Tag: career

This editorial was originally published on Oct 18, 2008. It is being republished as Steve is on vacation.

I think everyone would like more money, but I’m not sure how many of you really want to be rich. In reading through my list of blogs, I stumbled upon Mark Cuban’s entry on How to Get Rich and thought it was an interesting read. He gives you some of the advice I would, the most important being “there are no shortcuts.” If you remember nothing else, remember that.

I remember years ago, driving around with my Mom in the car. We were on some errand or something, I can’t remember, but I know that I was saying I wanted to do something. She told me an interesting story she’d picked up from somewhere, perhaps Reader’s Digest since it sounds like something they’d publish. It goes like this: a famous violinist was giving a concert and afterwards attended a party nearby. People were all there to basically see him and one lady was gushing with praise for his performance and told him “I’d give anything to be like you.” The violinist stopped and looked at her, saying “No, you wouldn’t.”

Naturally people stop and stare and the lady is a bit flustered, “oh but I would, ” she protests. The violinist then repeats she wouldn’t and continues. “You wouldn’t give the one thing you must, time.”

He meant practice, effort, dedication, etc., and that’s really the secret to being rich. You have to really invest in yourself, believe in yourself, and put lots of effort in. Most people don’t really want to do that, instead looking for some way to shortcut the process. There are ways to do it, but they either involve picking the correct 6 numbers on the correct week or placing a big bet on a single number, card, roll of the dice, or stock. And it’s far more likely that you’ll end up losing big with big bets.

I saw an article recently that said half of all US taxpayers make less than $32,000 a year. I’m not sure if that’s true, but the article cites the IRS statistics for taxes paid. If you make more than $65k a year, you’re in the top 25%. In many places that might be considered rich, and if that’s the case, I think the majority of people in IT, especially DBAs, are doing well. It might not be what you want, but it’s a good living you’re earning.

I think there’s a lot more to life than money. Not that I don’t want to make good money, but there are definitely important things that aren’t related to money. Now it’s easy for me to say that, I’ve been successful, my wife works, and we don’t have trouble paying our bills, but I’m a long way behind the Cube. Hopefully most of you are in a similar situation.

If you want to get rich, and crack into the top 5%, earning more than $150k a year, likely you really need to start your own business. If that’s a goal, good luck and I’d love to hear about your trials and success. I’d also you to build a business you enjoy, make decisions you’re proud of and would tell your kids about. Be fair, honest, and work hard, and send me a note. Maybe I’ll even start featuring a few of those down home efforts here.

If that’s not your goal, I really hope you enjoy your life and get to do what makes you happy. That’s what’s important, or should be, to all of us.

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 ( 35.6MB)  MP4 iPod Video ( 31.6MB)  MP3 Audio ( 6.4MB)  Feeds are available at iTunes and Mevio To submit an article, rant or editorial, log in to the Contribution Center

“From the beginning to the end, losers lose, winners win” – 50 Cent

It’s not always true, and there are no guarantees, but it is clear that those who put effort into improving themselves, often find more opportunities and the chance to succeed.  The definition of success may vary among all of us, but I would guess that succeeding for most of us has something to do with accomplishing more in some endeavor. Whether that’s getting more work finished, or improving the quality of our craftsmanship, it’s a movement forward. It’s winning.

“Winners train, losers complain” – Brian Kelley

I was reminded that not everyone looks at the world as a war, or as a zero sum game. There are lots of people that view the world as an environment where we can each improve, and help each other do better than we might on our own. However we must work on our own. We must take the responsibility to do something, not just talk about it, and not wait passively by as life passes us by. We also can’t just complain about our jobs, about the demands we face, the compensation that’s lacking, or anything else.

This industry gives us the opportunities to change positions, learn new skills, and grow our compensation faster than many other fields. However it’s up to us to make the effort, stop making excuses, and start getting things done.

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 ( 15.4MB)  MP4 iPod Video ( 18.7MB)  MP3 Audio ( 3.8MB)  Feeds are available at iTunes and Mevio To submit an article, rant or editorial, log in to the Contribution Center

It’s August and for many people in the world that means that school will be starting sometime this month. My children have a little over two weeks left before they begin, with the mourning for the end of summer break already beginning. Some of us that work at a career for a living will also be starting school. People are pursuing advanced degrees, such as a PhD or MBA, while still managing a full time job, with their workload about to increase this fall as well. However most of us aren’t in either of these situations, and we go to work each day, but come home and (hopefully) enjoy the rest of our lives with family, pursuing hobbies, or some other activity.

However many of us do have some leisure time that we could redirect to another endeavor. Working in technology can be a stressful, time consuming job at times, but it can also be a fairly easy job, physically. Many of us understand our environments and can often complete our jobs in a reasonable number of hours each week. It’s also a job that often compensates us very well. However it’s a field that demands regular skill improvement for success, security, and opportunity.

With that idea in mind, I wanted to ask you to think about the rest of the coming year. If you aren’t overloaded at work, and you treat the next few months as the beginning of a school term, how would you answer this question?

What will you learn this semester?

Learning new skills can make your job easier (Powershell, administrators?). It might bring new opportunities or projects your way (Powerpivot/Powerview/Hadoop). It might even find you a new job, one that suits you better in some way if you blog about what you are learning and build a project. Learning is almost never time wasted, if you have the time in your life. Consider taking on a small project, working your way through a Stairway series or book, or learning some new skill this fall.

This time of year is busy for me. I have eight more flights and events booked across the next few months, and a few new presentations to develop and practice. However I’m hoping to find a few minutes each day to work my way through a C# book and improve my skills in that area. I haven’t built any front end software in years, apart from simple web interfaces, and I’d like to bone up some skills, which might bring new opportunities, but will also benefit my job where I need to create some content around the Deployment Manager product, in C#, and hopefully well done. No matter how it turns out, I’m sure I’ll have learned something, and probably had some fun.

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 ( 19.8MB)  MP4 iPod Video ( 23.1MB)  MP3 Audio ( 4.7MB)  Feeds are available at iTunes and Mevio To submit an article, rant or editorial, log in to the Contribution Center