Database Administrator

Job Summary

Database Administrator (DBA), you will play a critical role in architecting, building, maintaining, optimizing, and securing clients databases across both Oracle Database and Microsoft SQL Server platforms. This is a hands-on position that goes well beyond monitoring: you will design and implement new database environments, lead migrations and upgrades, troubleshoot complex performance and availability problems through to root cause, and define the architecture, standards and automation that keep multi-client, heterogeneous estates reliable.

Responsibilities

• Validate database design and architecture solutions for new and existing client environments on both Oracle and SQL Server, including sizing, high availability and disaster recovery topology, storage layout and security model.
• Build, install, configure and harden new database instances and environments to a documented standard, and hand them into operation with runbooks and monitoring already in place.
• Administer databases regarding efficiency, security, and systems integrity.
• Monitor system's health and performance.
• Ensure high levels of performance and availability.
• Ensure that all database backup schedules are implemented and monitored for issues.
• Test database recovery procedures periodically and validate that recovery time and recovery point objectives are actually met.
• Lead and execute database migrations, upgrades and patching cycles on both platforms, with tested rollback plans and post-change performance validation.
• Optimize query performance through T-SQL and PL/SQL improvements, indexes, statistics, partitioning, execution plan management and other techniques.
• Troubleshoot and resolve complex production incidents to root cause across both platforms, lead technical bridges during major incidents, and produce root cause analyses with preventive actions.
• Perform capacity and growth planning, and raise storage, licensing and infrastructure needs proactively before they become incidents.
• Define and maintain database standards, reference architectures, technical documentation and operational runbooks for the supported estate.
• Design and implement automation for repetitive database operations in order to reduce manual effort and human error.
• Optimize use of operational resources.
• Provide 24x7 support for critical production systems.
• Overseeing the compliance of company operating processes.
• Maintain technical expertise in both Oracle technologies and SQL Server. 
• Maintain awareness of current and future technologies and best practices relevant to operations.
• Act in a mentoring capacity to other team members, including technical guidance and knowledge transfer on both platforms.
• Make recommendations on performance improvement and automation opportunities to improve operations

Skills and Experience

EXPERIENCE:

• 6+ years' experience as a senior DBA in large-scale production environments supporting several clients, with hands-on, in-depth experience in both Oracle Database SQL Server. Dual-platform capability is a requirement of this role, not a preference.
• Proven experience building database environments from the ground up: sizing and architecture definition, installation and configuration, instance and storage layout, schema and object design, standards definition, and documented handover into operations.
• Demonstrated experience troubleshooting and resolving complex production incidents to root cause on both platforms: performance degradation, blocking and locking, execution plan regressions, data corruption, cluster and replication failures, and capacity exhaustion.
• Experienced in high availability and disaster recovery architectures on both platforms: SQL Server Always-On availability groups, failover clustering and log shipping; Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC), Data Guard, and RMAN backup and recovery strategies.
• Experience leading database migrations, version upgrades, consolidations and platform modernization, with tested rollback plans and no-regression validation.
• Desirable 2 years' experience of Azure SQL Database, AWS RDS (SQL Server and Oracle), Oracle Cloud Infrastructure and/or MS Dataverse.
• Experienced in Clustering Services, High Availability and Always-On configurations.
• Proven experience with cloud-based services and shared operations in heterogeneous environments.
• Participate in 24x7 on call support rotation.

Education:

• Computer Science, Engineering, IT bachelor's degree or equivalent working experience.
• Azure Data Engineer Associate.
• Oracle Certified Professional (OCP), Oracle Database Administrator, or equivalent demonstrable Oracle expertise.

Technical Skills

• Expert-level SQL Server administration and performance engineering: T-SQL, Query Store, execution plan analysis, Dynamic Management Views, wait statistics, indexing and statistics strategy, partitioning, hints, resource governance, and Azure Monitor SQL Insights for cloud-hosted instances.
• Expert-level Oracle administration and performance engineering: PL/SQL, AWR and ASH analysis, optimizer behavior and execution plan management, SQL plan baselines, statistics management, partitioning, ASM and tablespace design, RMAN, Data Guard and RAC.
• Database architecture: capacity and growth planning, instance and storage layout, high availability and disaster recovery topology design, consolidation strategy, data lifecycle and archiving, and the definition of build standards and reference architectures that can be reused across clients.
• Excellent knowledge of database backup and recovery on both platforms, including restore testing, point-in-time recovery, block and page level recovery, and validated recovery time and recovery point objectives.
• Structured troubleshooting and root cause analysis: the ability to isolate a problem with evidence rather than assumption across the database, operating system, storage and network layers, and to document both the root cause and the preventive control.
• Database security and compliance: least-privilege access models, auditing, encryption at rest and in transit, key management, and data masking for non-production environments.
• Automation and scripting for database operations (for example PowerShell, Python, Shell or Ansible), covering health checks, patching, provisioning and non-production refresh.
• Familiarity with database design, documentation and coding, clustering, replication.
• Knowledge of client-server applications.
• Knowledge in ITIL.

Desired Technical Proficiencies:

• Azure Database Administrator Associate.
• Oracle Certified Professional (OCP) Database Administrator.
• AWS Certified Database - Specialty.
• Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Architect or equivalent cloud database certification.

Language Skills

• English Level B2+

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