As I sit here in an offshoot of the convention center, I started reflecting back to this morning’s keynote for various reasons. It got me thinking about 3 key words for myself when it comes to this conference:
- Impact
- SQL Family
- Dedication
How did I come to these three key words for myself? I’m not sure I can do them justice or at this time even provide detailed thoughts as my mind is in overdrive right now. I don’t like blogging anything without a good proof read by a second pair of eyes, but in this case I’ll type now and ask for forgiveness later.
Impact
I’ve seen this all week thus far from the SQL Saturday meeting I attended on Monday, the after parties I have the fortunate opportunity to attend, to the keynote shared today and the PASSion Award winner. Stop a minute, look around you. The hustle and bustle of the conference is everywhere around you. From first timers being overwhelmed, yes we were all in that situation at some point in time, to the speakers heading to their sessions, to the vendors spending all day at their booths. You may ask how is that related to impact? Believe it or not each person here at the PASS Summit has impacted someone or somebody in their career whether you know you have or not. The Keynote given today did just that, each speaker today spoke to someone in that room. If it wasn’t you then they reached someone else.
SQL Family
I’ve had numerous conversations with friends, SQL Family members, people I have no clue who they are, and people who came up to me and knew me and introduced themselves. As I sat at the bloggers table this year I stood up and looked back at the audience and was amazed that we do in fact have a close-knit technical community who enjoys learning immensely. That’s evident by everyone being here. As a SQL Family there will be times when people are struggling, and yet I see from all over this convention people encouraging each other. It will not always be easy; it wasn’t meant to be easy. Hard work and dedication goes into one’s career and I iterate that it is an awesome sight for me to see people in careers bond together to forge new relationships, expand existing ones, and help encourage where they can.
Dedication
Today I had goose bumps as Dr. Nehme and Dr. Dewitt announced that this would be their last Keynote. First of all what an inspiration these two individuals have been for our community. As I looked at them I thought about some others in terms of dedication:
- Volunteers – have you thanked anyone today?
- Speakers – do you know how much work goes into preparing to speak?
- Attendees – you are dedicated; if you weren’t then you wouldn’t be here
- Vendors – vendors are interacting all day long along with setting up their booths etc. Job well done this year.
- Sponsors – if it wasn’t for these fine folks then we wouldn’t be able to attend what is being put on for us.
**Humbled to be here….thankful for the opportunity….and looking forward to moving this community forward.
