Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Database Developer

🎯 Role Definition

The Database Developer is responsible for designing, developing, optimizing and maintaining database systems and data models that support critical business applications and analytics. You will collaborate with business analysts, software developers and data engineers to translate requirements into scalable database solutions, ensure data integrity and performance, implement efficient data pipelines and participate in full‑lifecycle database development—from schema design and ETL to deployment and ongoing tuning. The role demands strong SQL/PLSQL skills, performance tuning expertise, data modelling capabilities and a mindset for delivering high‑quality database services aligned with business goals.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

Junior SQL/Database Developer
Data Engineer (entry)
Application Developer with database focus

Advancement To:

Senior Database Developer / Lead Database Developer
Database Architect / Data Platform Architect
Manager – Database Engineering or Head of Data Platforms

Lateral Moves:

Data Warehouse Developer / BI Developer
Database Administrator (DBA)
Cloud Database Engineer or Big Data Developer

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

Design, implement and maintain logical and physical database schemas, tables, views, indexes and constraints that meet business and technical requirements.
Write complex SQL queries, stored procedures, functions, triggers and packages (e.g., PL/SQL, T‑SQL) that support application functionality, reporting needs and data manipulation.
Optimize database performance through indexing, execution plan analysis, partitioning, query tuning and resource monitoring to ensure high responsiveness and throughput.
Develop and maintain ETL/ELT processes or data pipelines that extract, transform and load data between source systems, analytical platforms and data warehouses.
Collaborate closely with software developers to integrate databases with applications, APIs and services, ensuring data flows align with functional requirements.
Ensure data integrity, consistency, quality and governance by enforcing constraints, performing data reconciliation, designing validations and supporting audits.
Participate in database migration, upgrade or consolidation projects (on‑premises to cloud, version upgrades, platform transitions) with minimal downtime.
Implement backup, recovery, high‑availability, and disaster‑recovery strategies (e.g., replication, clustering, standby databases) to support business continuity.
Maintain documentation of database design, data dictionaries, technical specifications, entity‑relationship diagrams and deployment guides.
Troubleshoot and resolve database issues, production incidents and performance bottlenecks, acting as a technical resource for support teams.
Monitor database metrics (CPU, memory, I/O, waits), conduct capacity planning, forecast growth, and implement tuning or hardware/architecture improvements.
Refactor existing database code, eliminate technical debt, upgrade deprecated features, and adopt best‑practice patterns for maintainable and efficient systems.
Support data warehouse, business intelligence and analytics teams by providing optimized data access, designing data marts, and ensuring timely availability of analytical data.
Work within agile development processes: participate in sprint planning, backlog grooming, code reviews, deliver database deliverables and contribute to team retrospectives.
Provide mentoring, reviewing code or stored‑procedure logic for junior database developers or analysts and help raise the team’s database standards.
Ensure security, access control, role‑based privileges, encryption and compliance with regulatory frameworks such as GDPR, HIPAA or PCI DSS.
Stay current with database technologies, cloud database services (AWS, Azure, Google), NoSQL or hybrid architectures and propose improvements or migrations.
Collaborate with infrastructure or DevOps teams for database deployment automation, CI/CD, version control of scripts and alignment with release management.
Create test data sets, unit test scripts and QA activities around database code to validate correct behavior, performance and support continuous integration.
Align database development deliverables with business goals, understand how database performance and availability impacts applications, user experience and overall organisation productivity.

Secondary Functions

Support ad‑hoc data extraction, profiling, migrations or performance‑investigations in collaboration with data analysts and engineers.
Contribute to the organisation’s data platform roadmap: recommending new technologies, migration strategies, data optimisation or architecture enhancements.
Collaborate with business units to translate functional or analytical requirements into database specifications and prioritize backlog items.
Participate in process improvement of database development lifecycle, standardisation of artefacts, tool automation and code‑quality metrics.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

Deep proficiency in SQL and PL/SQL (or T‑SQL) for writing complex queries, stored procedures, functions, packages, triggers.
Experience with relational database management systems (RDBMS) such as Oracle, SQL Server, PostgreSQL, MySQL and a working understanding of NoSQL or hybrid databases.
Strong expertise in database schema design, normalization/denormalization, indexing strategies, partitioning and data modelling.
Performance tuning skills: ability to analyse execution plans, troubleshoot bottlenecks, optimise queries and adjust database configurations.
Knowledge of ETL/ELT tools, data integration, scripting (Python, Shell), data migration techniques and data warehousing concepts.
Familiarity with backup/recovery strategies, high‑availability setups, disaster‑recovery planning and database cloning techniques.
Experience with cloud‑based database services (AWS RDS/Aurora, Azure SQL Database, Google Cloud SQL), containerised database deployments or hybrid architectures.
Ability to maintain documentation: data dictionaries, ER diagrams, deployment scripts, release notes and version control of database objects.
Proficient in version control (Git), branching/merging for database code, CI/CD pipelines and collaboration with DevOps engineers.
Understanding of data security, governance, encryption, user roles/privileges and regulatory compliance relevant to company data assets.

Soft Skills

Excellent analytical and problem‑solving mindset: able to diagnose complex database issues and design durable solutions.
Strong communication skills: able to convey technical design, performance impact and collaborate with non‑technical stakeholders.
Detail‑oriented and quality‑driven: ensures accurate data models, correct logic, documentation and compliance with standards.
Team‑oriented collaborator: works effectively with developers, analysts, infrastructure and product teams in agile environments.
Adaptability and continuous learning: keeps up with evolving database technologies, cloud trends and industry best practices.
Ownership and accountability: takes responsibility for database deliverables, monitors production health and drives improvements.
Business‑centric mindset: understands how database systems impact application performance, user experience and organizational KPIs.
Time‑management and prioritisation: able to juggle multiple database tasks, production support needs and development deadlines.
Mentorship orientation: supports less experienced team members, conducts code reviews and promotes best practices.
Agile mindset: participates in sprint planning, backlog refinement, retrospectives and contributes to process improvements.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems or a related technical discipline.

Preferred Education:
Master’s degree in Data Engineering, Computer Science or relevant certifications such as Oracle Certified Professional (OCP), Microsoft Certified: Azure Database Developer Associate.

Relevant Fields of Study:

Computer Science / Software Engineering
Information Systems / Data Management
Applied Mathematics / Statistics
Data Engineering / Database Systems

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range:
2–4 years of hands‑on experience as a database developer working with RDBMS, writing SQL/PLSQL, and participating in schema design and data integration.

Preferred:
4–6+ years of experience developing and maintaining large‑scale database systems, performance optimisation, data warehousing, migrations, and leading or mentoring others.