CockroachDB Database Administrator

Position: Senior CockroachDB Database Administrator (CockroachDB DBA)

Experience Required

8-10 Years (with strong experience in distributed databases and production database administration)

Job Summary

We are seeking an experienced CockroachDB Database Administrator (DBA) to design, deploy, administer, and optimize CockroachDB clusters in large-scale production environments. The ideal candidate should have hands-on experience managing distributed SQL databases, ensuring high availability, disaster recovery, performance optimization, monitoring, automation, and production support.

The candidate will be responsible for maintaining highly available, fault-tolerant, multi-region CockroachDB clusters while collaborating with infrastructure, cloud, and application teams to ensure database reliability, scalability, and operational excellence.

Key Responsibilities

CockroachDB Administration

• Design, deploy, configure, and manage CockroachDB clusters in production environments.
• Build and maintain multi-region distributed database clusters .
• Ensure high availability, fault tolerance, and data consistency across geographically distributed environments.
• Monitor cluster health, node status, replication, latency, and resource utilization.
• Perform database capacity planning and cluster scaling.

Performance Optimization

• Monitor and optimize SQL query performance.
• Analyze execution plans and identify bottlenecks.
• Optimize database schema design and indexing strategies.
• Resolve high-latency and throughput issues.
• Address hotspotting, leaseholder imbalance, and replication lag.

Troubleshooting & Incident Management

• Troubleshoot complex database and infrastructure issues, including:
  • Node failures
  • Network partitions
  • Replication issues
  • Leaseholder imbalance
  • Range imbalance
  • High CPU or memory utilization
  • Storage issues
  • Performance bottlenecks
• Participate in incident management and on-call support.

Backup & Disaster Recovery

• Design and implement disaster recovery strategies.
• Configure backup and restore processes.
• Implement Point-in-Time Recovery (PITR).
• Validate backup integrity through regular recovery testing.
• Manage failover and failback procedures.

Automation & Database Operations

• Automate provisioning, deployment, upgrades, scaling, and maintenance of CockroachDB clusters.
• Perform rolling upgrades with minimal or zero downtime.
• Develop automation scripts using Bash, Python, or similar scripting languages.
• Improve operational efficiency through Infrastructure as Code (IaC).

Monitoring & Observability

• Monitor database health using observability tools.
• Configure alerts and dashboards.
• Track:
  • Cluster health
  • Replication status
  • Latency
  • Resource utilization
  • Storage growth
  • Query performance
• Work with monitoring tools such as Grafana, Prometheus, and Cloud monitoring platforms.

Documentation

• Create operational runbooks.
• Develop Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs).
• Maintain architecture diagrams and recovery procedures.
• Document production support processes and troubleshooting guides.

Required Technical Skills

Database Technologies

• CockroachDB
• Distributed SQL Databases
• SQL Performance Tuning
• Database Replication
• High Availability (HA)
• Multi-region Database Deployment
• Database Clustering

Cloud & Infrastructure

• AWS / Azure / GCP
• Linux Administration
• Kubernetes (Preferred)
• Docker
• Networking Fundamentals

Monitoring & Observability

• Prometheus
• Grafana
• Cloud Monitoring Tools
• Performance Monitoring
• Alert Management

Automation

• Bash
• Python
• Shell Scripting
• Terraform (Preferred)
• Ansible (Preferred)

Backup & Recovery

• Backup & Restore
• Point-in-Time Recovery (PITR)
• Disaster Recovery
• Failover / Failback
• Business Continuity Planning

Operations

• Production Support
• Incident Management
• Root Cause Analysis (RCA)
• Capacity Planning
• Performance Tuning

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering, or a related field.
• 8-10 years of database administration experience.
• Strong hands-on experience with CockroachDB or other distributed SQL databases.
• Experience managing production database environments.
• Expertise in SQL performance tuning and database optimization.
• Experience with Linux system administration.
• Knowledge of cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP).
• Strong troubleshooting and analytical skills.
• Excellent communication and documentation abilities.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with Kubernetes-based database deployments.
• Knowledge of Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, Ansible).
• Experience with PostgreSQL or other distributed databases.
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines and DevOps practices.
• CockroachDB certification (if available).
• Experience in mission-critical production support environments.