To help answer that question, I went to the PASS website to look for its mission statement. I couldn’t find it in the dropdown menus. I searched the site. No results found.

That’s disappointing.

And perhaps it explains why the organization is struggling as it is now.

The Mission of PASS

I served on the PASS Board of Directors from January of 2001 through December of 2007. I poured my heart and soul, not to mention thousands of volunteer hours, into the organization. I served in many capacities, including Executive Vice President of Finance, during some very trying times. In fact, I was in the EVP role when we decided the relationship with the former management company was unsalvageable and we needed to move in a different direction. But that’s another story.

Thinking back, I’m struggling to remember the official Mission Statement we had back then. I’m certain we had one.

But I remember well what my mission was. I know exactly why I served.

I served in appreciation for those who had gone before me in the SQL community, who had given freely of themselves so that I, and many others like me, could benefit from their experiences.

I served to create a place where we could connect with fellow SQL Server professionals and improve our craft.

I served to pay it forward to the up-and-coming SQL professionals who would undoubtedly surpass all I could do. I wanted to do for them what others had done for me.

I was but a small part of much larger effort. My role was tiny compared to those I served along side – both on the board and other volunteers. And that’s not false humility on my part. At times, I really was in over my head. But the team I served with was strong and we carried each other when needed.

Although I don’t want to speak for them, I suspect they served for the same reasons I did.

Connect. Share. Learn.

The reasons that I served those many years ago still exist today. I believe there are seasoned SQL Server veterans who still want to connect with those following in their footsteps. I believe that good data professionals still want to share with other good data professionals to sharpen their skills. And I believe still that our SQLFamily actively wants to help the next generation learn.

Connect. Share. Learn.

I did see that on the PASS website. Connect. Share. Learn.

That’s the closest thing that I could find on the PASS website that could be counted as a Mission Statement. I think those three words encapsulate why SQL professionals from around the globe are PASS members. Imagine, hundreds of thousands of people worldwide with a shared heart for the SQL Server community.

So, if we run with that. PASS has not outlived its usefulness or its purpose.

Are there other places to connect? Other places to share? To learn?

Absolutely. PASS has never had a monopoly on those things. It wouldn’t be healthy for the SQL Community if PASS did. But that doesn’t mean the community isn’t better for the organization’s efforts and presence.

I know I have benefited personally and professionally. The knowledge I’ve gained. The relationships I’ve made. The friendships that I cherish. I’ve certainly benefited from PASS.

An Organization on Life Support

But now, PASS is in dire straits. I don’t believe that’s been officially communicated, but we all know it’s true.

The pandemic has exposed and amplified every weakness in PASS’ operations and structure. From its complete dependence on in-person events for revenue to the way it relies on a for-profit company for senior leadership and staffing, every aspect of PASS that could be a liability has become a massive, potentially devastating death nail for the organization.

That grieves me.

I wish PASS was not in this predicament. I wish decisions had been made differently over the past 10 years. I wish there was a better revenue model. I wish there was a different arrangement with the management company. And, I wish the Board of Directors had a trusted advisor, one with sound business acumen, that could provide unbiased advice.

I don’t mean to cast stones. That’s not the point here.

I’m not second guessing any specific decisions or arrangements. Now is not the time for that. That time will come.

I hope.

But it’s not guaranteed.

Helping PASS

Let’s face it. Without support from the SQL Community that it helped nurture, PASS may not exist in 6 to 12 months.

It may not survive.

If you’ re like me, you don’t want to see that happen. You’d like for PASS to be around next year, and the year after that. Maybe not in its current form. Maybe not without significant changes. But at least still be around.

So, how can we help? How can we give back to an organization that’s benefited our careers and enriched our friendships? A few ways come to mind.

First, register for the PASS Virtual Summit. It’s 100% online so there are no travel costs. It’s reasonably priced, currently 599 USD for the 3-day event and 399 USD for a pre-conference seminar. Or you can opt for the bundle which provides 5 full days of training for 999 USD. That’s 200 USD per day, and you can access the content for 12 months.

Second consider buying a PASS Pro Membership. I know. You get almost nothing for that membership. It was a kneejerk reaction to try to bring in a bit of revenue. That’s OK. Just consider your PASS Pro Membership a vehicle to donate approximately 100 USD to an organization you support in principle.

Third, assuming PASS comes through this, scathed or not, consider running for the Board of Directors. Be the change you’d like to see. Applications are open until 9 October, 2020.

Objections

But wouldn’t giving money to PASS simply enable them to continue making bad decisions, decisions that I disagree with? Wouldn’t the money just go into the pockets of the for-profit the management company, C&C? Isn’t supporting PASS now the same as endorsing every decision they’ve made to this point? Besides, haven’t they lost their way and don’t they treat the SQL Community they claim to love poorly these days?

Those are tough questions, ones I’ve wrestled with myself. This has been a difficult post for me to write because there is an element of truth in each of those questions.

But I can tell you that I believe we are past the point of enabling, past the point of disagreeing on principle.

For PASS to be around to reform, it must first survive. And frankly I’m doubtful it can without substantial help. If we can help it survive, we can change it and make it better.

Has PASS Outlived Its Purpose?

I don’t think PASS has outlived its purpose. I think it’s just as relevant today as when founded twenty-plus years ago.

The question is: will it have a future?

I, for one, hope so.

[Edit – 10/2/2020] After this post was originally published, Chris Yates (@YatesSQL), the current Vice President of Marketing for PASS, reached out to me. The PASS Mission Statement may be found here. It reads: “Empower data professionals who leverage Microsoft technologies to connect, share, and learn through networking, knowledge sharing, and peer-based learning.”

The post Has PASS Outlived Its Purpose? appeared first on The SERO Group.

Free SQL Server Training Resources

Often these IT Professionals, sometimes called “Accidental DBAs,” do an admirable job, even with little formal SQL Server training. Fortunately, there are a lot of great resources available online for the “Accidental DBA.” Here are a few free SQL Server learning resources worth checking out:

1. Microsoft Resources and Labs

Microsoft has put together quite a few learning opportunities available to the public for free. These are in several different formats so you can pick the one you’re most comfortable with. Here are a few you may want to check out:

1. Microsoft SQL Server 2019 (CTP 3.2) Lab. In this self-paced lab, you’ll learn how to use SQL Server 2019 to solve business challenges.
2. Microsoft AI School. Artificial Intelligence is a hot topic in today’s business environment. In Microsoft AI School, you’ll “find the information, learning materials, and resources you need to start building intelligence into your solutions.”
3. SQL Server Tutorials. More than just Online Documentation, SQL Docs is a great place for detailed information about how to use SQL Server. It includes tutorials that will step you through learning the database technology.
4. EdX. Founded by Harvard and MIT, EdX is a place where education is freely available to everyone online. Microsoft has partnered with EdX to provide free courses online for SQL Server. Here are a few:
   • Querying Data with Transact-SQL.
   • Developing SQL Databases.
   • Analyzing and Visualizing Data with SQL Server Reporting Services.
5. Channel 9. Microsoft produces a lot of video content for SQL Server and other products. They make it available online via Channel 9.

2. YouTube Channels

YouTube can be a great resource for learning just about anything. From changing a tire to playing the ukulele, you can find it on YouTube. It should come as no surprise that there are a lot of great SQL Server training videos available as well. Of course, since just about anyone can create a video, you’ll want to be careful. Not everyone is the expert that they portend to be online. Do your own research. Here are a couple of places to start.

1. SQL Server YouTube Search. A list of SQL Server-related videos.
2. Microsoft SQL Server YouTube Channel. Microsoft SQL Server home on YouTube.

3. SQLSaturdays and Virtual Groups

For many years, I was on the board of Directors for a global user group called PASS. The organization is committed to providing learning opportunities for professionals around the globe and to helping the community to better connect with one another. There are a couple of ways PASS helps with this.

1. SQLSaturdays are a series of free one-day training events in cities around the world. These events, as the name suggests are held on Saturdays and are free to attend. They typically have some of the best and most well-known SQL Server experts around. Look for a SQLSaturday near you and plan to attend. You’ll see some great content and better yet make some incredible connections.
2. Virtual Groups. Through live webinars, PASS Virtual Groups offer top-notch training no matter where you happen to be. Check out a list of upcoming webinars.

Summary

With a new release every 18 to 24 months, keeping up with the latest changes can be a challenge. Hopefully, these free resources will help. We also have an ever growing SQL Script Library available to help get you started with some of the more common tasks.

Want to work with The Sero Group?

Want to learn more about how SERO Group helps organizations take the guesswork out of managing their SQL Servers? It’s easy and there is no obligation. 

Schedule a call with us to get started.

The post Want to Learn SQL Server? Here Are 3 Free Sources appeared first on The SERO Group.

That question haunted me some twenty years ago while I was in the early stages of building The SERO Group. I wanted more experience to better serve my clients and to better understand how to lead my employees and contractors. I wanted to be stretched. I wanted to be challenged and to be mentored as I assumed more and more responsibilities both from a technical and from a business-leadership perspective. Yet, as a young entrepreneur, I didn’t where to start.

I’ve since learned that many technical professionals wrestle with the same question. “How can I prove myself without being given the opportunity to do the job?” 

Fortunately, I stumbled upon a great opportunity. As the leader of a local SQL Server User Group, I was presented with a complimentary registration to the Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS) Community Summit. At the time, PASS was a fledgling group started by key individuals in the SQL Server community with the organizational backing and financial support of Microsoft and Computer Associates.

While at the association’s second annual conference in San Francisco, I met and got to know some of the leaders of the group. They asked me to help the organization grow by volunteering some of my time. I started by communicating with other local user groups from around the nation. Later I served on the Board of Directors and was responsible for conference operations. After five years on the board, I became the organization’s Vice President of Marketing and eventually the Executive Vice President of Finance. 

During my tenure on the Board of Directors, I was presented with the exact opportunities (aka challenges) that I had so desperately sought before. I was stretched beyond my comfort zone and guided in my growth. Before passing the baton to the next generation of leaders, I had: 

• Helped set the strategic initiatives and direction for a 250,000 member global organization.
  
• Provided the financial oversight and fiscal responsibility for a multi-million dollar budget.
• Worked with an incredibly astute group of colleagues to fundamentally transform the association’s management which helped to create a budgetary surplus for the first time in the organization’s history. 
• Gained a better understanding of business, leadership, and team dynamics.  
• Become an 8-time recipient of the prestigious Microsoft MVP Award for sharing my knowledge and experiences with the SQL Server community.  

Most years, it was time-consuming. Often, it was stressful. Sometimes, it was frustrating. But, looking back it was one of the most rewarding professional experiences of my career and provided an opportunity for unparalleled growth that I could not have achieved on my own.

Why volunteer your time?

I would encourage you to look outside their day jobs for career-enhancing experiences and opportunities. Why?

1. Gain and share your technical experiences. Local non-profits are often in need of professional assistance yet do not have the financial resources to pay for them. By volunteering your time with a local charity, you may have access to technical projects that are not available to you at work. Perhaps you can offer to help a local organization with some data analytics so they can better understand their donor demographics?
2. Grow and develop your leadership experiences. Leadership is a skill that can be learned and developed. However, this skill, like all others, requires practice and patience. Volunteering your time with a local Boy’s or Girl’s Club, the Boy Scouts of America, or Trail Life USA Troop can help you observe accomplished leaders in action while doing a good deed.
3. Broaden and share your business insights. Although charities and non-profits exist to serve their constituents, the organizations must remain solvent in order to accomplish their missions. By volunteering your time with a non-profit, you’ll be exposed to the business challenges and decisions that the organization is facing. 
4. Strengthen and extended your project experience. One of the benefits of working with multiple organizations is that you see different ways of doing things. Different strokes for different folks as the saying goes. By volunteering, you can quickly see a variety of different approaches to business and technical situations.
5. Make professional and personal connections. The world is full of really great people who want to “pay it forward” by unselfishly helping others. By offering your time and experiences to others, you’ll undoubtedly meet people like this. You can learn from them, perhaps even teach them something, and do more good together.  
6. Broaden and share your perspectives. Although we can learn from others, being immersed in an environment and personally walking through an experience further underscores and solidifies in your mind the lessons learned. With more exposure, you’ll have a broader set of experiences from which to draw. Plus you’ll be able to share your experiences with others. 
7. Create shared experiences. Life is enriched by the shared experiences we create. Social media is no substitute for a personal interaction with others. By volunteering your time, you’ll create more shared experiences with and for others. 

Don’t know where to start? I’d suggest starting with what interests you. Have a passion for helping local youth? Volunteer for Big Brothers and Big Sisters. Want to get into information security? Check out your local ISACA chapter. Love backpacking, contact the local hiking group. Follow your interests. 

By the way, the organization where I got started, PASS, is currently soliciting applications to serve on the Board of Directors. If you’re interested, check out the application form. 

Have a volunteer experience that you’d like to share, drop me a line or leave a comment. I’d love to hear it. 

The post How Can I Get the Experience I Want When My Current Job Won’t Let Me? appeared first on The SERO Group.

The journey would difficult at best. Yet now let’s throw in one more twist, a restriction that no seafaring traveler from old would agree to. Let’s say that you could only take one bearing during the trip. You could only consult the stars with your sextant but once, only at the very beginning. You cannot check your progress. You have no way to determine what adjustments must be made to your course to successfully complete your journey. You are, in effect, sailing without any feedback.

How do you think you’d do? Would you reach your destination? Or would the imprecise reading at the onset of the journey leave you hundreds of miles off course? Would you sail safely into the New World? Or would the unpredictable events during the year-long adventure affect your ability to succeed?

Of course, the likelihood of actually arriving your destination, of achieving your goal, would be near zero.

Yet, as leaders and managers, this is what we frequently do to our teams. We set their destinations (performance goals for the year) and expect them to accomplish them without any feedback from us throughout the year.

We withhold the frequent feedback that will help them to do their jobs better, that will help them to make the micro adjustments along the way to improve. Then once a year we unleash a barrage of shortcomings during their annual review. And they never see it coming.

If anything you say during an annual review is a surprise to a member of your team, the failing is not theirs. It’s yours. You didn’t give them feedback, important feedback, during the year to help them do their jobs. You didn’t help them to make the adjustments required.

Were they habitually late to meetings? You didn’t tell them that was unsatisfactory. Were they consistently blaming others when they missed deadlines? You didn’t help them to own all aspects of their projects. Were they having interpersonal issues with other departments? You didn’t provide the feedback so they could adjust.

If the feedback is important, if it’s worth dinging them on an annual review, why would you withhold it until the annual review? Why not give them the gift of feedback regularly?

Learn to give feedback. It’s not hard. It doesn’t have to be stressful. And your team will appreciate it.

The post Failing Your Annual Review appeared first on The SERO Group.

The post Unhappy at Work? The Choice is Yours appeared first on The SERO Group.

As we enter the last quarter of 2014, I’m reminded of a story by Mike Greene that I read recently in the Business Journals (check it out here).

Paraphrasing, the story went something like this:

A man walked into an old country store late one afternoon. As he wandered around looking at the merchandise, he was occasionally interrupted by a low moan coming from behind the end of the cash register counter. He continued to peruse the shelves until his curiosity finally got the better of him. He approached the counter and asked the store owner about the sound.

The owner nodded his head toward the floor where an old dog lay sleeping. “He’s napped there every day for the past several years. So much so that he’s worn the wooden floor down and an old rusty nail pokes him in the side as he sleeps,” offered the store owner.

The man looked questioningly at the dog and then at the store owner and wondered aloud, “Why doesn’t he just get up and move to another spot?”

“Good question,” replied the owner, “as much as it hurts him, I guess it’s not enough to do anything about it.”

The end of the year is traditionally a time to reflect on the prior year and to set goals for the next 12 months. As you consider the direction you’d like to take in 2015, spend some time thinking about the things you’ve been living with and ask yourself, “Do I hurt enough to change, to actually do something about it?”

It may mean making a career move or signing up for training to expand your knowledge. Maybe it’s seeking out a mentor to help you navigate the difficulties or uncertainties in life. Or maybe it’s something else entirely.

Whatever it is, resolve that come next December, you’ll be able to look back with a sense of accomplishment and pride in what you’ve done.

photo courtesy of freeimages.com

The post Are You Hurting Enough to Really Change? appeared first on The SERO Group.

Meetings are not free, even if everyone is local and there are no travel costs to consider. The loss in productivity alone can be staggering.

Personal Productivity at the Expense of Team Productivity

I used to just “grin and bear” it as the saying goes. I used to take my laptop to those meetings under the guise of “taking notes”. But what I was really doing was being productive on my own. I was sifting through email in pursuit of InboxZero. Or I remoting into a client’s server to do some “real work” while the meeting languished.

But I’ve learned that although I was being productive as an individual, I was contributing to the ineffectiveness of the team. My mental absence was hindering the team as a whole. My personal productivity was at the expense of the productivity of the team. In essence I was part of the problem, not part of the solution.

I’ve written about some of those experiences and my short-sightedness in a prior post entitled “Closing Your Laptop in Meetings.”  If you haven’t read it, I’d encourage you to do so and then take the challenge.

Conducting Effective Meetings

Something had to give. I didn’t want to spend scores of hours each year sitting in meetings that even most of the attendees would say was worthless. So, I did a lot of research and experimenting, looking for ways to make the meetings I conduct and the meetings I attend more effective.

I finally found a few critical points that have helped me immensely in making my meetings more productive. I’ll be the first to admit that these are not rocket science; they are common sense approaches that just seem to work.

Now, your turn. What techniques have you found for making meetings more effective?

The post Conducting Effective Meetings appeared first on The SERO Group.

My laptop, my security blanket

Recently, I listened to a cast about how to make your meetings more effective by leaving your laptop at your desk. “That’s just crazy; that’s pure nonsense!” I thought as I listened. “What will they suggest next? Adding cursors to your stored procedures to improve performance?”

Like most professionals, I’ve sat through more meetings than I care to remember. Some are very productive. Others, not so much. They seem to go on and on like a bad movie. How could one make it through such meetings without a laptop with which to multi-task?

Having a laptop with you is like having a security blanket. When a meeting takes a non-productive detour, you can turn to your trusty laptop and get some things done. At least you’ll stay productive.

I’ve been to some meetings where I was able to reach inbox zero while others belabored a really inconsequential point way past reason. And I’m not alone. I remember in one all-day meeting, I received a flurry of emails from several others sitting in the same room. Many of those emails were in response to questions I’d sent to them days or weeks earlier.

If at first you don’t succeed…

But as crazy as Mark and Michael’s advice sounded to me, they have a proven track record of offering good advice. Could this really be true? It sounded so foreign to me.

So I decided to conduct an experiment. For the next couple of weeks, I’d leave my laptop closed during meetings and devote my entire attention to the meeting. No more emails. No more remoting into a client’s system to check something. Just the meeting at hand.

At first it was tough, really tough. When a meeting seemed to take a nonproductive tangent, I instinctively reached for my laptop. Argh! It was missing in action! What had I done? Stupid, stupid, stupid!

But over the next several meetings I persisted. I stubbornly stuck to my experiment as hard as it was.

The Payoff

I found that it got easier over time. Not having the laptop in which to seek refuge forced me to mentally stay in the meeting. I was more engaged. I paid attention. I contributed more.

Soon I noticed that the meetings were better as a result. I realized that I didn’t have to sit back and allow the meeting to go astray. I could do something about it. I could subtly step in and redirect the meeting back on track by suggesting we take that point off-line. I could even do this in meetings that I didn’t run. It wasn’t very difficult; most people were buried in their laptop and not paying attention.

I also realized that what Mark and Michael had said was true. While I felt that having a laptop made me more productive, the meeting is not all about me. It’s about the group and making good decisions. If I’m being more effective as an individual, it’s detracting from the meeting and thus making the meeting less productive. That wastes a lot of other people’s time and costs the company.

When I closed my laptop, I was able to influence the meeting and the outcome for the better. I wish I’d learned this lesson years ago.

Excuses

I know what you must be thinking right about now. “Joe, you’ve spent too much time in the server room. Your brain has frostbite.” I know. I thought that at first, too. But give it a try. I think you’ll agree.

Mark and Michael talk about some excuses that people may have when you, as the leader of a meeting, decide to banish the portable computers from your meetings. I won’t recount those here. But I will give you some that immediately came to my mind along with my current thoughts on them.

• “I really need my laptop to take notes.” That really is an excuse. Almost everyone claims to need a laptop to take meeting notes, but very few actually do take notes with it. The temptation to do other work is too great. If you really want to take notes, and I encourage you to take notes, use pen and paper. If you must have them electronically, transcribe them later.
• “I need to be able to look up the latest figures at the meeting.” That may be, but reporting the latest figures to the group can probably easily be an action item that you take away from the meeting. Taking time during the meeting to look them up is not the best use of everyone’s time.
• “I need to have my calendar available.” Again, coordinating a future meeting can be done after this meeting ends. Spending an extra five minutes trying to schedule another meeting takes up valuable time during this meeting. Besides, if everyone was fully engaged in this meeting and decisions could be made, perhaps another meeting wouldn’t even be necessary.

For every rule there is an exception

Like the guys from Manager-Tools, I’ve found that not having my laptop open in meetings has made the meetings more productive. I think that’ll be the norm from now on. I’m even going to add this suggestion to the How to Conduct Effective Meetings Lunch and Learn that I give to companies.

There are, of course, some exceptions to this general rule. But I’m beginning to think that those are few and far between.

So what do you think? Do you take your laptop to meetings? Have you tried leaving it closed during the meetings? What has your experience been?

The post Closing Your Laptop in Meetings appeared first on The SERO Group.

Series Outline

• So I Got Promoted, Now What?
• Stop Doing Your Old Job
• Employ the Same Successful Tactics
• Get to Know Your Peers
• Get a Trusted System
• Manage Your Email
• Manage Your Calendar
• Start Having Weekly One-On-Ones
• Recognize the Tendency to Revert

How do you recognize an extroverted IT professional? Answer: He looks at your shoes when he talks to you.

That’s a harsh joke. It’s certainly not true for the people I know in the IT field, but it does illustrate a point. Those of us in the IT realm are not known for our exceptional interpersonal skills. It’s not that we don’t have interpersonal skills. It’s just that we tend to be more at ease when “interfacing” with other techies.

Being comfortable amongst similar people comes naturally. I’m reminded of the old sales axiom: People buy from people they like, and people like themselves.

Why Should I Care About My Peers?

Getting along with other IT folks may have been sufficient in your prior role, but as you get promoted up through the ranks you’ll need to extend your comfort zone to include a broader swath of the organization. Business is relational and you’ll need to be as well to succeed that landscape.

Why? There are many reasons. Here are but a few.

Learn From Your Peers

If someone has been in a position that’s similar to your new role in the organization, it stands to reason that they may have picked up some good insight during their tenure. I’m not suggesting that they’ll be perfect or that you’ll want to follow their lead. That’s probably not the case. You need to be true to your own style and make your own mark, but they may be able to help you navigate around potential land mines as you adjust to your new responsibilities in the organization.

Establish Lines Of Communication

In most organizations, a certain level of cooperation is required from multiple teams and departments. You must work with other groups to push the organization’s goals and objectives forward. It’s much easier to work with someone else when you’ve already established a professional relationship with him. People are more willing to go to bat for someone else if they know him.

Prepare For Future Conflicts

When two people interact regularly, there will eventually be conflict, even under the best of circumstances. The likelihood of conflict is escalated when put in the context of a stressful or demanding project. Some would even argue that the conflict helps to produce s better outcome. Regardless, those conflicts are less intense and are more easily resolved afterward if the two parties have already established trust and mutual respect for one another.

Vet Your Ideas Before Unveiling Them

As we come up with ideas for our department or the organization, it’s good to have a trusted colleague with whom we can share those ideas and get good and honest feedback. An idea that we conceive may have downsides that we haven’t considered. Vetting the ideas before announcing them will help you to improve the ideas and lay the groundwork for better acceptance of them when announced.

Expand Your Network

Let’s face it, business can be turbulent. Mergers and acquisitions, reorganizations and outsourcing, recessions and contracting economies all make for a very dynamic workplace. In such an environment, it’s good to have an extensive network of people who can help you if needed, or who you can help.

Ok, But Who Are My Peers?

That’s a good question. I’m reminded of the parable of the Good Samaritan where a young man asks “Who is my neighbor?” and learns that his true neighbors extend far beyond his confort zone.

Getting to know your peers means getting to know others both inside and outside of your current organization, those with whom you work regularly and those you only see occasionally, those who are in the same industry and those who work in complementary industries. In short, most anyone you come into contact with can be considered your peer for these purposes.

However, that’s a pretty ambitious target so let’s narrow it down a little for starters.

Peers At Work

The peers at work are primarily your colleagues at the same level in the organization. If you are the DBA Manager, your peers may be the Dev Team Manager, the Customer Service Team Manager, and the Quality Assurance Team Manager. Don’t limit yourself to one department or physical location; reach out to peers in other departments and locations.

You may also go up the promotional ladder a rung or two, depending on the culture of work environment.

Peers In The Same Industry

Trade shows and conferences offer great opportunities to meet other people in the same industry as yours. If you go to these types of events and only consume the information presented in the break-out sessions, you’re missing out of one of the most important aspects of the event. Networking (in the best sense of the term) is probably the most important aspect of these events. You can even participate when you’re unable to attend in person.

Peers In Complementary  Industries

During the course of your business day, you’ll likely meet people from other walks of life. Getting to know your suppliers, your customers, your service providers will help you to work more effectively with them.

How Do I Get To Know My Peers?

Getting to know your peers is not really that difficult. Little kids seem to have an innate ability to do it. If you go to a playground and watch for a few minutes, you’re bound to see a new kid arrive. At first he tentatively plays near the other kids, then before you know it he’s joined their game.

As we grow, we sometimes convince ourselves that it’s much more difficult than that. We start believing that meeting new people is hard. It’s not. If a little kid can do it, surely we can. Initially you may have a certain level apprehension or even anxiety about striking up a conversation with someone you don’t know very well. As you practice, it will become much easier.

Lots of books have been written about the subject. If you’re looking for a good starting point, try the classic How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. It’s a good common sense approach for becoming a good conversationalist. In general, it’s simply finding common ground and becoming a good listener.

Some specific examples of situations where you can get to know your peers may be:

At Meetings

Meeting are pervasive in business today. Our calendars are full of them, so why not use them as an opportunity to meet someone new? Arrive early and introduce yourself to someone else who’s early. Spend a few minutes talking with her before the meeting. Afterward, send a short follow up email. Something simple like “Hey Darlene – It was good chatting with you before the meeting earlier today. Here’s a link to the resource I was telling you about. See you next week.”

Small Tokens

Don’t be afraid to reach out to your peers with little acts of kindness. For example, if you occasionally bring bagels or donuts for your team, buy some extra and give them to your peer for his team. Let him be the one to give it to his team. “Hey Marc – I was at the bakery this morning picking up some bagels for my team and thought your guys may want some too. Enjoy.”

At Lunch

Of course, lunch is one of the more common ways to get to know your peers. “Let’s do lunch.” as they say. But you’ll probably want to be more genuine than that. I find that it’s typically easier to establish a working relationship with my peers first and then invite them to lunch. For example, after I’ve met and talked with someone a few times I may ask “Hey – I was thinking of trying the new Mongolian place for lunch today. Have you heard anything about it?” And then you can invite him to join you.

Start Today

The best part about all of this is that you don’t have to wait until you’ve been promoted to begin getting to know your peers. You can start reaching out to your co-workers, customers, suppliers, and colleagues in other industries now. What’s stopping you?

The post So I Got Promoted, Now What? Get To Know Your Peers appeared first on The SERO Group.

Series Outline

• So I Got Promoted, Now What?
• Stop Doing Your Old Job
• Employ the Same Successful Tactics
• Get to Know Your Peers
• Get a Trusted System
• Manage Your Email
• Manage Your Calendar
• Start Having Weekly One-On-Ones
• Recognize the Tendency to Revert

Constant Change

It seems that Moore’s Law is on its seventh double espresso. The law, which was originally described by Gordon E. Moore in 1965, primarily relates to advances in computer hardware. But given the dizzying pace of changes in all technology , I think it’s more broadly applicable to other areas today. The affects on IT Professionals is fairly obvious.

Can you name a database administrator, a solutions architect, a seasoned developer, or any other highly skilled, highly technical IT Professional that views his job as a run-of-the-mill 9 to 5 position? I can’t. Most successful people in our industry realize that in order to do their jobs, a certain amount of continuing education is required.

So over time, we’ve developed ways to keep up with the latest trends in our field. We listen to podcasts, read blogs, attend conferences, participate in user groups, and take training classes. These sources, among others, help us to do our jobs better.

There’s A Lot To Learn

It’s important to realize that once you’ve been promoted, your job has substantially changed. Many IT Professionals fail to recognize this shift and languish in their new role as Team Lead, Manager, or Director. I’ve seen it countless times at the companies where I’ve consulted.

Need proof? Think back to the first few weeks or months as a new database administrator or application developer. How much did you know, really know, about your job? At the time you may have thought you knew it all, but if you’re honest with yourself, you didn’t. Think about how much more you know now.

The same applies to your new job. You may feel like you know how to manage others and work at a higher level in the organization, but trust me when I say there’s plenty more to learn.

New Job, Same Preparation

That’s not to say that everything you learned in your last role is now obsolete. On the contrary, we can supplement that expertise with newfound and complementary knowledge and once again prepare to excel in our new role. The good news is that you already know how to do this – just take the same approach that landed you the promotion.

Dive Into Your New Role

In much the same way you seized your prior technical role and sought out every bit of information you could in your area of expertise, you can and should do the exact same thing in your new role. How?

• Seek out podcasts on how to manage a technical team. I like Manager Tools series of podcasts.
• Look for blogs that are dedicated to effective management.
• Attend a non-technical conference. Once again I hear good things about the Manager Tools conferences.
• Read books on effective communications and leadership. There are classics like anything from Peter Drucker and Dale Carnagie’s How To Win Friends and Influence People as well as more contemporary books like Good to Great.
• Join associations.

Expand Your Horizon

In your prior role, you may have found it valuable to learn some ancillary technologies to help you do your job better. The same is also true for your new role.

• Get involved with ToastMasters International.
• Read books about making presentations. Presenting to Win describes how to create an engaging presentation.
• Learn more about negotiations tactics.
• Look for opportunities to improve your budgeting and financial skills.

You Can’t Improve What You Don’t Measure

As a database or network professional, you may have found that capturing statistics and benchmarking data paid off in many ways. Metrics help determine when things are begining to depart from the norm. They can be used to help predict when upgrades will be needed. And they can be used to identify where the problem really is, and more importantly where it isn’t.

Metrics can be used in your new role, too. Capturing metrics can help you to justify new expenditures, identify gaps in your current levels and processes, and benchmark your areas of responsibility. Remember the adage: you cannot improve what you don’t measure.

Show Me The Money

Redundancy, high availability, and up-time are all good concepts and even measurements in some cases for technical people. We can see how they naturally help us to achieve our goals. However, oftentimes those concepts are a bit too abstract for other people, particularly those who may hold the pursestrings. In those cases, putting the concept or technology into financial terms often helps. For example the cost of a High Availability solution may be $200,000. That sounds expensive until you realize that the cost of being down for just one day is $500,000. In that case, $200,000 maybe well worth the investment depending on the probability of an outage.

The same tactics can be employed in your new role. Learn to associate your projects and requests with financial measures. Calculate the Return On Investment. The practice will help you to better understand the real need (or lack of real need). And it’ll help form a good basis for your request to your boss.

Carpe Diem

Although I couldn’t find a reference for it, I believe it was Tom Peters that once quipped “Nothing begets failure like success.” I believe he meant that once a company was successful at one endeavor, it was in danger of always trying to repeat that success and thus stifling true innovation.

As individuals, we are susceptible to that as well. If we, in our new job, continue doing the exact same set of tasks that made us successful in our prior role, we will doom ourselves to failure. However, we can employ the same fervor, the same passion, and the same tactics that lead to our prior success in our new roles and seize the day.

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