Senior Engineer, VMware & Datacenter Engineer

Over the last 20 years, Ares’ success has been driven by our people and our culture. Today, our team is guided by our core values – Collaborative, Responsible, Entrepreneurial, Self-Aware, Trustworthy – and our purpose to be a catalyst for shared prosperity and a better future. Through our recruitment, career development and employee-focused programming, we are committed to fostering a welcoming and inclusive work environment where high-performance talent of diverse backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives can build careers within this exciting and growing industry.

Job Description

We are seeking a highly motivated Senior Engineer, VMware & Datacenter Engineer responsible for designing, implementing, automating, and supporting enterprise database platforms. This is a unique opportunity to join a growing Infrastructure Engineering team responsible for modernizing and transforming the firm's data platform and database services.

Candidates must have hands-on experience administering, automating, and supporting medium to large enterprise database environments. The ideal candidate will possess a strong background in database engineering, software development, automation, cloud services, and platform engineering. Experience with Infrastructure-as-Code, CI/CD, database lifecycle management, and cloud-hosted database services is highly desirable.

Reporting relationships

Reports to: Vice President, Infrastructure Engineering

Supervises: None

Primary functions and essential responsibilities

• Design, implement, administer, and support enterprise database platforms including Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL, Oracle, MySQL, and cloud-native database services.
• Design and maintain highly available database architectures including clustering, replication, failover, backup, recovery, and disaster recovery solutions.
• Develop and maintain automation solutions for database provisioning, configuration management, schema deployments, patching, backup validation, and health monitoring.
• Drive database platform modernization initiatives through scripting, Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC), and DevOps practices.
• Design and develop APIs, utilities, and self-service capabilities to automate database operations and improve service delivery.
• Implement and support cloud database services across Microsoft Azure and hybrid cloud environments.
• Perform database performance tuning, query optimization, index management, and capacity planning activities.
• Monitor database health, capacity, availability, and security using enterprise monitoring and reporting platforms.
• Support database migration initiatives including on-premises to cloud migrations, platform upgrades, and version modernization projects.
• Partner with software development teams to establish database standards, deployment pipelines, and data architecture best practices.
• Build and maintain CI/CD integration for database changes, schema deployments, and platform automation workflows.
• Troubleshoot complex database, application, cloud, infrastructure, and performance-related issues.
• Develop operational dashboards, reports, and metrics utilizing Power BI, Grafana, or similar platforms.
• Collaborate with Security Operations teams to implement database security controls, encryption, vulnerability remediation, and compliance requirements.
• Maintain technical documentation including architecture diagrams, operational procedures, standards, and disaster recovery runbooks.
• Participate in technology transformation, platform engineering, and automation initiatives across the enterprise.
• Provide escalation support for Service Desk, Infrastructure, Production Support, and Application teams.

Qualifications

Education: Bachelor's Degree in Information Technology, Computer Science, Engineering, or related field preferred.

• 8+ years of hands-on experience managing and supporting enterprise database platforms.
• Strong experience with Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL, Oracle, and/or MySQL database, Azure SQL Database, Azure Database for PostgreSQL technologies.
• Demonstrated experience designing highly available database environments and disaster recovery solutions.
• Proven experience developing automation solutions using Python, PowerShell, C#, REST APIs, Git or similar programming languages.
• Experience with DevOps, CI/CD, Terraform, Ansible, Jenkins and Infrastructure-as-Code practices preferred.
• Experience supporting cloud database solutions within Microsoft Azure and hybrid cloud environments.
• Strong understanding of database security, encryption, authentication, and compliance requirements.
• Experience troubleshooting performance issues across large-scale database environments.
• Experience with monitoring, observability, performance tuning, and operational reporting platforms

General Requirements:

• Relevant certifications such as Microsoft Certified: Azure Database Administrator Associate, Azure Administrator Associate, Oracle Certified Professional, PostgreSQL certification, ITIL Foundation, HashiCorp Terraform Associate, or Azure DevOps Engineer Expert are preferred.
• Strong analytical and troubleshooting skills, with the ability to diagnose and resolve complex technical issues.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, including technical documentation and executive-level reporting.
• Ability to work independently, manage multiple priorities, and deliver effectively in a fast-paced enterprise environment.
• Strong planning, organizational, stakeholder management, and project execution capabilities.
• Detail-oriented, customer-focused approach with an emphasis on automation, operational excellence, and continuous improvement.
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate across Infrastructure, Security, Application Development, Data Engineering, and Cloud teams.
• Ability to translate business and technical requirements into scalable, secure, and maintainable database solutions.
• Proven experience delivering database automation, platform modernization, and cloud transformation initiatives.

Reporting Relationships

Compensation

The anticipated base salary range for this position is listed below. Total compensation may also include a discretionary performance-based bonus. Note, the range takes into account a broad spectrum of qualifications, including, but not limited to, years of relevant work experience, education, and other relevant qualifications specific to the role.

$140,000 - $150,000

The firm also offers robust Benefits offerings. Ares U.S. Core Benefits include Comprehensive Medical/Rx, Dental and Vision plans; 401(k) program with company match; Flexible Savings Accounts (FSA); Healthcare Savings Accounts (HSA) with company contribution; Basic and Voluntary Life Insurance; Long-Term Disability (LTD) and Short-Term Disability (STD) insurance; Employee Assistance Program (EAP), and Commuter Benefits plan for parking and transit.

Ares offers a number of additional benefits including access to a world-class medical advisory team, a mental health app that includes coaching, therapy and psychiatry, a mindfulness and wellbeing app, financial wellness benefit that includes access to a financial advisor, new parent leave, reproductive and adoption assistance, emergency backup care, matching gift program, education sponsorship program, and much more.

There is no set deadline to apply for this job opportunity. Applications will be accepted on an ongoing basis until the search is no longer active.