Senior Database Engineer

Who we are

Henry Schein One provides advanced, market-leading software solutions that help dental teams manage their practice effectively so that they can focus on delivering the best possible care to their patients.

What you'll be doing

• Server and Cluster Operations
  
  • Manage RDS parameter groups, option groups, and cluster settings.
    
  • Monitor system metrics (CPU, memory, disk, network, IOPS, replication lag).
    
  • Configure and validate backups, snapshots, PITR, and cross-region disaster recovery.
    
  • Oversee patching and minor version upgrades, including rollback plans.
    
  • Maintain replication slots, subscriptions, and logical/physical replication health.
    
  • Control instance class sizing and Aurora Serverless v2 scaling policies.
    
• Query Performance and Optimization
  
  • Collect and analyze pg_stat_statements and Performance Insights.
    
  • Monitor query latency, CPU waits, lock contention, and replication slot usage.
    
  • Identify slow queries, missing indexes, and inefficient joins.
    
  • Tune parameters (work_mem, shared_buffers, effective_cache_size, autovacuum settings).
    
  • Recommend and apply indexing strategies (B-tree, GIN, BRIN).
    
  • Validate query plans using EXPLAIN/EXPLAIN ANALYZE.
    
• Maintenance
  
  • Schedule and monitor autovacuum and analyze processes.
    
  • Rebuild or reindex bloated indexes.
    
  • Detect table/index bloat with pgstattuple or pg_class stats.
    
  • Update statistics proactively to prevent plan regressions.
    
  • Clean up orphaned replication slots, temp tables, and unused schemas.
    
• Application and Proxying Layers
  
  • Operate RDS Proxy or Heimdall/RDS Proxy alternatives for connection pooling.
    
  • Validate application prepared statements usage and prevent plan cache flooding.
    
  • Manage query routing for read replicas (Aurora reader endpoints).
    
  • Monitor transaction pool health and idle connection behavior.
    
• Performance Tuning
  
  • Optimize schema design for multi-tenant workloads (partitioning, indexing, foreign keys).
    
  • Minimize impact of bulk loads (disable triggers/constraints, drop/rebuild indexes).
    
  • Monitor Aurora storage I/O metrics (DataFileRead, commit latency).
    
  • Benchmark workload changes before and after application releases.
    
• Observability
  
  • Integrate CloudWatch metrics, alarms, and enhanced monitoring.
    
  • Use Performance Insights and pg_stat_activity for active monitoring.
    
  • Track query execution trends and resource consumption.
    

• Our industry leading cloud practice management system, Dentrix Ascend - https://www.dentrixascend.com/
  

• Migration to our modern technology stack
  

• 5+ years hands-on experience in PostgreSQL performance tuning and query plan analysis
  
• 5+ years hands-on experience in RDS/Aurora administration and scaling in AWS.
  
• Index and statistics management (vacuum, analyze, reindex, parameter group settings, etc.)
  
• Connection pooling, proxying queries, and result caching (e.g. Heimdall, RDS Proxy)
  
• Backup, recovery, and replication (CDC) strategies in managed environments
  
• SQL development, optimization, and schema design for high-volume workloads
  
• Experience with both OLTP and OLAP architectures
  
• Hands-on experience with observability and monitoring tools:
  
  • PostgreSQL: pg_stat_statements, pg_stat_activity, EXPLAIN ANALYZE
    
  • AWS CloudWatch for Aurora PostgreSQL monitoring

• You take ownership and get things done, driving projects with a bias for action and a commitment to delivering value incrementally.
  
• You learn rapidly from setbacks and adapt your approach to continuously improve.
  
• You transform ambiguous problems and abstract ideas - not rigid specifications - into delightful, high-quality, and remarkably simple solutions. You are driven by true craftsmanship, creativity, and a relentless pursuit of excellence in everything you build.
  
• You possess a genuine passion for continuous learning and self-improvement. You actively seek and value diverse perspectives, recognizing the limitations of your own viewpoint.
  
• You champion a "One Team" philosophy, effective in working with multiple teams towards shared goals. You believe in transparent collaboration, actively engaging with the team through huddles, interactive reviews, and whiteboarding.
  
• You have strong opinions, loosely held - you thrive in technical discussions, confidently propose and debate ideas, and drive well-reasoned solutions to help the team achieve the best outcomes. You're not one to just go with the flow; you help drive us forward.
  
• You are self-motivated, consistently seeking opportunities to contribute more, and take on greater responsibilities to propel the team forward.
  
• You demonstrate strong interpersonal awareness, understanding team dynamics and the impact of your interactions.