Senior Database Manager

Job Description

Job Brief:

The Group is seeking an experienced Senior Database Manager to lead its Database Management department. The successful candidate will ensure the delivery of secure, resilient, high-performing, and well-governed database services across the Group and its subsidiaries. The role holds accountability for database strategy, architecture, operations, team management, continuity, security, capacity, lifecycle management, vendor management, and continuous improvement across Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL, and MongoDB environments.

Responsibilities:

Strategy, Governance and Architecture

• Own the database management operating model, including prioritization, work allocation, technical standards, procedures, documentation, and service quality objectives.
• Lead and govern enterprise database platforms, primarily Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server, while ensuring adequate operational capability for PostgreSQL and MongoDB.
• Establish database engineering standards, naming conventions, configuration baselines, lifecycle plans, upgrade and patching standards, backup policies, and monitoring requirements.
• Review and approve database designs for new applications, upgrades, integrations, migrations, and major changes, with technical validation of all recommendations prior to production.
• Monitor developments in emerging database technologies, including Oracle cloud and hybrid database services, to inform lifecycle plans, architecture decisions, and the technology roadmap.

Oracle Engineered Systems and Storage

• Govern the administration and lifecycle of Oracle Engineered Systems, including Exadata Database Machine and Oracle Database Appliance (ODA), and oversee the management and monitoring of Compute Nodes, Storage Cells, and InfiniBand (IB) and RoCE switches within the Exadata rack environment.
• Oversee ASM storage management, including the creation and configuration of Disk Groups with appropriate redundancy levels (External, Normal, and High), and Exadata storage operations including Griddisk and Celldisk resizing.
• Govern hardware fault diagnosis procedures for Exadata systems, including the use of ILOM Snapshot and sundiag tools, and ensure engineers follow approved diagnostic and escalation procedures.

Availability, Performance and Monitoring

• Ensure databases supporting critical systems, trading operations, back-office systems, the data warehouse, and subsidiary services meet approved availability, integrity, performance, and recoverability requirements.
• Govern high availability, replication, clustering, standby, switchover, failover, and disaster recovery solutions for all approved database technologies.
• Ensure backup, restore, and point-in-time recovery are tested regularly with evidence retained, and escalate any gaps against approved RTO/RPO targets.
• Manage capacity and performance governance, including growth forecasting, resource planning, storage trends, licensing impacts, workload risks, and performance baselines.
• Approve monitoring and alerting coverage for all production and critical databases using Oracle Enterprise Manager (OEM), OpManager, Event Log Analyzer, and other approved tools, and oversee OEM installation, upgrades, and database discovery.
• Ensure every new database, instance, cluster, or supporting service is registered in asset, monitoring, backup, security, and continuity inventories before handover to production.

Security and Change Management

• Govern database security controls, including least privilege, privileged access management, account lifecycle, auditing, encryption where applicable, secure connectivity, hardening, and periodic access reviews, and ensure appropriate use of Oracle security products (such as Transparent Data Encryption, Virtual Private Database, and Oracle Audit Vault) where deployed.
• Ensure production DDL, DML, schema, privilege, and configuration changes follow approved request, testing, approval, and change management procedures with rollback plans and execution evidence, including patching with OPatch and OPatchAuto for PSU, CPU, one-off, and merged patches.

Incident, Problem and Service Management

• Lead database incident and problem management and root cause analysis, ensuring findings are technically validated and that the problem, workaround, root cause, permanent fix, and lessons learned are documented in the approved ticketing system.
• Coordinate with development, infrastructure, networks, cybersecurity, application support, business continuity, and service owners on dependencies, incidents, changes, and resilience requirements.
• Support and coordinate database-layer requirements for critical applications within the Group's technology environment, including financial systems, scheduling platforms, portal services, and end-of-day integration links (such as end-of-trading-day processes), and manage application users and roles in line with approved standards.

Vendor, Asset and Performance Management

• Manage vendors, support contracts, renewals, licenses, subscriptions, support cases, and technical escalations, and track end-of-support and end-of-life risks.
• Maintain accurate database asset inventories, architecture diagrams, dependency maps, service ownership, versions, support status, backup schedules, recovery runbooks, and operating procedures.
• Define departmental KPIs and periodic reporting on availability, backup success, restore testing, incidents, performance, capacity, patching, vulnerabilities, change quality, and continuity readiness.
• Support internal and external audits and ensure database findings are remediated within approved timeframes.
• Ensure database operations comply with Group policies, ISO 22301, ISO/IEC 27001, and relevant regulatory or contractual requirements.

Team Leadership

• Develop team capabilities through training, mentoring, knowledge sharing, and backup resource development, reducing single-person dependency on critical technologies or procedures.

Responsible Use of AI

• Use approved AI tools to support database monitoring, alert and log correlation, incident triage, trend analysis, capacity forecasting, SQL and execution plan review, and detection of anomalies or performance bottlenecks, with all outputs subject to technical validation by the database team.
• Use approved AI tools to accelerate the preparation of architecture diagrams, dependency maps, operational documentation, incident summaries, KPI reports, and knowledge base content based on verified information.
• Treat AI strictly as a supporting tool: all generated SQL, commands, scripts, tuning recommendations, configuration changes, and architecture proposals must be reviewed, tested, and approved before use. Sending production data, passwords, secrets, database copies, sensitive schemas, or confidential logs to external AI platforms is prohibited, as is autonomous execution in production without explicit authorization under the approved agent governance framework.

Business Continuity and Operational Resilience

• Own the continuity and operational resilience plan for databases and critical services.
• Ensure switchover, failover, restore, and recovery activities are planned, executed, documented, and tested regularly, with resulting corrective actions reviewed.
• Validate RTO/RPO dependencies with application and service owners and confirm the architecture can meet approved recovery objectives.
• Identify and remediate or escalate single points of failure, unsupported components, redundancy weaknesses, capacity bottlenecks, and fragile dependencies.
• Ensure DR and standby environments remain synchronized following production changes, upgrades, and migrations, including monitoring, backup, security, and documentation.
• Participate in enterprise recovery tests, switchover and failback exercises, and provide clear management reporting on risks and required decisions.
• Use approved AI tools to analyze database architecture, replication, and dependencies, model resilience and recovery scenarios, and support remediation options and recovery priorities that are technically validated against approved RTO/RPO targets.

Skills Description

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Information Technology, Information Systems, or a related field (mandatory).
• 10+ years of total experience in information technology.
• 8+ years of experience in database administration and engineering within enterprise or business-critical environments.
• 5+ years of experience in team leadership or technical leadership.
• Strong hands-on experience with Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server, with appropriate administrative and operational knowledge of PostgreSQL and MongoDB.
• Advanced Oracle Database professional certification, such as OCP or equivalent (mandatory).
• Oracle Exadata Administration certification (preferred).
• Current Microsoft database administration certification or equivalent (preferred).
• ITIL Foundation or higher (preferred).
• PostgreSQL and/or MongoDB training or certification (an advantage).
• Certifications in business continuity, information security, cloud computing, Linux, or systems engineering are an advantage where aligned with the Group's environment.