Get Out There and Challenge Yourself

It’s been almost five months since I posted my last article, and so much has changed since then. I have a new job, a new house, a new address, and of course a new mortgage.

I had been working as a DBA for Wells Fargo Securities for nearly 15 years when I decided that I could no longer grow in that role. I had a lot of good years at the bank, and I will definitely miss all of my friends. But in order for me to be happy, I really needed a change. My decision to move was more about needing to break loose from the daily routine of checking error logs, backup jobs, and dashboards. I really needed a job that challenged me, so that I could gain even more knowledge about SQL Server. There was only one place I felt I could get that type of challenge in a job. So I decided to apply at Microsoft. I figured since I loved SQL Server so much, there was no better place to learn more about it than from the company that developed it.

After talking to a number of friends that already worked at Microsoft, I decided to focus on the Premier Field Engineer positions for SQL Server. A Premier Field Engineer, or PFE for short, is focused on directly supporting a customer whether it’s over the phone or being onsite with them. The type of tasks performed by a PFE can vary greatly. It could be simple performance troubleshooting, delivering training, or something more in-depth such debugging minidumps. Just the thought of not knowing what problems lay ahead, just sounded like so much fun.

The entire process took about six months, from the first day I submitted my resume to the day I was offered a job. This may sound strange, but I really enjoyed the interview questions, because I felt like it help validate my knowledge of SQL Server.

I have already been working onsite with customers, and so far, I have no plans to go back to a normal DBA job. I’m glad that I had the courage to leave such a good job and to challenge myself in my career goals. Most of all, I’m glad that I have a wife who is very supportive of such a gamble.

For those of you out there that might feel stuck in a boring DBA job, find a way to take a gamble. You don’t have to leave a great company, but you might be able to find a way to make your job more interesting. Start simple, such as learn more about SQL Server and then teach your coworkers. That’s how it all started for me. I started reading more and more about SQL Server, then I tried to pass that knowledge onto the junior DBAs on my team. From there, I got into public speaking at user groups and SQL Saturdays. I started small and with every win, I kept challenging myself to do more. So get out there and start challenging yourself, just as I did.