Daily Coping 14 Jul 2020

Posted on July 14, 2020 by way0utwest

I’ve started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here.

Today I’m asking you to adopt a growth mindset. Change “I can’t” into “I can’t… yet””.”

This might seem silly and simple, but changing your attitude often results in a big change in the way you approach something and it can increase your mental health.

I can’t fly internationally or go to an office, yet.

That’s hopeful. It helps me realize this isn’t a permanent situation, but one that will change. I’ll get to go visit my Redgate colleagues, and I’ll get to go present at a conference in front of a live audience.

Just not yet.

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Beating the Cloud Vendors

Posted on July 13, 2020 by way0utwest

I find the cloud in 2020 to be very interesting. I run into plenty of technical professionals that still dismiss it or think that moving to the cloud is a recipe for disaster. They are sure their internal systems are better, more cost effective, and better built than anything a cloud vendor can sell their organization.

They might be right. I do think that this can be true.

I also think that the cloud is a fairly unstoppable trend for the world, so you better be able to answer Brent’s question: what do you do better than the cloud? Even if your company isn’t planning on moving or pushing you to think about it, this could be a good exercise. In fact, it might be a fun team building exercise over lunch or on a late Friday afternoon when things are slow.

It does mean that you need to learn something about the cloud, which is a very nebulous term. There are IaaS and PaaS services, lots of networking options, plenty of automated tasks built in and even more services available that you might ever want to install. There is also very confusing pricing, limited hardware choices, and a feature mix that could be different from what’s available on premises.

The cloud gives you lots of flexibility in some ways, and little in others. Vendors provide certifications and instrumentation and logging that you might not want to build. Or maybe you’ve built it already. What equipment or contracts that you have might not be cost effective to change now, but when you think about renewing or replacing them, you might have a much different view.

I can almost guarantee that your management, especially finance, will think about this differently than you do.

Depending on what I’m doing, I think the cloud is either amazing or maddening. Some of that is me, and some is truly the cloud and how I use it. You can beat the cloud vendors, but you might not want to. If you do, be prepared to prove it.

Steve Jones

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Daily Coping 13 Jul 2020

Posted on July 13, 2020 by way0utwest

I’ve started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here.

Today’s tip is to  make a list of things you’re looking forward to doing during a break from work.

When you’re working at home, it’s important to take breaks. I’ve gotten pretty good at not sitting at my desk all day, but it’s easy for me since I don’t work with others too often. As a result, I can flex work.

My short list during workdays is:

  • exercise
  • cooking

I will often take a few minutes after finishing some task to tackle a chore, or take a slightly longer break to set up lunch or dinner or exercise. My gym is open, and I go 2-3 times a week, but mostly continue to work out at home.

A better list might be what I will do on a vacation day. For those, I have another camping trip booked, taking a few days off. I’m also looking forward to skiing, which looks possible this winter.

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Social: Thinking about those that have less of a voice

Posted on July 10, 2020 by way0utwest

I saw a few things posted this this week that got me to think. One was a note about the end of pride month, where I realize I hadn’t said or done anything to promote inclusiveness. I don’t think that LGBTQ people are any different than me in most ways. They chose to live a portion of their life in a different way than me, but lots of people do this, just in other different ways.

There was no Pride 5k this year, and few other events in the real world. However, I should have made some effort to promote this event, along with Black Lives Matter, and other things in the world that I’m thinking about.

We have LGBTQ people in the #sqlfamily. Andy Mallon has run an event at the PASS Summit, but I don’t see much else talked about. There are people that feel ashamed, second class, angry, and many other things about their lifestyle because many in society don’t openly welcome them. It’s not enough to

Kendra wrote that she’s sharing pronouns, which I think is a simple, easy thing to do that promotes inclusiveness and helps anyone that wants to share something different than my “he/him”, to do so. I’ve seen some people share “they/them”, but it takes some bravery to do this when most people don’t think about it and a few openly mock the choices.

I just updated my base Powerpoint deck and bio that I keep around on my site and machines to include pronouns. It’s an easy thing to do, and hopefully it makes others more comfortable expressing their own thoughts.

I also need to go out of my way to encourage and support others. I have tried to promote the WIT groups and spoken at a few of their events. I hope that others build groups to support their own underrepresented causes, because there is strength in numbers. However, I also hope that more people that are parts of less mainstream groups find a voice and promote themselves at other events.

That also means I need to make more of an effort to actively include those people when I can and go looking for them.

If anyone feels they are a minority and needs some mentoring, coaching, or wants an opportunity to write/speak, please feel free to reach out to me. I will do my best to include you in our community.

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