Voice of the DBA

Tag: travel

  • Back in the UK

    I flew overnight and am in the UK this week. It’s a time for me to get into the office and get some facetime with various other Redgaters while I’m over. I usually go a couple of times a year to the office and spend time with co-workers, which I find valuable to build bonds and relationships.

    I was chatting with a friend recently who is remote. Most of his data team is remote, but there is a main office in another city. They are debating Return-To-Office guidelines, and they’ve required any new hires to be in the other city.

    That’s a concern to this person, and others. Should he consider moving or look for a new job? Is there a lack of growth in this position if RTO becomes mandated. In this case, this person would rather have a remote team that gets together once a year.

    Interesting idea, and I’ve seen this in the past when different positions when there were remote teams. It can be expensive, but it can be an investment. I’ll need to think about this and maybe write a piece.

    Not much blogging this week, as it’s been a busy time, so I’ll be back next Monday with a set of more regular posts.

  • A Quick Trip

    I’m sure some of you have gone on a quick business trip before, maybe even regularly. I’ve had a lot of travel over the last few years, and quite a few short trips to various cities for events or customer visits. I’m expecting a few other stretches this year that will be busy, but not like this.

    I’m off to London today, actually I left last night, and I’ll be there around 940a local time today. I am jumping on an 1130a flight Wednesday to return, so this will be a 50 hours trip to London. I’m going for the Redgate Summit, and I’d usually make this a week trip and get to the office in Cambridge, but I am bookended by prior commitments.

    Yesterday (Sunday) had to coach a team at a volleyball tournament in Denver. This coming weekend, I need to be in New Orleans Friday to coach over the weekend. I guess I could try to stay one more day and get to Cambridge, but I would like a minute to decompress at home. So back Wed and head to New Orleans for the weekend.

    Fortunately this type of trip is a rarity, but it has happened a few times in the past and I’m sure it will happen again.

  • Off to Live 360

    I am off to Live 360 today, on my last trip of the year. I’m excited to deliver two presentations tomorrow (VSTH03 and VSTH12), but a little sad this is a very quick trip. I’m coming back Friday, so in total I’ll be in Orlando for about 43 hours, I need to sleep, so my time is less than that.

    I haven’t been to this conference in a few years, but I’m looking forward to going back, even though it’s a short trip. I always enjoy these multi-tech conferences because I get the chance to learn something completely out of my area. In my limited time, I’ll learn about Shift Left DevOps security, because it’s interesting and Brian is a friend. I will also try to hit a GraphQL session since I know nothing about it and it works with various db stores. If I can, I might do some prompt engineering as well.

    If you’re at the event, I’ll try to swing by Wed afternoon and be there all day Thur. Feel free to stop me and say hi.

  • Off to the PASS Data Community Summit 2024

    As this publishes, I’ll get taxiing down the runway at DIA (fingers crossed) and flying to Seattle for the PASS Data Community Summit 2024.  I’m very lucky that I get to attend this conference most years, even when I wasn’t selected to speak by the program committee. I wasn’t picked this year, but Redgate has given me a few tasks, so off I go.

    If you’re attending the event, please stop my and say hi. I always enjoy meeting new people at the event and networking is one of the big reasons to go to a conference. Please, meet people. If you don’t want to meet me, meet others.

    Ref: If you’re not convinced, read this: .

    If you aren’t attending, you can watch some stuff on a livestream. I’m trying to get a full time stage/set up for the whole week, and I didn’t get it this year, but I’ll try for next year again.

    You can also get on-demand access to the content if you want.

    I had commitments last night in Denver, so I moved my flight to this morning. A relatively quick summit for me, as I’ll get there today and then leave Fri afternoon, but it will be great and I’m looking forward to the adventure.