Senior Oracle/PostgreSQL DBA

Senior Oracle/PostgreSQL DBA

Hybrid Parsippany, NJ- locals only-- maybe GA

Key Responsibilities

Database Administration

·  Administer, configure, and maintain Oracle (19c+) and PostgreSQL (14+) database environments across development, staging, and production

·  Manage database provisioning, schema design, user access, and lifecycle operations

·  Perform version upgrades, patch management, and migrations with minimal downtime

·  Maintain and test backup and recovery strategies (RMAN, pg_dump, point-in-time recovery)

Performance & Query Optimization

·  Analyze and tune slow-running queries using execution plans, explain plans, and profiling tools (AWR, ADDM, pg_stat_statements, pgBadger)

·  Design and maintain optimal indexing strategies, partitioning schemes, and statistics management

·  Identify and resolve locking, contention, and resource bottleneck issues

·  Conduct regular performance reviews and capacity planning assessments

Monitoring & Alerting

·  Set up and maintain proactive database monitoring using tools such as OEM (Oracle Enterprise Manager), pgAdmin, Prometheus + Grafana, Datadog, or equivalent

·  Define and configure threshold-based alerts for CPU, memory, I/O, tablespace usage, replication lag, connection pools, and long-running queries

·  Build dashboards for real-time visibility into database health and performance trends

·  Ensure 24/7 observability with appropriate on-call escalation runbooks

Debugging & Incident Response

·  Lead triage and root cause analysis (RCA) for database-related incidents including outages, data corruption, replication failures, and performance degradation

·  Maintain detailed incident logs and post-mortem documentation

·  Collaborate with application teams to debug data-layer issues and provide resolution guidance

Proactive Support & Reliability

·  Conduct regular health checks, audit reviews, and preventive maintenance

·  Identify risks before they become incidents, proactively address fragile configurations, aging objects, and growing technical debt in database infrastructure

·  Maintain and improve DR (Disaster Recovery) and HA (High Availability) setups, Oracle Data Guard, RAC, PostgreSQL Streaming Replication, pgBouncer, Patroni

·  Document runbooks, SOPs, and knowledge base articles for recurring operational tasks

Security & Compliance

·  Ensure databases meet compliance requirements (SOC 2, HIPAA, PCI-DSS, GDPR) including data masking, encryption at rest and in transit, and audit trails

·  Conduct periodic access reviews and vulnerability assessments

·  Enforce role-based access control (RBAC), least-privilege principles, and audit logging

Required Qualifications

·  8+ years of hands-on DBA experience with Oracle (11g/19c) and PostgreSQL (12+)

·  Deep expertise in query tuning and execution plan analysis for both platforms

·  Experience working in cloud environments — AWS RDS/Aurora

·  Proficiency with Oracle tools: SQL*Plus, RMAN, AWR, ADDM, OEM

·  Proficiency with PostgreSQL tools: psql, pg_stat_*, pgBadger, pgBouncer, Patroni, pg_activity

·  Experience designing and managing monitoring and alerting pipelines

·  Strong understanding of HA/DR architectures — Data Guard, RAC, streaming replication, failover clustering

·  Solid scripting skills in Shell, Python, or PL/SQL / PL/pgSQL for automation

Preferred Qualifications

·  Oracle OCA/OCP or equivalent certification

·  Experience with infrastructure-as-code tools (Terraform, Ansible) for database provisioning

·  Familiarity with containerized databases (PostgreSQL on Kubernetes, CrunchyData, CloudNativePG)

·  Exposure to database observability platforms like Dynatrace, Datadog

·  Prior experience supporting payroll, financial, or regulated-industry applications

Soft Skills

·  Strong analytical and problem-solving mindset with a bias toward prevention over reaction

·  Ability to communicate technical issues clearly to non-technical stakeholders

·  Self-driven, able to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment

·  Collaborative team player with a strong documentation discipline