Lead Database Administrator (Remote Work Options)

Wilbur Smith Associates Inc.International - Chicago, IL

Full-time

Remote - Chicago, IL

Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services

About the position

CDM Smith is seeking a Lead Database Administrator to join our global IT team. This individual will support mission-critical database systems, integrations, applications, and related infrastructure. The role involves supporting production systems and managing incidents by researching, coordinating resources, communicating with Information Technology (IT) and business staff, and resolving root causes. The Lead Database Administrator will collaborate with other IT teams such as business partners, network, security, cloud infrastructure, application teams, and external vendors and consultants to design, integrate, and implement applications and processes. A key responsibility of this position is to strictly enforce data integrity, data security, and data privacy by reviewing security announcements, performing periodic audit controls, and applying patches. The administrator will research, install, and configure database systems and related services, including hyper care. They will maintain the organization's services across multiple platforms and computing environments, both on-premises and in the cloud, while monitoring system health and performance to ensure high levels of performance and 24/7 availability. The Lead Database Administrator will provide technical expertise from service requests to large multi-year projects for application upgrades, migrations, and patch management. They will independently analyze, solve, and remediate complex issues, providing permanent problem resolution and root cause reports. Additionally, they will implement backups, restore databases and applications, and recommend recovery models. The role also includes developing, modifying, and enhancing scripts for backups, obfuscation, alerts, process improvements, routine and ad hoc reporting, and automation wherever possible. The administrator will create and maintain operations and deployment documentation and provide knowledge transfer to team members. They will also plan, create, participate in reviews, and execute production deployments, while reviewing current processes to ensure they are functioning properly and offering solutions for improving existing workflows.

Responsibilities

• Support production systems and manage incidents by researching, coordinating resources, and resolving root causes.
• Collaborate with IT teams, business partners, and external vendors to design, integrate, and implement applications and processes.
• Enforce data integrity, security, and privacy by reviewing security announcements and applying patches.
• Research, install, and configure database systems and related services, including hyper care.
• Maintain services across multiple platforms and computing environments, both on-premises and in the cloud.
• Monitor system health and performance to ensure high levels of performance and 24/7 availability.
• Provide technical expertise for application upgrades, migrations, and patch management.
• Analyze, solve, and remediate complex issues, providing permanent problem resolution and root cause reports.
• Implement backups, restore databases and applications, and recommend recovery models.
• Develop, modify, and enhance scripts for backups, alerts, process improvements, and reporting.
• Create and maintain operations and deployment documentation and provide knowledge transfer to team members.
• Plan, create, participate in reviews, and execute production deployments.
• Review current processes to ensure they are functioning properly and offer solutions for improvement.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent additional directly related experience.
• 8 years of related experience.

Nice-to-haves

• Excellent communication and analytical skills.
• Ability to lead small teams and manage individual and team time and tasks to deadlines.
• Excellent knowledge of managing database systems and related technical stack.