Databricks Administrator

Job Title: Databricks Administrator
Location: Washington, District of Columbia
Type: Contract
Contractor Work Model: Onsite

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: The Enterprise Data Platform (EDP) empowers the Board to confidently use trusted, standardized, and well governed data to drive insight and innovation.
BACKGROUND:
Databricks Administrator is the hands-on technical owner of the agency's Databricks platform supporting EDP. This role is accountable for platform operations, security, and governance configuration end-to-end-ensuring the environment is compliant, reliable, cost-controlled, and enables secure analytics and AI/ML workloads at scale
REQUIREMENTS:
The candidate shall possess the knowledge and skills set forth in the Technical Services BOA,
Section 3.5.6.1 for labor category Intermediate Cloud Systems Engineer.
The candidate shall also demonstrate the below knowledge and experience:
Hands-on experience administering Databricks (workspace administration,
clusters/compute policies, jobs, SQL warehouses, repos, runtime management) and expertise using Databricks CLI.
Strong Unity Catalog administration: metastores; catalogs/schemas; grants; service principals; external locations; storage credentials; governed storage access.
Identity & Access Management proficiency: SSO concepts, SCIM provisioning, groupbased RBAC, service principals, least-privilege patterns.
Security fundamentals: secrets management, secure connectivity, audit logging, access monitoring, and evidence-ready operations.
Cloud platform expertise (AWS ): IAM roles/policies, object storage security patterns, networking basics (VPC concepts), logging/monitoring integration.
Automation skills: scripting and/or IaC using Terraform/CLI/REST APIs for repeatable configuration and environment promotion.
Experience implementing data governance controls (classification/tagging,
lineage/metadata integrations) in partnership with governance teams.
CI/CD practices for jobs/notebooks/config promotion across SDLC environments.
Understanding of lakehouse concepts (e.g., Delta, table lifecycle management, separation of storage/compute).
SQL proficiency and data engineering fundamentals for troubleshooting query
performance issues, understanding ETL/ELT workflow patterns, and debugging data pipeline failures; basic Python/Scala familiarity for notebook/code issue diagnosis.
Experience with compliance and regulatory frameworks (FedRAMP, HIPAA, SOC2, or similar) including implementation of data residency requirements, retention policies, and audit-ready evidence collection.
Hands-on experience with AWS security and networking services including PrivateLink, Secrets Manager/Systems Manager integration, CloudWatch/CloudTrail integration, S3
bucket policies, cross-account access patterns, and KMS encryption key management.
Experience administering Databricks serverless compute, Workspace Git integrations (GitLab), Databricks Asset Bundles (DABs) for deployment automation, and modern workspace features supporting DevOps workflows.
SLA/SLO management and stakeholder communication skills; ability to define platform service levels, produce operational reports, translate technical issues to business stakeholders, and manage vendor relationships (Databricks account teams).

Education / Experience/Certifications/Accreditations
Bachelor's degree in a related field or equivalent practical experience.
7+ years in cloud/data platform administration and operations, including 4+ years supporting Databricks or similar platforms.
Databricks Platform Administrator/Databricks AWS Platform Architect
Databricks Certified Data Engineer Associate/Professional
AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate or Professional
The Contractor shall deliver, but not limited to, the following:
Administer Databricks account and workspaces across SDLC environments; standardize configuration, naming, and operational patterns.
Configure and maintain clusters/compute, job compute, SQL warehouses, runtime versions, libraries, repos, and workspace settings.
Implement platform monitoring/alerting, operational dashboards, and health checks; maintain runbooks and operational procedures.
Provide Tier 2/3 operational support: troubleshoot incidents, perform root-cause analysis, and drive remediation and preventive actions.
Manage change control for upgrades, feature rollouts, configuration changes, and integration changes; document impacts and rollback plans.
Enforce least privilege across platform resources (workspaces, jobs, clusters, SQL warehouses, repos, secrets) using role/group-based access patterns.
Configure and manage secrets and secure credential handling (secret scopes / key
management integrations) for platform and data connectivity.
Enable and maintain audit logging and access/event visibility; support security reviews
and evidence requests.
Administer Unity Catalog governance: metastores, catalogs/schemas/tables, ownership, grants, and environment/domain patterns.
Configure and manage external locations, storage credentials, and governed access to cloud object storage.
Partner with governance stakeholders to support metadata/lineage integration,
classification/tagging, and retention controls where applicable.
Coordinate secure connectivity and guardrails with cloud/network teams: private connectivity patterns, egress controls, firewall/proxy needs.
Configure cloud integrations required for governed data access and service connectivity
(roles/permissions, endpoints, storage integrations).
Implement cost guardrails: cluster policies, auto-termination, scheduling, workload sizing
standards, and capacity planning.
Produce usage/cost insights and optimization recommendations; address waste drivers (idle compute, oversized clusters, inefficient jobs).
Automate administration and configuration using APIs/CLI/IaC (e.g., Terraform) to reduce manual drift and improve repeatability.
Maintain platform documentation: configuration baselines, security/governance
standards, onboarding guides, and troubleshooting references.
Design and implement backup and disaster recovery procedures for workspace
configurations, notebooks, Unity Catalog metadata, and job definitions; maintain
recovery runbooks and perform periodic DR testing aligned to RTO/RPO objectives.
Monitor and optimize platform performance, including SQL warehouse query tuning, cluster autoscaling configuration, Photon enablement, and Delta Lake optimization guidance (OPTIMIZE, VACUUM, Z-ordering strategies).
Administer Delta Live Tables (DLT) pipelines and coordinate with data engineering teams on pipeline health, data quality monitoring, failed job remediation, and pipeline configuration best practices.
Manage third-party integrations and ecosystem connectivity, including BI tool
integrations (e.g., Power BI), and external metadata catalog integrations.
Implement Databricks Asset Bundles (DABs) for standardized deployment patterns; automate workspace resource deployment (jobs, pipelines, dashboards) across SDLC environments using bundle-based CI/CD workflows.
Conduct capacity planning and scalability analysis, including forecasting concurrent user/workload growth, platform scaling strategies, and proactive resource allocation during peak usage periods.
Facilitate user onboarding and enablement, including new user/team onboarding procedures, training coordination, workspace access provisioning, and creation of selfservice documentation/guides

PLACE OF PERFORMANCE:
On-site at FRB locations, Washington, DC
CITIZEN STATUS: ship Required.
INTERVIEW: Selected candidates will participate in a phone screening. Those that pass the phone screening may be invited to an in-person interview. The use of video conference tools (e.g., MS Teams or WebEx) can be used in accordance with agency guidelines.

System One, and its subsidiaries including Joul, ALTA IT Services, and Mountain Ltd., are leaders in delivering outsourced services and workforce solutions across North America. We help clients get work done more efficiently and economically, without compromising quality. System One not only serves as a valued partner for our clients, but we offer eligible employees health and welfare benefits coverage options including medical, dental, vision, spending accounts, life insurance, voluntary plans, as well as participation in a 401(k) plan.

System One is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, age, national origin, disability, family care or medical leave status, genetic information, veteran status, marital status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.

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Ref: #851-Rockville-S1