Database Migration Specialist Lead Engineer

Job Title: Database Migration Specialist Lead Engineer Location: Huntsville, Alabama Experience: 12+ Years Employment Type: Contract Interview Type: In-Person or Webcam Job Description We are seeking an experienced Database Migration Specialist Lead Engineer who will be responsible for leading end-to-end database migration initiatives across on-premise and cloud environments. The ideal candidate will possess deep expertise in database architecture, performance tuning, migration strategy, and hands-on migration execution. This role involves collaborating with cross-functional teams, assessing current environments, designing target database solutions, and ensuring secure, scalable, and efficient transition with minimal downtime. Key Responsibilities Lead database migration projects from initial assessment through planning, execution, optimization, and post-migration support. Analyze current database platforms, schemas, stored procedures, security rules, and data dependencies to determine migration requirements. Develop detailed migration plans, timelines, risk assessments, cut-over strategies, and rollback procedures. Perform data conversion, ETL, schema restructuring, code rewrites, performance tuning, and validation. Mentor engineering and data teams on best practices, standards, and performance optimization techniques. Troubleshoot complex database and performance issues during and after migration. Collaborate with application development, DevOps, cloud engineering, and security teams. Ensure data integrity, compliance, auditable migration tracking, and minimal service disruption. Document architectures, migration processes, runbooks, and technical solutions. Required Qualifications 12+ years of hands-on experience in database engineering, administration, or data migration. Extensive experience with major databases such as Oracle, SQL Server, PostgreSQL, MySQL, DB2, or MongoDB. Proven experience leading large-scale migrations involving cloud platforms (AWS RDS/Aurora, Azure SQL, GCP Cloud SQL, or similar Strong knowledge of ETL tools, migration utilities, and replication technologies (GoldenGate, AWS DMS, SSIS, Informatica, Flyway, Liquibase, or similar Expertise in SQL, query optimization, stored procedures, indexing, and performance tuning. Experience with application-database dependency mapping and refactoring. Strong understanding of data security, backup and recovery, disaster recovery, and high availability. Ability to architect and document technical solutions clearly. Excellent communication, leadership, problem-solving, and stakeholder management skills. Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or related field. Preferred Skills Cloud certifications (AWS, Azure, GCP) Experience with CI/CD automation for database deployments Experience in containerized or microservices-based environments Knowledge of data warehousing solutions