IT & Development ✦ Dedicated & full-time

Database
Administrator

Database performance, backups and integrity you can rely on — from $14/hr + GST.

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$14/hrFrom, + GST · full-time
70%Average saving vs a local hire
14 daysBrief → first day
Fully managedWe hire, you lead

What a Database Administrator does

Data is the business. A database administrator keeps it fast, backed up and intact — tuning performance, managing backups and safeguarding integrity.

Every StaffingSolutions.io database administrator is recruited, hired and managed by us — reference-checked for your tools, working your business hours, and backed by our zero-risk promise: no placement fee, money-back first week, and a free replacement if the fit isn't right.

What they handle

  • Performance tuning — queries and indexes.
  • Backups & recovery — tested.
  • Integrity & security — enforced.
  • Monitoring — health and capacity.
  • Migrations — planned and run.
  • Documentation — schemas and jobs.
The actual work

A week in the role

Databases do not fail politely. This role is the maintenance and performance discipline behind them: backup and restore that has actually been tested, index and statistics upkeep, tuning against real execution plans, and the access controls deciding who can read what. Usually SQL Server, PostgreSQL or MySQL.

The taskWhat that actually involves
Check overnight maintenance jobs

Reviews SQL Agent job history each morning — Ola Hallengren backup, DBCC CHECKDB integrity and IndexOptimize runs — and investigates any failure, long-running step, or job that silently skipped a database created since the maintenance configuration was last touched.

Test restores against the RPO

Restores production backups into a scratch instance on a set schedule, times the restore against the agreed recovery objectives, verifies the data landed intact, and records the result so recovery time is a measured figure rather than an estimate.

Tune the worst-performing queries

Pulls top waits and highest-cost statements from Query Store or pg_stat_statements, reads the actual execution plan for key lookups, scans and skewed row estimates, then proposes an index or rewrite with before-and-after timings for the developer to review.

Manage index and statistics maintenance

Adjusts fragmentation thresholds and sampling rates so rebuilds do not flood the transaction log on databases sitting in an availability group or log shipping pair, and removes duplicate or never-read indexes identified from index usage statistics.

Monitor availability groups and replication

Watches synchronisation state, redo queue and send queue across AlwaysOn replicas or the replication distributor, investigates latency spikes back to their source, and confirms failover targets sit on the same patch build before any planned failover.

Capacity and file growth planning

Tracks data and log file growth, tempdb contention and disk headroom per instance, pre-sizes files instead of letting autogrowth fragment them, and gives your infrastructure lead a storage forecast ahead of the budget cycle.

Database security and role review

Audits logins, orphaned users left behind after a restore, and membership of sysadmin or db_owner, replaces individual object grants with role membership, and reports standing elevated access to your data owner to approve or revoke.

Support schema deployments

Reviews developer migration scripts for blocking operations, missing indexes on new foreign keys and non-sargable defaults, dry-runs them against a copy of production, and executes the deployment in the approved window with the rollback script ready.

Patch database instances

Plans cumulative update and minor version upgrades, tests on non-production first, checks vendor support matrices for the applications sitting on top, and executes inside a maintenance window with a pre-patch backup and a verified rollback path.

Data extract and reporting support

Writes and schedules the extracts feeding Power BI datasets or downstream systems, tunes the underlying views, and keeps a record of every ad hoc query run against production so repeat requests become scheduled jobs instead of interruptions.

Deadlock and blocking investigation

Captures deadlock graphs and blocked process reports through extended events, traces the offending transactions back to the calling application and code path, and hands the developer the isolation level or index change that removes the contention.

Environment refreshes with masking

Refreshes development and test databases from production copies on request, applies the agreed masking or scrambling rules to personal, health and payment fields before handing the environment over, and documents exactly which datasets were obfuscated.

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Questions

Frequently asked

How much does a database administrator cost?
From $14/hr + GST for a full-time, dedicated team member — roughly $29K a year against $95K–$115K all-in for the local equivalent once you add super, leave, payroll tax, software and a desk. No placement fee, no setup fee, no recruitment retainer: you pay from the day they start, for hours worked, and interviewing candidates costs nothing. Specialist roles sit a little higher. Run your numbers →
How fast can they start?
Typically 14 days from your discovery call to day one. In the first week we source and screen against your brief; you get three matched profiles and interview whoever you like. Once you choose, we handle the offer, the contract, equipment and connectivity checks, and induct them on our side before they reach you. Specialist roles — developers, NDIS claims, anything needing niche software — can take a week longer, because we won't pad a shortlist just to hit a date.
What if the fit isn't right?
You're covered twice over. If it's clearly wrong by day five, your first week is refunded in full. After that, a free replacement any time — new shortlist, new interviews, no second fee, because there was never a first one. Before it gets that far, talk to us: our HR manager will work through it with you and the team member, since most problems turn out to be an unclear process rather than the wrong person, and a fortnight of coaching usually fixes it. Replacing someone is the last resort, not the first move.
Is there a minimum term?
Three months, then month to month. It's the same runway you'd give a new local hire to learn your systems, your clients and your standards — and the team members who get a fair run are the ones who stay for years. There are no exit penalties at any point, and if the issue is the person rather than the role, the first-week refund and free replacement cover that separately.
How do you handle confidentiality?
The same way you'd treat any remote team member. Every placement signs an NDA and a confidentiality clause before day one, and they work inside your systems — your email, your CRM, your file storage — so you control what they can see and can revoke access instantly. No client data is stored on our side.
What stays with you, and what goes to them?
They take the recurring, process-driven part of the database Administrator role — the work that happens the same way every week and eats your day. Judgement calls, client relationships, anything requiring your licence, sign-off or authority stay with you. The clients who get the most out of a database Administrator hand over a defined process and keep the decisions, rather than handing over the whole function and hoping. On the discovery call we'll map which tasks fall on which side of that line before you commit to anything.
How do I hand the work over without losing weeks to training?
Record yourself doing the task once and talk through it as you go — a fifteen-minute screen recording beats a written manual every time, and your database Administrator will turn it into a documented process you both work from. Expect the first fortnight to be shadowing and checking, then steadily less. If you have nothing documented, that's normal and it's not a blocker: we'll help you decide what to record first, and your account manager checks in through the whole ramp-up.