Senior Cassandra Database Administrator
Posted Sep 23, 2026 · We last checked this listing on Oct 6, 2026
Likely interview questions for this role
Written from this job description, not a generic list. Each one notes what the interviewer is really checking.
About your past
Tell me about a time you tracked down a serious performance problem in a database. What was the cause?
What they are checking: Whether they diagnose problems methodically using metrics and logs rather than guessing.
Tell me about database standards or policies you created. How did you get teams to follow them?
What they are checking: Whether they can set best practices across platforms and make them stick.
What would you do
A development team wants to use secondary indexes or ALLOW FILTERING to make a query work. How do you respond?
What they are checking: Whether they can steer developers toward a better model and explain why the shortcut causes problems.
A node goes down during business hours. Walk me through what you do.
What they are checking: Whether they stay calm, protect availability and follow a clear recovery process.
About the work
Walk me through how you design a Cassandra table, starting from the queries the application needs.
What they are checking: Whether they truly understand query-first data modeling, which is the core skill for Cassandra.
How do you choose a partition key, and what problems come from a bad one?
What they are checking: Whether they understand hot partitions and large partitions and how to avoid them.
Explain how consistency levels and replication factor work together in Cassandra.
What they are checking: Whether they can balance data correctness and availability in a real production setup.
How do you handle tombstones and compaction to keep performance healthy?
What they are checking: Whether they know the operational issues that hurt Cassandra clusters over time.
How do you set up backups and test recovery for a Cassandra or DataStax cluster?
What they are checking: Whether they actually test restores, since a backup that has never been restored is not proof of safety.
How have you built ETL processes that load data into or out of Cassandra?
What they are checking: Whether they have real experience with ETL design, which the posting names.
How do you plan for growth when a cluster's data volume keeps climbing?
What they are checking: Whether they think ahead about capacity, adding nodes and repair before problems hit.
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Practice this out loudThe full job description
As published by Uline.