PostgreSQL DBA SME

PostgreSQL DBA SME

Location: Remote. May require travel to Washington DC/ 25% travel

The PostgreSQL Database Subject Matter Expert (SME) provides deep technical leadership across database architecture, performance engineering, optimization, security, and enterprise scale operations. This role supports complex application ecosystems, multi cloud deployments, modernization initiatives, and mission critical workloads requiring high availability, scalability, and compliance.

Key Responsibilities

Architecture & Design

• Design, implement, and optimize PostgreSQL database architectures for OLTP, OLAP, and hybrid workloads.

• Develop logical and physical data models, indexing strategies, partitioning schemes, and storage optimization plans.

• Lead database modernization, migration, and consolidation initiatives (onprem to cloud, crossversion upgrades, Oracle/MySQL to PostgreSQL conversions).

Performance Engineering

• Conduct deepdive performance tuning across queries, indexes, schemas, and system parameters.

• Analyze execution plans, optimize slow-running SQL, and resolve bottlenecks at the database, OS, and network layers.

• Implement monitoring, alerting, and capacity planning using tools such as pg_stat_statements, pgBadger, Prometheus, Grafana, or equivalent.

Operations & Administration

• Manage installation, configuration, patching, and version upgrades of PostgreSQL clusters.

• Implement and maintain high availability (HA) and disaster recovery (DR) solutions using replication, failover, and backup strategies (e.g., streaming replication, Patroni, pgBackRest).

• Ensure database reliability, security hardening, encryption, auditing, and compliance with organizational and regulatory standards.

Cloud & Automation

• Architect and support PostgreSQL deployments on AWS RDS/Aurora, Azure PostgreSQL, or Google Cloud Platform Cloud SQL.

• Automate provisioning, scaling, and maintenance using Terraform, Ansible, or CI/CD pipelines.

• Support containerized and Kubernetes-based PostgreSQL environments (e.g., CrunchyData, CloudNativePG).

CrossFunctional Leadership

• Serve as the primary PostgreSQL expert for engineering, DevOps, analytics, and application development teams.

• Provide guidance on SQL best practices, schema design, and data access patterns.

• Troubleshoot complex production issues and lead root cause analysis (RCA) efforts.

Required Skills & Experience

• 8 to 15+ years of hands-on experience with PostgreSQL database engineering and administration.

• Expert-level knowledge of SQL, PL/pgSQL, indexing, partitioning, replication, and performance tuning.

• Strong understanding of Linux internals, storage systems, networking, and system performance.

• Experience with cloud-native PostgreSQL services and automation frameworks.

• Familiarity with ETL/ELT pipelines, data integration tools, and analytics workloads.

• Proven ability to support large-scale, high-availability, mission-critical environments.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience migrating from Oracle, SQL Server, or MySQL to PostgreSQL.

• Knowledge of NoSQL or complementary data platforms (Redis, MongoDB, Elasticsearch).

• Certifications in cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud Platform).

• Experience supporting federal, healthcare, or regulated environments.