Lead Database Consultant

Summary

Join Pythian as a Lead Database Consultant and provide comprehensive database and application infrastructure support to diverse clients. You will play a key role in presales, service delivery and optimization, and thought leadership. Responsibilities include database administration, backup and recovery, architecture development, problem management, and client communication. You will also mentor team members and contribute to Pythian's knowledge base. This remote position offers a competitive compensation package, flexible work arrangements, and professional development opportunities.

Requirements

• Knowledge and experience in installing, configuring and upgrading PostgreSQL databases & tools relevant in PostgreSQL Administration
• Experience administering PostgreSQL in virtualized and cloud environments, especially AWS, GCP or Azure
• Experience with scripting (bash/python) and software development (C++, Java, Go)
• Automation technologies such as Ansible, Terraform, Puppet, Chef, SALT experience
• Debugging skills and the ability to troubleshoot methodically, identifying and applying fixes for known errors, and when necessary, capacity to think outside of the box to resolve complex issues
• Very good documentation skills
• Experience with High Availability (HA) solutions for PostgreSQL, including Patroni, and repmgr, is required
• Experience with PostgreSQL backup tools, including Barman, pgBackRest, pg_basebackup, etc. is required
• Experience in database migrations from different database engines, including Oracle, MySQL, and MSSQL, to PostgreSQL
• Experience migrating between on-premises and cloud-based databases
• Experience analyzing and optimizing schema conversions, SQL compatibility issues, and performance tuning post-migration

Responsibilities

• Provide all aspects of client service generally associated with Database Consultants (DBC) such as the coordination, analysis, design, implementation, and administration of IT solutions, including database server configuration and maintenance
• Analyze client’s infrastructure and processes and recommend to clients, as appropriate, best practices for improvements to current operational processes and procedures to ensure that databases remain operational for maximum uptime and are recoverable
• Provide administration of backup procedures and disaster recovery plans, provide proactive monitoring to head off potential issues before they become incidents, respond to monitoring alerts, and carry out troubleshooting of operational problems
• Oversee backup, clustering, mirroring, replication, failover, and restoration and recovery of corrupted databases, develop and review action plans (such as maintenance, deployment, upgrades, etc.), and complete all relevant client documentation
• Develop a thorough understanding of all relevant client information including warnings, handoffs, briefing notes, etc
• Develop, implement and maintain complex data architectures such as normalized and/or dimensional data models and DDL generation; carry out transformation and migration of data through scripts or stored procedures
• Own Problem Management whereby incidents are assessed for any recurring patterns, designs technical procedures for regular requests/changes, develops and reviews action plans (such as maintenance, deployment, upgrades, etc) and associated documentation
• Provide technical oversight of Incident Management to the team members and assists team members in the design of technical procedures for complex scheduled changes to ensure that best practices are being used
• Assist the Team Manager in reviewing the team's work for quality and adherence to technical processes and standards, and in overseeing client capacity and change management
• Make, manage and meet client commitments in conjunction with fellow team members. Prepare client status and incident reports, review client reports on a recurring basis, respond to client requests and enquiries, and maintain alignment with a client’s operating procedures
• Take on technical client affinity as assigned by the Team Manager, aligns to client operating procedures as required, e.g., change control, follows hourly requirements of client allotments and alerts Team Manager to any pacing concerns
• Participate in and, at times, take on a leadership role in suggesting, recommending and possibly designing/implementing new monitoring checks, enhancements to DBC toolkits, and other process improvements such as Initial Reviews, Performance Reviews, Audits, etc., especially but not limited to those that increase the value of the service that Pythian brings to its clients
• As agreed upon with Sales and with the approval of one’s manager, participate in pre-sales activities such as proposal preparation and tech calls, as well as pre-sales visits to client sites on an occasional basis, as required
• Take on a leadership role in the help and mentoring of team members
• Participate in the preparation and presentation of employee training courses or wiki material for the enhancement of Pythian’s knowledge base, as agreed upon with one’s manager
• Be available for 24/7 escalations from the DBC team

Preferred Qualifications

• Previous remote working experience is a plus
• Understanding of current IT service standards such as ITIL
• Being a contributor to projects relevant to PostgreSQL, or other database or infrastructure software
• Hands-on experience in monitoring PostgreSQL databases using industry-standard tools such as Prometheus, Grafana, SolarWinds, pgAdmin, Zabbix, Nagios and Datadog
• Experience with cloud-native and managed database monitoring tools, including AWS CloudWatch, Google Cloud Operations (Stackdriver), and Azure Monitor. This includes configuring monitoring solutions, analyzing performance metrics, setting up alerts, and troubleshooting database issues in cloud environments
• Nice to have experience in setting up, configuring, and administering PostgreSQL on Kubernetes
• Additionally, experience with EnterpriseDB (EDB) solutions, such as EDB Postgres Distributed (PGD) for multi-master replication and EDB BigAnimal for managed PostgreSQL in the cloud, would be highly beneficial. Familiarity with automatic failover strategies, consensus-based leader election, and cloud-based database resilience is a plus
• Experience with Debezium and Striim is not mandatory but beneficial

Benefits

• Competitive total rewards package
• Flexibly work remotely from your home, there’s no daily travel requirement to an office!
• Hone your skills or learn new ones with our substantial training allowance; participate in professional development days, attend training, become certified, whatever you like!
• We give you all the equipment you need to work from home including a laptop with your choice of OS, and an annual budget to personalize your work environment!
• You will have an annual wellness budget to make yourself a priority (use it on gym memberships, massages, fitness and more)
• Additionally, you will receive a generous amount of paid vacation and sick days, as well as a day off to volunteer for your favorite charity