I had a very interesting conversation recently with a good friend of mine. She's at the top of her game as a first class enterprise DBA in a major medical institution. She was interested in my career advice because she'd recently received an unsolicited invitation for a higher paying job in the business intelligence (BI) field. While I won't talk much more about the specifics of that conversation, it's not a unique conversation. In fact, I gave an interview to SearchSQLServer.com a while back about how DBA career paths are more and more leading into an even better paying career in business … [Read more...]
Business Intelligence Careers SearchSQLServer.com Interview
Filed Under: Administration, Databases, Opinion, Professional Development, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication Tagged With: Business Intelligence, Career, DBA, Developer, SQL Server 2008 R2, SSAS
Free Webcast Series: Patterns and Practices in Database Administration
SSWUG.ORG’s virtual webcasts will prepare the “Accidental DBA” for patterns and practices they will experience in their role as a database administrator. I will provide easy-to-understand insights and realistic examples for professionals who have not had any formal DBA training. By the end of our four-part series, you should have the information needed to get up to speed on database planning, administration and performance tuning basics. Session Descriptions In the first session, you will see what is needed to fulfill the role of a (Database Administrator) DBA by learning more about what … [Read more...]
Filed Under: Administration, Challenges, Databases, Presentations, Professional Development, SQL Server, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication Tagged With: Career, DBA, Management, Performance, Professional Development, SQL Server 2008 R2, Training
Leadership, Management, and SQLRally
Transparency - A Great Leadership Quality I've always appreciated how Andy Warren (blog| twitter) operates in the most transparent manner, especially as it relates to his role as a director for the Professional Association for SQL Server. For example, Andy's latest blog post about prepping for the SQLRally, to kick off in less than 30 days, is insightful and gives you a good idea of the sort of work a strong director for PASS needs to put in. I also enjoy how Andy more or less thinks out loud and offers you the chance to provide your input. In that latest blog post, he was mulling different … [Read more...]
Filed Under: Conferences, Governance, Interviews, PASS, Professional Development, SQL Server, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication, Strategies, Video Tagged With: Career, Goals, Plays Well With Others, Professional Development, SQLPASS, Training
Funny Things You’ll Hear at the “Leadership for IT Professionals” at the 2011 SQLRally
The 2011 PASS SQLRally is just about one month away and it's high time I highlighted some of the important things you'll be hearing about in my precon seminar Leadership and Team Management Skills for the IT Professional. Just to set the context, many of us IT people got to our lofty career positions because of our keen use of technology. It takes a lot of smarts to get where we've gotten, but they are a very specific set of smarts that can't always be used in every business setting. And, since so many of us have topped out in our potential salary as long as we stay in the trenches and the … [Read more...]
Filed Under: Conferences, PASS, Presentations, Professional Development, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication Tagged With: Best Practices, Humor, Management, Plays Well With Others, Professional Development, SQLPASS, Training
SQLServerPedia Has a New Editor-in-Chief. Oh no, it’s Me!
Attrition has taken its toll once again as a few good friends move from being colleagues to being former colleagues. As a result of the folks moving on to bigger and better things, I'm now stepping up in to the roll of editor-in-chief of SQLServerPedia. This roll is mostly about checking on the quality of content produced by our syndicating bloggers to make sure that they're not trying to sell products or services and that their posts are of high quality. That's about where the official duties end, save for things like acting as a judge in big SSP contests. One new aspect that I want … [Read more...]
Filed Under: On-Line Resources, Professional Development, SQL Server, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication, TCD blog post Tagged With: Oracle, Plays Well With Others, SQL Server 2008 R2, SQLMag, Writing
Innovation and Invention: Whose Method Is Best?
There are a lot of reasons why I love The Economist magazine and pay over $100 per year for a subscription. First of all, it summarizes all of its news articles, big and small, in the first 4-5 pages of the magazine. Don't have time to read the entire issue? No problem, how does 20 minutes work for you? Second, it reports news from around the world as if the rest of the world actually matters, whereas every American news magazine I read looks at the rest of the world as an afterthought. You probably know me well enough to know that I travel internationally at least a couple times each … [Read more...]
Filed Under: On-Line Resources, Professional Development, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication Tagged With: Creativity, Innovation, Professional Development
Totally Awesome and Totally Free Training SQL Server Training
One of the things that I enjoy about working for Quest Software is that we give back copiously to the community. From activities and offerings like SQLServerPedia, to our free posters mailed anywhere in North America (and don't forget the free hi-res PDFs for the rest of the world), Don't forget that free DVDs of our virtual conferences featuring me, along with Buck Woody (blog | twitter) and Brent Ozar (blog | twitter) will be mailed anywhere in North America free of charge, now available at this link. Enjoy! -Kevin Twitter at kekline More content at http://KevinEKline.com … [Read more...]
Filed Under: Administration, Challenges, On-Line Resources, Presentations, Professional Development, Tips & Tricks, Video Tagged With: Best Practices, DBA, Developer, Professional Development, Training
Cloud Evolving, SQL Server Responding
Brent Ozar (blog | twitter) and I did an interview with TechTarget’s Brendan Cournoyer at last summer's Tech-Ed, which as turned into a podcast titled “Cloud efforts advance, SQL Server evolves.” The podcast covers all the major trends at the conference (like BI), virtualization features in Quest’s products (like Spotlight), Brent’s new book and MCM certification, and more. Here’s a link to hear it, appearing on 6/11/10: http://searchsqlserver.techtarget.com/podcast/Cloud-efforts-advance-SQL-Server-evolves … [Read more...]
Filed Under: Cloud, Databases, Interviews, Professional Development, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication, TCD blog post Tagged With: Azure, Career, cloud computing, DBA, Professional Development, SQL Server 2008 R2, Writing
Education and Career Resources from Microsoft and the Community
Sometimes I'm timely in getting the news out on useful resources. And, other times, I'm a bit slower on the draw. As I told friends back at New Year's Day, "As an official member of the Procrastinators Club, welcome to 2008!" On the other hand, it's always good to remind folks of great resources that are still available and on the shelf. Why? Well, the Internet hits us with such a deluge of constantly new material, that we often forget about the old(ish) stuff that's still really useful. Quest vConference for SQL Server One of the most popular teaching sessions I ever engaged … [Read more...]
Filed Under: Administration, Databases, On-Line Resources, PASS, Presentations, Professional Development, SQL Server, SQLMag, SQLServerPedia Syndication, TCD blog post, Tips & Tricks, Video Tagged With: Career, DBA, Developer, Professional Development, Quest Software, Training, Women in Technology
Video: Interview – Part 1: Quest Software
Heather Eichman interviews Kevin Kline, the former President of PASS and strategy manager for the SQL Server business unit at Quest Software. Originally Posted on January 24, 2008. … [Read more...]
Filed Under: Conferences, Interviews, PASS, Professional Development, SQL Server, SQLServerPedia Syndication, Video Tagged With: Career, Video, WorldView
