Senior Database Administrator

About PDQ

PDQ, founded in Salt Lake City, UT, USA, makes device management simple, secure, and Pretty Damn Quick. IT teams use our products to reduce complexity, improve efficiency, and enhance control in their unique environments. We are backed by TA Associates and Berkshire Partners, top-tier global private equity firms.

Our Core Values:

• Honesty: You communicate transparently and build trust through your actions.
• Ownership: You take responsibility for outcomes and follow through on commitments.
• Collaboration: You value diverse perspectives and work effectively across teams.
• Improvement: You actively seek opportunities to learn, grow, and innovate.

Location

• Remote, US: This position is open to candidates residing in any of PDQ’s open states: AR, AZ, CO, CT, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KY, MD, MI, MN, MO, NC, NH, OK, OR, TN, TX, UT, VA, WA, WI.

About the role:

As a Senior Database Administrator at PDQ, you will be responsible for building, managing, and optimizing PDQ databases. This role is crucial in establishing best practices, ensuring data availability and reliability, and driving performance at scale. You will play a key role in safeguarding data integrity, supporting mission-critical business applications, and enabling data-driven decision-making.

How you might spend your day:

• Designing and implementing database architecture solutions that scale with our growing SaaS platform
• Leading database performance tuning, optimization, and troubleshooting initiatives
• Investigating and resolving complex production database performance and availability issues, including identifying root causes, mitigating incidents, and driving long-term improvements
• Collaborating with software development teams to optimize database queries and schema designs
• Collaborating with DevOps teams to automate routine database administration tasks and maintenance procedures
• Extending and maintaining database observability tools to monitor performance and capacity, and analyze historical data to identify trends and proactively address issues
• Implementing and maintaining database security measures and access controls
• Mentoring and teaching engineering teams in writing optimized and performant database queries

We're looking for people who have:

• 6+ years of experience managing databases at scale
• Experience working in SaaS environment with high-availability requirements
• Strong grasp of OLTP databases, specifically PostgreSQL in high-volume environments
• Experience with database replication, partitioning, sharding and clustering
• Proficiency in SQL performance tuning, query optimization and schema design
• Experience with automation tools and scripting languages (Bash, Python, or similar)
• Knowledge of backup and recovery tools and methodologies

Extra Credit:

• Experience with cloud platforms (specifically GCP and Cloud SQL)
• Knowledge of containerization and orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes)
• Experience with monitoring tools (Prometheus, Grafana, GCP SQL Query Insights)
• Certifications in PostgreSQL or related technologies
• Experience troubleshooting PostgreSQL WAL and VACUUM behavior
• Experience with OLAP (columnar) databases (ClickHouse)

Who you are:

• Ownership: You take responsibility for projects, drive results, and deliver on commitments
• Honesty: You demonstrate integrity, transparency, and ethical behavior in all interactions
• Collaboration: You work effectively with cross-functional teams and foster a culture of teamwork
• Improvement: You continuously seek opportunities for growth, innovation, and personal development
• Detail-oriented, organized and a good team player 
• Independent, highly motivated, and solution-driven mentality to all activities 
• Excellent interpersonal skillset, particularly with the ability to build authentic business relationships 
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