Database Administrator

Company Description

American Iron & Metal (AIM) is a family-owned company and recognized global leader in the metal recycling industry with more than 125 sites and 4000 employees worldwide. We have continued to prosper for the last eight decades thanks to the dedication of our employees and the ongoing trust and support of our customers.

Become part of team AIM, a growing team with an entrepreneurial spirit who has over the years evolved into a successful and multifaceted company with business divisions that include metal recycling, decommissioning and demolition, auto-parts sales and recycling, manufacturing of solder assemblies, construction waste recycling, and production of customized industrial and mining products.

We take pride in doing good things for the environment to help create a greener, more sustainable future for all.

It’s simple; we do it right. We AIM for excellence.

Job Description

We are looking for a Senior Database Administrator (DBA) who is equally comfortable tuning a 20-year-old database as they are designing resilient, cloud-ready data platforms. You are deeply experienced, constantly learning, and proud of your craft. In this role, you will be the operational owner of our database environment: ensuring stability, performance, security, and recoverability of critical systems. You will also participate in key projects such as migrations, upgrades, cloud adoption, and new application deployments.

Your role and responsibilities will include, but are not limited to the following:

- Act as the technical owner for enterprise database platforms (on-premises and cloud), including day-to-day administration, monitoring, and troubleshooting.

- Manage and optimize databases across legacy and modern technologies (e.g., SQL Server, Raven DB, Cosmos, MySQL/PostgreSQL, Azure SQL, AWS RDS, Progress, etc.).

- Ensure high availability, performance, and capacity through proactive monitoring, tuning, and maintenance (indexing, statistics, partitioning, resource governance, etc.).

- Design, implement, and regularly test backup and recovery strategies, including disaster recovery and failover procedures.

- Maintain strong security and compliance posture: user access management, roles and permissions, data encryption, auditing, and alignment with corporate and regulatory requirements.

- Perform and coordinate regular maintenance activities such as patching, upgrades, and vulnerability remediation with minimal impact to business operations.

- Provide tier-3 support for complex incidents and production issues, including participation in an on-call rotation where required.

- Participate in infrastructure and application projects: new system implementations, database refactoring, consolidations, and modernization initiatives.

- Collaborate with solution architects, developers, and business analysts to design scalable and resilient database solutions that meet functional and non-functional requirements.

- Lead or support migration efforts from legacy platforms to modern environments (e.g., on-prem to cloud, version upgrades, re-platforming and re-architecture).

- Contribute to the standardization and automation of database operations (e.g., Infrastructure as Code, CI/CD integration, configuration management, scripting).

- Produce and maintain clear documentation: runbooks, topology diagrams, DR procedures, standards, and operational guidelines

Qualifications

- 10+ years of progressive experience as a Database Administrator in medium to large enterprise environments.

- Proven experience managing mission-critical, 24/7 environments with strict SLAs.

- Strong knowledge of performance tuning & optimization (execution plans, indexes, waits, locking/blocking).

- Strong knowledge of high availability and disaster recovery (Always On, clustering, log shipping, replication, etc.).

- Strong knowledge of backup, restore, and DR strategy design and execution.

- Experience with security hardening and least privilege access control.

- Experience with cloud database services (Azure, AWS) and hybrid architectur

- Proficiency in scripting and automation (PowerShell, Bash, Python, T-SQL/PL-SQL, etc.)

- Familiarity with DevOps practices, CI/CD pipelines, and Infrastructure as Code (e.g., ARM/Bicep, Terraform, Ansible) is an asset.

Personal Attributes & Soft Skills

- Continuous learner who actively keeps up with new database technologies, patterns, and best practices while respecting the realities of legacy systems.

- Self-starter with strong initiative; able to identify issues, propose solutions, and execute with minimal supervision.

- Demonstrated accountability and ownership – you treat the environment as if it were your own.

- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, especially under pressure during critical incidents.

- Excellent communication skills, able to translate complex technical topics into clear language for non-technical stakeholders.

- Collaborative mindset; comfortable working with cross-functional teams including infrastructure, security, development, and business units

- Fully bilingual in English and French (spoken and written).

- Comfortable working in a hybrid model, combining remote work with on-site presence as needed for operational and project activities.

- Willingness to participate in off-hours maintenance windows and an on-call rotation for critical systems support.

Additional Information

What we offer!

- Competitive salary + other perks

- Group insurance & RRSP program

- Company-wide events throughout the year (BBQ, Holiday party etc.)

- Free gym on site

- A cafeteria on site

- Dynamic & rewarding work environment- work on high-impact, meaningful projects while also having fun