Staff Database Engineer

Location: San Diego

Department: Database Engineering

About SHEIN 

SHEIN is a global online fashion and lifestyle retailer, offering SHEIN branded apparel and products from a global network of vendors, all at affordable prices. Headquartered in Singapore, with more than 15,000 employees operating from offices around the world, SHEIN is committed to making the beauty of fashion accessible to all, promoting its industry-leading, on-demand production methodology, for a smarter, future-ready industry. 

Position Summary

We are seeking a Staff Database Engineer (Official Title: Staff Database Engineer I) with experience managing large-scale, mission-critical environments that require zero downtime. As part of the SHEIN DBRE team, you will play a key role in ensuring the reliability, performance, and security of our database infrastructure through automation and scalable solutions. Our team integrates DBA, SRE, and DBRE expertise to deliver highly available data services. We design resilient architectures to meet evolving business and data processing demands, prioritizing efficiency and system reliability. While each team member may have their preferred technologies, a deep understanding of database fundamentals—and how different database systems interact with applications and operating systems—is essential for success. This role requires collaboration across multiple customer environments and global teams. 

This role requires independent execution and the ability to manage critical production systems without direct supervision. Commitment to incident response and adherence to on-call responsibilities is essential. 

 

Job Responsibilities

• Maintain scalable, reliable, and robust production database environments across various database systems, including MySQL, ClickHouse, and MongoDB.
• Continuously monitor database health, proactively diagnose issues, and implement resolutions as needed. 
• Optimize database performance through query tuning, index optimization, and performance diagnostics.
• Develop and maintain database tools and automation scripts to streamline operations and reduce manual toil.
• Collaborate with development teams and engineers to provide guidance on database design, best practices, and architectural decisions.
• Manage database upgrades, migrations, and schema changes while ensuring minimal disruption and improved performance.
• Triage and resolve database issues, driving incidents to resolution and implementing preventative measures.
• Conduct capacity planning and benchmarking across multiple database technologies.
• Ensure data integrity, high availability, security, and privacy compliance across all database environments.
• Provide 24/7 escalated on-call support as part of a pager rotation.

Job Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or a related technical field, or equivalent experience.
• 4+ years of hands-on MySQL database management experience.
• 4+ years of experience with Azure, AWS, or any other major cloud provider.
• Strong understanding of distributed and replicated database architectures.
• Proven troubleshooting and problem-solving skills, with a strong sense of ownership and accountability.
• Experience in monitoring and analyzing system performance, identifying bottlenecks, and improving database reliability and scalability.
• Proficiency in at least one scripting language (e.g., Golang, Shell); familiarity with Golang development is a plus.
• Passion for solving scalability and performance challenges in large-scale environments.
• Ability to remain calm and focused under pressure, especially during critical incidents.
• Strong expertise in Linux operating systems, storage, networking, and related system principles.

 

Nice to Have

• Bilingual fluency in Mandarin and English is highly preferred.
• 5+ years of experience managing MySQL at scale in high-performance environments.
• Experience with ClickHouse, MongoDB, or other distributed database systems.
• Deep knowledge of database internals, including the ability to independently deploy and optimize open-source tools like Percona or MySQL source code.
• Hands-on experience with Golang development or proficiency in other programming languages for automation.
• Hands-on experience using multiple AI models (Claude Code, ChatGPT, Gemini) to solve real-world problems, including troubleshooting model limitations, comparing outputs, and applying prompt tuning strategies to improve result quality
• Experience building AI-driven operations tools or platforms from scratch, covering requirements, architecture design, and production deployment.
• Participated in team-wide AI tooling transformation initiatives; contributed to or established shared asset libraries covering Prompts, MCP integrations, and Skills.
• Familiar with AI application frameworks such as LangChain and LlamaIndex, with practical experience integrating them with relational or vector databases.
• Able to systematically structure and document database tuning knowledge into AI-consumable formats (knowledge bases, RAG corpora, Skill libraries), driving continuous improvement of team-wide tuning capabilities.

 

Benefits and Perks 

• Bonus and RSU eligible
• Healthcare (medical, dental, vision, prescription drugs) 
• Health Savings Account with Employer Funding 
• Flexible Spending Accounts (Healthcare and Dependent care) 
• Company-Paid Basic Life/AD&D insurance 
• Company-Paid Short-Term and Long-Term Disability 
• Voluntary Benefit Offerings (Voluntary Life/AD&D, Hospital Indemnity, Critical Illness, and Accident) 
• Employee Assistance Program 
• Business Travel Accident Insurance 
• 401(k) Savings Plan with discretionary company match and access to a financial advisor  
• Vacation, paid holidays, floating holiday and sick days  
• Employee discounts 
• Free weekly catered lunch 
• Dog-friendly office (available at select locations) 
• Free gym access (available at select locations) 
• Free swag giveaways 
• Annual Holiday Party 
• Invitations to pop-ups and other company events 
• Complimentary daily office snacks and beverages

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