9093 - SQL Data

Senior DBA/DBE Consultant
SQL Server Performance & Scalability | Job Description
Position Details

• Title: Senior DBA/DBE Consultant


• Client: A leading U.S. financial technology company and regulated bank


• Department: Technology – Database Engineering & Operations


• Location: Remote / Hybrid. Must be able to travel for 1–2 weeks to either Miami or Northern California


• Engagement Type: (Consultant / Contract-to-Hire)

About the Client

• Financial technology company and bank holding company, operating under federal banking regulation


• Runs high-volume payments, banking, and money-processing platforms


• Operates mission-critical transactional systems at scale


• Treats reliability, data integrity, and security as non-negotiable

Position Summary

• Serve as the technical authority on SQL Server internals, performance engineering, and scalability


• Hands-on, high-impact role supporting the client's highest-volume financial transaction databases


• Diagnose and fix hot spots, latch/lock contention, blocking, plan regressions, and I/O bottlenecks


• Design durable fixes: partitioning, indexing standards, query redesign, and HA/DR architecture


• Work with application engineering, SRE, architecture, and security teams


• Mentor the client's DBA team and serve as the escalation point


• Own outcomes end to end, from diagnosis to measurable improvements in latency, stability, and scalability, with clear accountability and follow-through

Key Responsibilities

• Apply deep knowledge of SQL Server internals (storage engine, query optimizer, SQLOS, memory, transaction log, tempdb) to diagnose complex production issues


• Perform root-cause analysis using wait statistics, DMVs, Extended Events, Query Store, and PerfMon counters


• Design and optimize stored procedures; read existing code and give clear feedback to improve its performance


• Analyze execution plans at the operator level: cardinality estimation, memory grants, spills, parallelism, and row goals


• Advise on engine configuration: MAXDOP, cost threshold for parallelism, compatibility levels, database-scoped configurations, and trace flags


• Own end-to-end performance tuning for latency-sensitive OLTP workloads (authorization, ledger, payments, account services)


• Resolve parameter sniffing, plan regressions, implicit conversions, and non-SARGable predicates


• Use Query Store and Intelligent Query Processing features for baselining, plan forcing, and regression control


• Govern indexing and statistics strategy: clustered key design, covering and filtered indexes, columnstore, and maintenance


• Troubleshoot and resolve hot spots, including last-page insert contention (PAGELATCH_EX), tempdb contention, and spinlock contention


• Resolve blocking chains, deadlocks, lock escalation, and isolation-level issues, recommending RCSI or snapshot isolation where appropriate


• Write, refactor, and review complex high-performance T-SQL, including stored procedures, set-based logic, window functions, and dynamic SQL that is safe from SQL injection


• Review developer and ORM-generated (e.g., Entity Framework) SQL, and publish coding standards and anti-pattern guidance


• Design batched large-scale data changes (purges, backfills, archival) that can run safely online


• Design and operate table and index partitioning for multi-billion-row financial tables, including sliding-window patterns (SWITCH, SPLIT, MERGE)


• Support data lifecycle, archival, compression, and retention in line with regulatory requirements


• Design, implement, and troubleshoot Always On Availability Groups (sync/async commit, readable secondaries, distributed AGs, WSFC quorum)


• Diagnose AG redo lag, log send queue growth, HADR_SYNC_COMMIT waits, and failover issues


• Design, operate, and troubleshoot transactional and peer-to-peer replication, including latency and data consistency issues


• Validate HA/DR against RTO/RPO targets, and lead DR tests and failover drills with audit-ready documentation


• Enforce least-privilege access and data protection controls (TDE, Always Encrypted, TLS, SQL Server Audit)


• Support audit readiness for PCI-DSS, SOX, GLBA, and FFIEC-aligned controls, and follow CAB change management


• Design proactive monitoring and alerting for performance, blocking, AG health, replication, jobs, and capacity


• Build idempotent automation with PowerShell (dbatools), T-SQL, and CI/CD pipelines


• Identify opportunities for AI-assisted operations, anomaly detection, and self-healing remediation


• Lead or support P1/P2 incidents, and deliver RCA reports with corrective and preventive actions


• Establish performance baselines, SLOs, and capacity models, and quantify every change with before/after metrics


• Mentor DBAs and developers, and present findings to leadership in terms of risk, cost, and business impact

Required Qualifications

• 10+ years of hands-on SQL Server DBA or database engineering experience


• 5+ years in a senior or principal-level, performance-focused role


• Expert knowledge of SQL Server 2016–2022 internals


• Proven tuning of large, high-concurrency OLTP systems (thousands of TPS, multi-TB databases)


• Experience in financial services, payments, or banking


• Demonstrated resolution of hot spot, latch, lock, and tempdb contention in production


• Advanced T-SQL development and execution plan analysis


• Hands-on design and operation of partitioning at scale


• Deep production experience with Always On AGs and SQL Server Replication


• Strong proficiency with Query Store, Extended Events, DMVs, and wait-stats methodology


• Working knowledge of Windows Server, WSFC, SAN/NVMe storage, and virtualization


• PowerShell scripting and automation (dbatools preferred)


• Experience working under PCI-DSS, SOX, or similar audit controls


• Strong written communication, including RCA reports and executive summaries

Preferred Qualifications

• Cloud performance and cost optimization experience


• In-Memory OLTP and columnstore for hybrid workloads


• SQL Server on Linux and containers


• Database DevOps: SSDT, Flyway, or Liquibase, plus CI/CD and automated testing


• Additional platforms such as PostgreSQL, Cosmos DB, or Snowflake


• Certifications such as DP-300 (Azure Database Administrator Associate) or MCSE/MCM Data Platform


• Community contributions (blogs, speaking, open-source tools)


• Analytical rigor: Diagnoses with evidence (waits, plans, XE), not guesswork


• Production ownership: Stays calm under P1 pressure; contains the impact first, then fixes it permanently


• Engineering judgment: Weighs reliability, performance, cost, and complexity trade-offs


• Communication: Explains technical findings in terms of business impact


• Knowledge transfer: Builds team capability and documents to audit-ready standards