Senior Oracle Database Administrator (DBA)

Location: National*

Closing Date: 13th October

Interviews: 24/25 October

Grade: 7

(MoJ candidates who are on a specialist grade, will be able to retain this grade on lateral transfer)

Salary: London: £58,847 - £73,875 (which may include an allowance of up to £15,028)

             National: £54,358 - £69,150 (which may include an allowance of up to £14,792)

Working pattern: Full-time, part-time, flexible working

Contract Type: Perm

Vacancy number: 90764

*We offer a hybrid working model, allowing for a balance between remote work and time spent in your local office. Office locations can be found ON THIS MAP

The Role

We’re recruiting for a Senior Oracle Database Administrator (DBA) here at Justice Digital.

This role aligns against the Senior infrastructure engineer role from the Government Digital and Data Framework.

We are seeking a talented and tenacious DBA with experience of ensuring underlying databases are stable, secure and support change. 

The team

The Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) provides compensation to victims of violent crime in England, Wales and Scotland, and victims of overseas terrorism.

We manage our own IT infrastructure and draw on a blend of in-house expertise and external contractors. Our digital vision aligns with the wider government and MoJ strategy 

CICA are part of the Ministry of Justice’s Delivery Group, and work closely with partner Agencies in the MoJ including the Legal Aid Agency and Office of the Public Guardian. We are developing new opportunities to share expertise and support integration of services, where practicable and cost effective, across the Group

We strongly encourage empathetic approaches and cross functional working and are looking for people to help build on this culture of agility and openness. We help each other in our teams to achieve our outcomes, we share knowledge and are open about mistakes. We embrace change and work together to foster a culture of continuous improvement.

To help picture your life at MoJ Justice Digital please take a look at our blog and our Digital and Technology strategy 2025

Our Tech Stack

We use a range of Oracle technologies to enable our enterprise scale databases which underpin critical services running on AWS. We are looking for people with experience of Oracle Identity and Access Management, IAS, Weblogic or OHS. Additionally, we also have Microsoft SQL databases and are seeking someone with the expertise to support and maintain them alongside our Oracle technologies.

We’re happy to help you learn our tech stack once you’re part of our team, and do not require an exact match in your experience. Check out GitHub for a closer look at the technologies we use, and a complete list of services that we build and maintain. We subscribe to the manifesto for agile software development.

Key Responsibilities

As a Senior Database Administrator at the MoJ you will have technical and people responsibilities.

Technical:

• Lead on service improvements, including upgrades, implementations and migrations which may include the design and build of cloud database environments
• Perform installation, maintenance, and upgrade of databases that are going out of support and configuration of Oracle products, including the deployment of quarterly security patches

• Some out of hours work on a rota may be required for this role
• Troubleshoot incidents including priority 1 or priority 2 major incidents, conduct blameless post-incident evaluations and ensure permanent closure of incidents for production and non-production environments
• Review and deploy application patches or upgrades provided by vendors or development teams

• Perform application database administration services including SQL code review, performance analysis, query tuning, database application design, physical data modelling, development support and engineering

People:

• Developing and influencing people via line management duties, informal and formal coaching, and mentoring
• Supporting lead developers in building high performing teams
• Helping to build and maintain a diverse, inclusive culture across the development community, growing awareness, inclusivity, and balance

If this feels like an exciting challenge, something you are enthusiastic about, and want to join our team please read on and apply!

Benefits

• 37 hours per week and flexible working options including working from home, working part-time, job sharing, or working compressed hours.
• A £1k per person learning budget is in place to support all our people, with access to best in class conferences and seminars, accreditation with professional bodies, fully funded vocational programmes and e-learning platforms.
• Staff have 10% time to dedicate to develop & grow.
• Generous civil service pension based on defined benefit scheme, with employer contributions of 28.97% from April 1st 2024 (Contribution Rates)
• 25 days leave (plus bank holidays) and 1 privilege day usually taken around the Kings’ birthday. 5 additional days of leave once you have reached 5 years of service.
• Compassionate maternity, adoption, and shared parental leave policies, with up to 26 weeks leave at full pay, 13 weeks with partial pay, and 13 weeks further leave. And maternity support/paternity leave at full pay for 2 weeks, too!
• Wellbeing support including access to the Calm app. 
• Bike loans up to £2500 and secure bike parking (subject to availability and location).
• Season ticket loans, childcare vouchers and eye-care vouchers.
• 5 days volunteering paid leave.
• Free membership to BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT.
• Some offices may have a subsidised onsite Gym.

Person Specification

Essential:

Experience of:

• Upgrading and migrating PL/SQL based applications

• Working with Oracle database versions 19c on Oracle Linux and / or migrating to latest versions

• Working in cloud native environments

• Oracle installations, upgrades and patching

• Oracle Automatic Storage Management / RMAN
• Experience of working with Microsoft SQL Server (2008/2012/2014/etc.)
• Experience of SQL installations, upgrades and patching
• Experience of SQL Server database backup recovery and maintenance schedules

• A systematic approach to solving problems
• Experience of mentoring and supporting your colleagues, whether one-to-one or in groups
• Awareness of version control for databases
• Experience working in Agile environments
• Experience of working with AWS

Willingness to be assessed against the requirements for BPSS clearance.

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan and the Civil Service D&I Strategy.

How to Apply

Candidates must submit a CV and Supporting statement (750 words) which describes how you meet the requirements set out in the Person Specification above.

In Justice Digital, we recruit using a combination of the Government Digital and Data Profession Capability and Success Profiles Frameworks. We will assess your Experience, Technical Skills and the following Behaviours during the assessment process:

• Communicating and influencing
• Working together
• Making effective decisions
• Developing self and others

A diverse panel will review your application against the Person Specification above. 

Successful candidates who meet the required standard will then be invited to a 45-minute panel interview held via video conference.

Should we receive a high volume of applications, a pre-sift based on Oracle and SQL or MSSQL experience will be conducted prior to the sift.

Should you be unsuccessful in the role that you have applied for but demonstrate the capability for a role at a lower level, we reserve the right to discuss this opportunity with you and offer you the position without needing a further application.

A reserve list may be held for up to 12 months, from which further appointments may be made.

Terms & Conditions

Please review our Terms & Conditions which set out how we recruit and provide further information related to the role and salary arrangements.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact recruitment@digital.justice.gov.uk