Author: way0utwest

This editorial was originally published on May 11, 2009. It is being re-run as Steve is on vacation.

How can you measure someone’s skills? Is there a good way to actually assess how well a DBA or developer will do in your company? If you have one, there is some money to be made by passing the information along.

Traditional interviews where you ask lots of questions typically haven’t necessarily proven to be a great way to do this.  Some people give tests, but they often are thrown together, and might contain multiple choice answers to make them easy to grade. However the other day someone posted a technique they used that I liked.

This person suggested that a VM be configured with Windows and SQL Server and then with a certain number of things wrong with the install. Or at least things that would be seen as wrong in that particular  environment. You then give it to a candidate and ask them to tell you what’s wrong. You could let them work through it in a stream of consciousness way, telling you what was wrong as they found it. You could also give them some time, say an hour, and then come back and let them explain what is wrong.

Actually I’d recommend you give the candidate the choice since some people work better alone.

I’ve thought about asking them to accomplish certain tasks before, but after considering this technique, I like it a bit more. Just asking them “what’s wrong?” or “what would you change?” is a good way to see how people think. Interacting with them, getting them to dig into a real system, is a great way to assess not only technical skills, but also some interaction. See how they debate, argue, or question a co-worker is important, at least it’s important to me.

Is this is a better way to interview people and assess skills? Would you like to be interviewed like this? Maybe this would even be a fun competition at somewhere like the PASS Summit.

Steve Jones

The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

The podcast feeds are available atsqlservercentral.mevio.com. Comments are definitely appreciated and wanted, and you can get feeds from there.

You can also follow Steve Jones on Twitter:

Overall RSS Feed:  or now on iTunes! 

• Windows Media Podcast – 19.1MB WMV 
• iPod Video Podcast – 20.8MB MP4 
• MP3 Audio Podcast – 4.3MB 

Today’s podcast features music by Everyday Jones. No relation, but I stumbled on to them and really like the music. Support this great duo at www.everydayjones.com.

Working in technology means that we are constantly challenged to learn new skills and improve our existing ability to get work done. When I started as a DBA, I could work within SQL Server, writing T-SQL, making backups, and managing security. As the product has evolved, I’ve needed to learn more about Active Directory to troubleshoot security, I’ve been called upon to cluster machines and implement replication. There are all sorts of areas in which I’ve found it important to develop some expertise.

However time is short. With family, with work, with commitments in the rest of my life, how do I find time to work on improving my career skills? Most of the time has been spent at work, slipping in learning time during a project, but I’ve also had to spend some time at night, practicing skills or reading about the intricacies of some feature.

Andy Warren has estimated that it really takes around 100 hours to develop some level of competence with a new skill. That’s 100 hours in a year, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but dedicating two hours a week to your career can be challenging. It’s much less than the 10,000 estimate for expertise, which is good since most of us can’t spare that much time to become an expert.

However is 100 hours too many? There was a TED talk that noted you could learn a new skill, at an acceptable level in 20 hours. I’m skeptical that this is true, and I’d certainly point out that there is prep time to analyze a skill, learn something about it, and then build the plan to learn. Those items alone could take much more than 20 hours.

I’m not sure what a good level is, but I’m thinking to try this in my life in some area and see what 20 hours gets me. I’m also on a Powershell Challenge, which will probably end up being close to 30 hours, but I’ll see how comfortable I am with the skill after that time. However, do you think you could learn something like Powershell in 20 hours?

Steve Jones

Video and Audio versions Today’s podcast features music by Everyday Jones. No relation, but I stumbled on to them and really like the music. Support this great duo at www.everydayjones.com. Follow Steve Jones on Twitter to find links and database related items and announcements. Windows Media Video ( 20.0MB)  MP4 iPod Video ( 23.2MB)  MP3 Audio ( 4.7MB)  Feeds are available at iTunes and Mevio To submit an article, rant or editorial, log in to the Contribution Center