Last night I saw a tweet from Matt Gordon (b|t); the topic caught my eye – “How I Became A…SQL Server Data Professional”. The original idea spawned from Kevin who is known as the SQL Cyclist (b|t) over here at this post

I’ll have to fill in the blank the same as Matt Gordon has with “How I Became A SQL Server Data Professional”

It definitely was not a bed of roses to get to where I am at now. My story is the same as many others across the world in that I became a DBA pretty much on accident at the time. I was a developer right out of college writing code in a language called Progress (think Visual Basic). I still remember to this today seeing variables in the code that had been passed down for a while with the Gilligan Island characters; you know skipper = minnow + Gilligan.

Needless to say I spent three years at that job and enjoyed it, but with growth and thinking I could take on the world I wanted to spread my wings and fly a little bit; which landed me the next 8 years at a place where my groundwork for getting into SQL would really flourish. I was doing SQL development work sprinkled in with some .Net and quickly realized that I wanted to stick with the core engine. Not sure why but SQL just stuck; it was intriguing to me. How to make queries run faster, how to get the most out of the engine,  why were queries taking such a long time to execute. All these things kept running through my head. Doing database work was building me into becoming the DBA that would bring me to my next job.

It was at this job where I got my feet wet with what SQL Community, PASS Summit, and Mentorship was all about. It’s been 5 solid years since getting involved and it has been one heck of a ride. As I sit back and look at where I started to where I am today I would never have guessed it. If you were to go back when I was younger people in my past would tell you that if it wasn’t sports oriented I would not have anything to do with it. Becoming a SQL Data Professional is not just a job to me; it’s a passion.

As I sit here and reflect back to all those memories I’m thankful for each one of them. No, it hasn’t always been easy. I believe the harder times have molded me and made me into a stronger more durable Data Professional. Whatever road you take to become what you are remember one thing – it is your journey; your story. You are the CEO of your destiny. Rise and grind – get it done.

Summary

I encourage you to take Kevin’s initial request to heart and think about when you became what you are now. How did you get there? What roads did you travel? Hope you had a good time reading this post; as it sparked a lot of memories for me. I wouldn’t trade any of them for anything in the world.