable tools to reframe failure and lead with courage. As co-founder of Varlo, a global athletic apparel brand, Jacob knows the entrepreneurial hustle. But it’s his work with executive teams, HR leaders, and frontline managers that sets him apart. His keynotes go beyond motivation - they activate change. Using humor, hard-earned wisdom, and practical frameworks, Jacob helps leaders unlock their teams' potential by transforming failure into strategy and adversity into alignment.

Whether guiding companies through burnout, broken culture, or leadership drift, Jacob equips audiences to embrace discomfort, lead with authenticity, and build failure-resilient organizations that thrive in uncertainty.

He lives in Metro Detroit with his wife and their four children. Offstage, you’ll find him cheering at basketball games, attending ballet recitals, or sneaking in a family vacation - always leading from the core.

Ready to connect? Text or call me @ 248-805-6093 or email me at jacob@failforwardbrown.com

For speaking inquiries: www.jakebrownspeaks.com

Jacob Brown

Koch Industries

Accomplishments:
•	Coordinated setting the golden configuration standard for the Cisco Wireless Controllers that is now used across all devices company-wide.

•	Developed an automated backup solution for Cisco 9800’s and AirEOS Wireless controllers.

•	Designed, tested, and implemented the Automation of Cisco Wireless Lan Controllers in an HA pair, using Ansible. This new automation aided in deploying the migration of WLCs across 120,000 sites and sped up implementation from a typical 90-minute deployment to 10 minutes.

•	Automated the creation of newly deployed DMZ subnets across 120 sites, that included a minimum of 20 devices at each site. The automation saved the company over 120 hours of manual labor and no downtime or network errors were detected.

Network Automation Engineer| Network Automation | Python | Ansible | GIT | 

Communications & Power Industries (CPI)

•	Managed new site integrations into the Corporate WAN/MPLS that included:
o	Designing wiring diagrams and migration planning guides.
o	Created VLANS/Subnets, DCHP Scopes, DNS domains, and SSIDs.
o	Implemented Tacacs+ authorization through ClearPass for WAN/LAN devices.
o	Secured and hardened site equipment for pre-migration.
o	Migrated new sites from legacy infrastructure to corporate WAN.
o	Automated device backups and creation of templates for new switches to be deployed using Python, Napalm, and Ansible and saved them to Repository on GIT
o	Began creation of a CI/CD pipeline with automated playbooks to push or pull configurations when changes are needed. Playbooks consisted of BGP, routes, VLAN, ACLs, etc. Zones were created to utilize these playbooks to push the configurations to only necessary devices.

•	Administered Palo Alto Firewalls that included:
o	Created Security, NAT and QOS policies.
o	Configured Postman to utilize REST APIs to pull running configurations, push new changes and to view any errors.
o	Implemented configuration changes with through Python with PAN-OS SDK.
o	Used API calls to existing devices to pull configurations and push to new deployments.
o	Handled entries for Zones, VLANs, Virtual Routers and IPSEC tunnels.
o	Managed object creations for addresses and services.
o	Applied URL filters, data patterns and spyware settings.
o	Implemented Active/Passive High-Availability clusters company-wide.

•	In charge of multi-vendor sites that included Dell, HP and Cisco Nexus and Catalyst routers and switches, Cisco WLC controllers and APs, and Clear Pass device/user authentication and access policies.

Senior Network Engineer > Cisco CCNP | Network Automation | Ansible | Python | Linux | GIT |

Faurecia

Responsible for managing global data centers and sites with WAN/LAN architectures in a cloud and Nexus infrastructure.

Accomplishments:
•	Through the aid of in-class and self-teachings, executed the planning, designing, architecture, and management of the relocation of the North American Data Center with a Nexus infrastructure.

•	Coordinated the design and implementation of an ACI focused European Data Center.

•	Aided with the implementation of a European Data Center Hot-site used in the failover of critical systems.

•	Joined the Global WAN team, where we seamlessly migrated 25,000+ employees to remote working due to COVID19 restraints within 3 weeks.

•	Cooperated in alleviating heavily congested cloud traffic by load balancing applications through newly created global hubs and increasing throughput by 75%.

•	Currently facilitating an SD-WAN solution with the global WAN Team across World-Wide Data Centers and local sites.

•	Automated Python scripts to ACI infrastructure to simplify configuration of VLANs, ports, interfaces,  and EPGs.

•	Used API calls to Nexus devices for MIB configurations, used for monitoring tools and also for status of the device. 

•	Automated new equipment deployments using Ansible and Netmiko for updated sites to prepare them for an SDWAN migration.

Central Operations Network Administrator - Network Engineer | Cisco | Routing | BGP | Ansible | 

RECARO North Amercia

Managed IT systems and network infrastructure that included servers, storage, PBX phones, and plant operational systems.
Accomplishments:
•	Managed Company merger by transitioning IT systems and network design to new company architecture without incidence while maintaining current production systems.
•	Redesigned network that included a redundant design to improve failover and decrease latency in critical production applications.

IT and Network Administration > Cisco | Routing | Switching | Network Automation | Ansible |

Pc Physician's

Information Technology Support Specialist > Network Automation | Networking | Ansible | Python |

CareTech Solutions

Help Desk Analyst > Cisco | Linux | Network Automation | Routing | Switching | Ansible |

Network Automation | CCNP Network Engineer | Ansible | Python | Linux | Napalm | API | Networking | Git | Infrastructure as code | REST | Nornir

MY IT JOURNEY TO NETWORKING AND DEVOPS.....
“You need to be constantly reinventing yourself. You need to challenge things that you do not understand. You need to try different ideas, different technologies, different creative approaches. Because the world is changing and we need to change with it.”
I have been lucky to actually do what I love. I found my passion a few years ago... well a lot of few years ago... I was always building PCs or repairing them on the side. I had a ton of parts in this room I had built in my basement. I had never thought of doing this as a career. I just loved doing it. After the recession hit the US, many people lost their jobs. It was a terrible time here. I had also lost mine. I went through a self discovery process and that is when I started to go back to fixing PCs. I started to study and learn technologies. This is when I found what excited me. Believe it or not, it was Networking! 
To this day, it is still networking. There are many new advancements in this industry which have sparked even more excitement and passion in it for me. During the lockdowns, I focused back on my studies with Cisco CCNP and this is where I started to learn the DevOps tools.  I continued my studies and earned the DEVNET Associate recently and that passion is on fire now! I have always loved to learn new technologies and to get my hands "dirty" with practice labs. I feel bad for my wife with all these servers and monitors now in what "WAS" a clean office.... :)
I am now focused on increasing my DevOps knowledge with tools such as Docker, Jenkins, Terraform, Git, Linux, and Bash. I am totally enjoying creating scripts in Python to use in Network Automation and in creating CI/CD Pipelines. 
The future is full of bright shiny things for all of us to embrace! I am enjoying the journey and always will.
I will always try to post things on here that will help us all out in no matter what stage of the journey you are in. I truly hope you learn something everyday form my page.

Key Words: Cisco Routers and switches, Cisco Nexus, Cisco IOS, Cisco ASA Firewalls, Palo Alto Firwalls, BGP, WAN, SDWAN, DEVOPS, Docker, Linux, Shell Scripting, Git, CI/CD, Jenkins, Python, Kubernetes, Automation, Networking, Cisco, Terraform, Bash, Containers, Continuous delivery, Infrastructure as code, scripts, Shell, Ansible, Grafan, API, YAML, Rest, Restconf, Netconf, Network programmability, JSON, Agile, Kafka, DevOps.

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