SQL Server Database Administrator

MS SQL Server Database Administrator (DBA) Department of Homeland Security (DHS) | Washington, DC (Hybrid) ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ABOUT THE ROLE We are seeking an experienced MS SQL Server Database Administrator (DBA) to support a critical engagement with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The ideal candidate will bring deep expertise in SQL Server administration, Azure cloud migrations, and database performance optimization within a federal environment. This is a hybrid role requiring 2 days onsite at the DHS Washington, DC office per week. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ KEY DETAILS Experience Required: 7+ Years Work Model: Hybrid — 2 Days Onsite in Washington, DC (Mandatory) Location: Local to DC, Maryland, or Virginia (DMV) only Citizenship: US Citizens ONLY Background Check: Mandatory (Federal) Security Clearance: Active Public Trust preferred ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ KEY RESPONSIBILITIES Install, configure, and maintain MS SQL Server 2019 or higher environments across DHS on-premises and cloud platforms. Administer and manage Azure SQL Managed Instances, ensuring high availability, performance, and security in compliance with DHS standards. Plan, execute, and validate backup and restore operations to meet DHS RPO/RTO requirements. Lead and execute database migrations from on-premises SQL Server environments to Azure (Azure SQL MI, Azure SQL DB) under DHS cloud modernization initiatives. Monitor and tune database performance — including query optimization, index management, and resource utilization. Manage SQL Server logins, roles, and permissions in alignment with DHS security policies and least-privilege principles. Collaborate with DHS application teams and stakeholders to support database design and best practices. Develop and maintain database documentation, runbooks, and SOPs per DHS guidelines. Respond to and resolve production database incidents per DHS incident response protocols. Participate in capacity planning, DR drills, and infrastructure upgrade projects within the DHS environment. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ REQUIRED SKILLS & QUALIFICATIONS Technical Skills: MS SQL Server 2019 or higher — advanced administration and configuration Azure SQL Managed Instance — provisioning, monitoring, and lifecycle management Backup & Restore — full, differential, and log backup strategies; point-in-time recovery SQL Query Skills — writing and troubleshooting T-SQL queries, stored procedures, and views Performance Tuning — execution plan analysis, index optimization, wait statistics, and query rewrites Azure Migration — end-to-end experience migrating SQL Server workloads from on-premises to Azure Logins, Roles & Permissions — SQL and Windows authentication, RBAC, and security hardening Experience Requirements: Minimum 7 years of hands-on MS SQL Server DBA experience in enterprise or federal environments. Proven track record of successful Azure cloud migration projects, preferably within a federal agency. Experience working in DHS or other federal/government environments is a strong plus. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ LOCATION & WORK MODEL Must be local to Washington DC, Maryland, or Virginia (DMV area). Hybrid role — 2 days per week onsite at the DHS Washington, DC office is mandatory. Remote work permitted for remaining days of the week. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ELIGIBILITY & COMPLIANCE Immigration Status: US Citizens ONLY. No sponsorship available. Required for DHS engagement. Background Check: Mandatory. A comprehensive federal background check will be conducted prior to onboarding per DHS requirements. Security Clearance: Candidates with an active DHS Public Trust clearance or higher are strongly encouraged to apply. Work Authorization: Must be authorized to work in the United States without restrictions. Required for access to DHS systems. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ This position supports a federal engagement with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). We are an equal opportunity employer committed to diversity and inclusion. Pay: $60.00 - $70.00 per hour Application Question(s): Are you a US Citizen Are you local to DC Metro Education: Bachelor's (Required) Experience: Database administration: 7 years (Required) Ability to Commute: Washington, DC 20001 (Required) Work Location: Hybrid remote in Washington, DC 20001