I set goals at the beginning of last year, and I’m doing the something similar this year.

Last year I didn’t do well in my goals. I definitely had the resolution failure, where I ended up being more excited in Q1 than Q2 or Q3 and felt rushed to do more in Q4. This year, I want to re-examine how I do things a bit more.

There are a few areas I want to build some competence in for future work, but I’m less worried about the ambitious aspect of improving myself for another job. I don’t want another job, at least not another full-time job I need for the income. I’m mid 50s, looking to retirement, and I want Redgate to be my last employer.

Therefore, my goals are a mix of a few things that matter for Redgate and a couple personal ones that pique my interest.

I also know that life and work will change, and my interests will rise and fall. As a result, I’m going to leave space to adjust and add goals in June. Therefore, I’m tackling less, but in these areas:

• Work-Related
• Fun and Personal
• Community

I do want these to be measurable, so I need specific goals I can check off as done or not, rather than a subjective measure.

Work-Related

Two big items here: DevOps and certification. I started the certification goal last year and did nothing until someone at work asked me to take a test for Partner status.

Certification first. I need to do these items:

• DP-900
• DP-300 (or DP-203)

I can measure those by pass or fail.

I also need to expand my demo work a bit and include some other databases. As Redgate evolves, what I really want is a good DevOps demo that includes at least 3 different database platforms and allows me to demo things from our various offerings. I’d like to be able to demo something and have it go live during a talk or class. As a result, I’m aiming to build a DevOps flow, from a git repo to multiple database platforms to publishing something that can be viewed live. That likely means some sort of website that reads from a DB and displays information on a page. I need to include these things by year end:

• repository with multiple folders for platforms
• test platforms (likely containers) for 3 data stores
• CI processes (3 ) that build from my repo.
• A live website that reads from the dbs (3 pages or 3 sites), updating from real time deployments.

Those would be good measurements. I also need to complete two books. The feedback book from last year and Good Strategy/Bad Strategy, which is used inside Redgate.

Fun and Personal

I had hoped the Advent of Code would capture my attention for more time, but as the puzzles get harder, and life outside of work is busy, this isn’t enough of a priority. I’ve been watching our Redgate developers work the 2021 puzzles at night, posting thoughts and struggles after work. Clearly I’m not enough of a developer to do this outside of work.

I am looking to combine some of the things I do already outside of work with those career related items. I have a Google Sheet for stats that I share, and a PowerBI Desktop report. I need to get the data in a database and make it available for others. I want to play with some of the Azure stuff, so I’m looking to set up more of a “DevOps” style flow with functions and apps that takes data from my sheet and puts it into an Azure database. Then I can more easily publish this into PowerBI for a live report.

The measurement here would be that I can update an XLS or db and have a Power BI report or a new XLS automatically generated.

Community

I am a supporter of the community where I can. I am hoping to see more events and do more speaking in 2022. I know that depends on how the pandemic goes, but I’m aiming to tackle these things:

• Support the Colorado groups by speaking twice and helping get one event set up
• Speak at 3 other user groups outside of Colorado
• Support SQL Saturdays – Help get 10 events run in 2022
• Volunteer more with Habitat – I want to get out to at least 4 build days.