In this age of COVID, we have all been pretty much forced into the unnerving situation of self reflection. With the additional time alone, quarantined, self sequestered, however you choose to look at it, we have been forced into a certain new level of self isolation that has brought new levels of self doubt, reflection and a new of age self criticism.
At first, I took this new version of quiet time and thought of it as punishment. And then I asked, "punishment for what? What did I do?" Then came the sleepless nights. The anxiety. The self doubt. And after some time away to unplug and some 2500 logged miles driving across a few states, I realized that I needed to use this time to self reflect on all aspects of my professional, as well as personal life. In this initial post, I will attempt to become a member of Paul Randal's 2020 class of "mentees" to help get me over that proverbial hump of the place that I am stuck in professionally and to get that reboot that I believe I so now need. I believe in the "less is more" approach to many aspects in my professional realm. Automation of tasks. Dashboards. Scripts and scripting. Diagnostics. Backups. All automated. So the less time I spend performing manual tasks, such as those previously mentioned, the MORE I get to focus on elevating my professional self. And after seeing Paul's post availing himself to mentor the next gen of SQL DBAs, the post, in a way, spoke to me. 16 of the 22 points (72.7272%) aligned with what I have been through, thought about and questioned in the last 5 years of my DBA career. So with all of this time to reflect, I realized what I need to work on to get me over that "hump" so that I can move on to the next and hopefully final chapter of my DBA career. With over 20 years in the IT field, and the last 8 as a SQL Server DBA, I like to think I have a good understanding of the IT infrastructure, but there is still SO much more to learn. I have been to a couple of the SQL Skills trainings in Seattle and still review my materials from those classes. I read SQL blogs and attend the occasional "free" briefing that promises the newest and greatest in SQL info. But after reading Paul's offer at this time in my career, I knew this was universe sending that signal. Timing is everything, right? I have worked almost exclusively with enterprise organizations throughout my IT career. National. Global. Organizations with up to 164,000 employees. 10's of 1000's of databases. Petabytes of data. All with the same road bumps and issues to get us to the next level. All with the same levels of arrogance and egos that can cause issues for someone like me trying to offer the best solutions for the optimal results in the long run. The solutions offered weren't always the cheapest or the quickest in terms of implementation, but they were the best solutions based on 1) my experience and 2) the information that I had gathered based off of research from people such as Paul Randal, Kimberly Tripp, Brent Ozar, Pinal Dave, Ola Hallengren and Adam Machanic (I swear I'm not name dropping here) just to name a few. More than once in my career as the sole DBA in an organization, I have come to that crossroad of:
These are the main situations that I have experienced and endured for the better part of my Senior DBA career. Definitely the ones with the most impact on my life. I feel that I have a good base and knowledge to be a Senior quality DBA and have held that title for a number of years, but I also know that I need to address all or most of the aforementioned bullet points in order to get me to the next level of "senior-dom." I love what I do. I love digging and finding the issues and their solutions. But I am past the point of carrying out daily issues and am ready to start forging my own path to lead....and not just be. Questions? Comments? Critiques?
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LoneSQLDBA
This will be my first attempt at a blog... SQL Server Stuff
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