Sr Principal Architect

Company: UKG
Location: Lowell
Posted on: June 1, 2025

Job Description:

Company Overview:With 80,000 customers across 150 countries, UKG is the largest U.S.-based private software company in the world. And we're only getting started. Ready to bring your bold ideas and collaborative mindset to an organization that still has so much more to build and achieve? Read on.At UKG, you get more than just a job. You get to work with purpose. Our team of U Krewers are on a mission to inspire every organization to become a great place to work through our award-winning HR technology built for all.Here, we know that you're more than your work. That's why our benefits help you thrive personally and professionally, from wellness programs and tuition reimbursement to U Choose - a customizable expense reimbursement program that can be used for more than 200+ needs that best suit you and your family, from student loan repayment, to childcare, to pet insurance. Our inclusive culture, active and engaged employee resource groups, and caring leaders value every voice and support you in doing the best work of your career. If you're passionate about our purpose - people -then we can't wait to support whatever gives you purpose. We're united by purpose, inspired by you. Job Title: Senior Principal Architect - AlloyDB / PostgreSQL DBA
Department: Enterprise Architecture / Cloud Data Engineering / Platform Engineering
Executive SummaryAbout the Role:
We are seeking a visionary and deeply technical Senior Principal Architect DBA to lead the enterprise strategy, architecture, and execution of PostgreSQL and AlloyDB-based solutions on Google Cloud Platform (GCP). This role combines deep technical database expertise, cloud architecture leadership, and strategic advisory skills. You will set the roadmap for database modernization, drive adoption of next-generation AlloyDB architecture, and ensure our data systems are secure, scalable, and high-performing.

You will be working across engineering, DevOps, security, and business leadership to shape how data is handled and scaled in a cloud-native, high-availability, and data-driven environment.

Core Responsibilities:
1. Cloud-Native AlloyDB & PostgreSQL Architecture
Architect end-to-end enterprise-grade AlloyDB environments with multi-region failover, autoscaling, read replicas, and zero-downtime DR.

Build foundational architecture that supports OLTP, real-time analytics, and mixed workloads in AlloyDB.

Design multi-tenant, sharded, or distributed architectures for large-scale SaaS or data platforms.

2. Database Strategy, Governance & Platform Standards
Define enterprise database standards for PostgreSQL/AlloyDB, including naming conventions, partitioning, retention, and schema management.

Establish governance and lifecycle policies: onboarding, patching, deprecation, and service SLAs.

Act as the principal author of the organization's database modernization roadmap.

3. Performance Engineering & Optimization
Conduct performance audits using tools like pg_stat_activity, auto_explain, pgBadger, and Query Insights.

Design and lead indexing strategies, table partitioning schemes, and query rewrite plans.

Tune AlloyDB to handle tens of thousands of TPS (transactions per second) with millisecond latency targets.

4. Security Architecture & Compliance
Design data security blueprints including field-level encryption, row-level access control, and data masking.

Implement VPC Service Controls, Private Service Connect, IAM fine-grained roles, and SSL mutual auth.

Align database infrastructure with compliance needs: SOC 2, HIPAA, ISO 27001, PCI-DSS.

5. Automation, CI/CD & SRE Alignment
Drive the design of infrastructure-as-code deployments using Terraform, Pulumi, or Deployment Manager.

Integrate database change management into CI/CD pipelines using Flyway, Liquibase, or Alembic.

Collaborate with SRE teams to set SLOs, SLIs, and automate recovery scenarios (failover simulation, backup restore drills).

6. Migration Leadership
Lead enterprise-wide migrations from Oracle, SQL Server, or legacy PostgreSQL to AlloyDB with full assessment, risk mitigation, and performance testing plans.

Use Database Migration Service (DMS), pgloader, or custom data pipelines for phased and online cutovers.

Own the data validation, dual-write strategy, rollback mechanisms, and stakeholder sign-offs.

7. Cross-Platform & Analytics Integration
Architect data pipelines between AlloyDB and BigQuery, Pub/Sub, Dataproc, Looker, and Dataform.

Provide guidance on when to use AlloyDB vs Cloud SQL vs BigQuery and create decision matrices for teams.

Integrate observability tools such as Grafana, Prometheus, OpenTelemetry, and Datadog with AlloyDB for unified dashboards.

Required Technical Skills & Experience:
12+ years of enterprise DBA experience, with 7+ years in PostgreSQL.

3-5 years experience on GCP, including AlloyDB, Cloud SQL, BigQuery, Cloud Storage, and GKE.

Mastery of PostgreSQL internals: MVCC, vacuum, write-ahead logging (WAL), B-tree/GiST/Gin indexing.

Advanced knowledge of PostgreSQL extensions like pg_stat_statements, pg_partman, PostGIS, and pglogical.

Real-world experience building multi-terabyte, high-throughput systems with horizontal scalability.

--- Preferred/Bonus Experience:
Led multi-phase migrations from Oracle to AlloyDB/PostgreSQL with minimal downtime.

Deep experience with hybrid cloud or multi-cloud database deployments (e.g., AWS RDS, Azure PostgreSQL, Spanner).

Certified:

Google Cloud Professional Cloud Database Engineer

PostgreSQL Certified DBA

Google Cloud Professional Cloud Architect

Publications, talks, or open-source contributions in the PostgreSQL or cloud-native data communities.

Leadership, Influence & Collaboration
Advisor to CIOs, CTOs, Enterprise Architects on database decisions and cloud transformation.

Mentor junior DBAs, SREs, DevOps engineers, and solution architects.

Represent the database domain in architecture review boards, data governance councils, and security compliance meetings.

Deliverables & Success Metrics
Enterprise-wide AlloyDB adoption playbook.

Reference architectures, performance tuning guides, and compliance blueprints.

Measurable improvements in database uptime, latency, cost-efficiency, and scalability.

Successful execution of zero-downtime migrations and disaster recovery tests.Where we're goingUKG is on the cusp of something truly special. Worldwide, we already hold the #1 market share position for workforce management and the #2 position for human capital management. Tens of millions of frontline workers start and end their days with our software, with billions of shifts managed annually through UKG solutions today. Yet it's our AI-powered product portfolio designed to support customers of all sizes, industries, and geographies that will propel us into an even brighter tomorrow!Equal Opportunity EmployerUKG is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, disability, religion, sex, age, national origin, veteran status, genetic information, and other legally protected categories.View UKG participates in E-Verify. View the E-Verify posters .It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.Disability Accommodation in the Application and Interview ProcessFor individuals with disabilities that need additional assistance at any point in the application and interview process, please email .The pay range for this position is $179,800.00to$258,500.00USD, however, base pay offered may vary depending on skills, experience, job-related knowledge and location. This position is also eligible for a short-term incentive and a long-term incentive as part of total compensation. Information about UKG's comprehensive benefits can be reviewed on our careers site at
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Keywords: UKG, Lawrence , Sr Principal Architect, Professions , Lowell, Massachusetts