Advanced Database Administrator

Job Description

Company: Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA)
Location: 2 Broadway, New York, NY 10004
Workplace Type: Hybrid (currently 2 days per week)
Employment Type: Permanent
Pay / Compensation: $140,828 – $166,223

About the Role

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority is North America’s largest transportation network, serving a population of 15.3 million people across a 5,000-square-mile travel area surrounding New York City, Long Island, southeastern New York State, and Connecticut. The MTA network comprises the nation’s largest bus fleet and more subway and commuter rail cars than all other U.S. transit systems combined. MTA strives to provide a safe and reliable commute, excellent customer service, and rewarding opportunities.

The Advanced Database Administrator serves as a senior technical expert responsible for the design, implementation, optimization, and ongoing management of the organization’s database environments. This role ensures data integrity, security, availability, and performance across complex, multi-platform, on-premises, and cloud database systems. The Advanced DBA supports database architecture and capacity planning, implements performance tuning, and maintains high-availability and disaster recovery solutions. Acting as a technical leader within the team, this role provides guidance to junior staff, collaborates across IT domains, and contributes to best practices, standards, and operational improvements to ensure reliable, secure, and high-performing database services.

What You’ll Do / Key Responsibilities

• Contributes to database architecture and design within assigned environments, supporting scalable, secure, and high-performing database platforms for critical business applications.
• Serves as a technical subject matter expert (SME) on multiple database technologies, providing guidance on integration, optimization, and modernization projects.
• Supports database technology roadmaps and platform improvements, ensuring alignment with enterprise standards and business requirements.
• Resolves complex database performance, scalability, and resilience issues, coordinating troubleshooting and implementing effective remediation solutions.
• Evaluates emerging database technologies to support future platform enhancements, providing recommendations to senior leadership or project teams.
• Collaborates with business and technical stakeholders to identify opportunities for leveraging data to improve business processes and system performance.
• Designs, engineers, and documents database solutions and technical standards, ensuring alignment with business objectives and architectural guidelines.
• Implements and maintains disaster recovery and high-availability solutions for supported database platforms to minimize service disruption.
• Develops and executes database backup strategies, including scheduling, validation testing, and documentation, meeting recovery objectives and compliance requirements.
• Plans and coordinates database installations, upgrades, and maintenance activities, ensuring reliable operations and consistent performance.
• Provides technical guidance and mentoring to junior or mid-level DBAs, promoting best practices and efficient workflows.
• Ensures data consistency, integrity, and availability through robust database design, configuration, and lifecycle management practices.
• Monitors database performance using diagnostic tools and metrics, identifying trends and proactively addressing potential issues.
• Performs advanced SQL optimization, including query tuning, indexing strategies, and configuration adjustments across platforms.
• Implements automation and scripting solutions to proactively identify and remediate performance bottlenecks and reduce manual administrative effort.
• Conducts system health checks and recommends operational or configuration improvements to optimize resource utilization.
• Implements and maintains backup and recovery solutions aligned with defined RTO and RPO objectives.
• Supports high-availability and resiliency architectures, including replication, clustering, mirroring, and failover setups.
• Participates in disaster recovery testing exercises, validating procedures, documenting results, and supporting continuous improvement efforts.
• Supports data protection and business continuity initiatives through redundancy and fault-tolerance implementations.
• Implements database security policies, access controls, encryption, and authentication procedures in accordance with standards.
• Participates in security audits and vulnerability assessments, assisting with remediation of identified risks.
• Maintains confidentiality, integrity, and availability (CIA) of sensitive data assets within assigned environments.
• Configures and maintains monitoring frameworks to track database performance, availability, and usage trends.
• Responds to incidents affecting database performance, connectivity, or data integrity, ensuring timely resolution.
• Performs root cause analysis for recurring or systemic database issues and implements corrective actions.
• Automates database operations using scripting and orchestration tools (e.g., Shell, Python, Ansible) to improve efficiency and reliability.
• Supports integration with enterprise identity platforms, such as Active Directory, to ensure secure and centralized authentication.
• Executes cross-platform data transport, including transportable tablespaces, endian conversion, and platform migration support.
• Performs other duties as assigned: complies with all policies and standards; may be required to work hours outside regular work hours; observes the work performed by contractors; reviews and approves contractor invoices against contractual standards; addresses performance issues with contractors; and escalates issues when needed.

Requirements & Qualifications

• Education & Experience: Bachelor’s Degree in Arts/Sciences (BA/BS). An additional 4 years of combined education and experience may be considered in lieu of a degree. Minimum 8 years of relevant experience.
• Certifications: Requires at least one certification in the current platform/domain/technical skill (e.g., AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner, AWS Certified Solution Architect – Associate & Professional, Azure Administrator Associate, Google Certified Professional Cloud Architect, Microsoft Certified: Azure Administrator Associate, Oracle Database Administrator certification like OCP or OCE).
• Technical Skills:
  • Expertise installing, configuring, and administering Oracle Database platforms (11g, 12c, 19c) in complex enterprise environments.
  • Proficient in managing multiple relational database platforms, including Oracle, SQL Server, MySQL, and PostgreSQL, with a focus on cross-platform integration and interoperability.
  • Skilled in database provisioning, cloning, and migration using DBCA, SQL scripting, and Oracle Data Pump to support multi-environment deployments.
  • Advanced experience designing and implementing backup, recovery, and cloning strategies using RMAN, Flashback technologies, and Recovery Catalogs to meet RTO/RPO objectives.
  • Expert in database security and compliance, including user and role management, privilege assignment, auditing, and implementing regulatory controls.
  • Advanced SQL performance tuning and query optimization using AWR, ASH, ADDM, and SQL Monitor reports to ensure high performance across multiple environments.
  • Strong expertise in query execution plan analysis using EXPLAIN PLAN, DBMS_XPLAN, SQL Trace, and TKPROF, including cross-instance performance troubleshooting.
  • Database and instance performance tuning expertise, including SGA, PGA, I/O optimization, and parallel execution, with experience in proactive monitoring and predictive tuning.
  • Hands-on experience configuring, patching, and troubleshooting Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) environments for high availability and scalability.
  • Implementation and management of Oracle Data Guard and Active Data Guard solutions, including monitoring, switchover, failover, and disaster recovery planning.
  • Configuration and administration of Oracle GoldenGate replication, including conflict detection, resolution, and cross-environment synchronization.
  • Design, implementation, and maintenance of Automatic Storage Management (ASM) environments to optimize storage performance and reliability.
  • Proficient in provisioning and managing Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) database services, including Autonomous Database, Exadata Cloud Service, and OCI DB Systems, with operational integration across hybrid environments.
  • Experience leveraging automation and scripting (e.g., Shell, Python, Ansible) to streamline database management, performance monitoring, and maintenance processes.
  • Participates in capacity planning, performance benchmarking, and advanced diagnostic activities to ensure sustained database availability and efficiency.
• Behavioral Skills: Advanced relationship building, interpersonal, and communication skills; adept in risk analysis and mitigation, critical thinking, problem-solving, decision-making, active listening, project prioritization, and working well under pressure.

Competencies

• Cultivates Innovation (Adept): Creating new and better ways for the organization to be successful.
• Customer Focus (Adept): Building strong customer relationships and delivering customer-centric solutions.
• Communicates Effectively (Expert): Developing and delivering multi-mode communications that convey a clear understanding of the unique needs of different audiences.
• Tech Savvy (Advanced): Anticipating and adopting innovations in business-building digital and technology applications.
• Technical Skills (Advanced): Specialized knowledge and expertise on tools, programs, domains, platforms, and products used for specific tasks.
• Values Diversity (Advanced): Recognizing the value that different perspectives and cultures bring to an organization.

Other Information: Pursuant to the New York State Public Officers Law & the MTA Code of Ethics, all employees who hold a policymaking position must file an Annual Statement of Financial Disclosure (FDS) with the NYS Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government (the “Commission”).

Equal Employment Opportunity: MTA and its subsidiary and affiliated agencies are Equal Opportunity Employers, including with respect to veteran status and individuals with disabilities. The MTA encourages qualified applicants from diverse backgrounds, experiences, and abilities, including military service members, to apply.