SQLServerCentral / Editorials / SQLServerCentral.com / Bring Solutions / Latest Posts

RE: Bring Solutions

Gary Varga — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 02:11:47 GMT

[quote][b]marcia.j.wilson (2/21/2013)[/b][hr][quote][b]Keith Langmead (2/21/2013)[/b][hr]...The only issue I have with this idea is that it assumes you're capable of providing a solution, and it's quite possible that won't be the case. I'm quite capable of identifying a problem with an application or something for instance, but I'm not a developer, and I wouldn't know where to start in order to resolve it. The best I can hope to do it provide as much information as possible so someone with the required skills and replicate the issue and fix a solution to it.[/quote]Good point. The person that identifies the problem isn't always the one that can fix it. However, as a developer, I greatly appreciate those who try to provide as much information as possible, especially information that helps me replicate the issue.[/quote]Woah there ladies and gentlemen!!!I guess we are saying that in a mature environment that we would welcome issue discovery early and hope that, when raised, as much salient information is provided. Also we would look for the most appropriate person to resolve the issue which is not necessarily the discoverer nor the person who raises the issue.This thread appears to suggest that governmental departments are immature. For those of you who have heard the debates in Westminster I am sure that this would not be surprising.

RE: Bring Solutions

marcia.j.wilson — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 10:59:54 GMT

[quote][b]Keith Langmead (2/21/2013)[/b][hr]...The only issue I have with this idea is that it assumes you're capable of providing a solution, and it's quite possible that won't be the case. I'm quite capable of identifying a problem with an application or something for instance, but I'm not a developer, and I wouldn't know where to start in order to resolve it. The best I can hope to do it provide as much information as possible so someone with the required skills and replicate the issue and fix a solution to it.[/quote]Good point. The person that identifies the problem isn't always the one that can fix it. However, as a developer, I greatly appreciate those who try to provide as much information as possible, especially information that helps me replicate the issue.

RE: Bring Solutions

Keith Langmead — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 10:06:23 GMT

In terms of managers wanting to know the root of a problem, I think it depends on the manager. Most will want to know at some point, after all they're bound to be asked by their bosses. A bad manager will want to know what caused the issue while it's being fixed and you realistically don't have that information, a good manager will let you (and help you) focus on fixing the issue, give you time to analyse the issue afterwards and only then ask what caused it and what can be done to prevent it happening again.Assuming your manager is responsive to such things (if not there's probably little hope either way), simply telling them there's a problem does little more than put extra work on their desk, so little surprise it might not be appreciated. Giving them one or more solutions at the same time makes things easier for them, and they're far more likely to be receptive to any ideas you might have.The only issue I have with this idea is that it assumes you're capable of providing a solution, and it's quite possible that won't be the case. I'm quite capable of identifying a problem with an application or something for instance, but I'm not a developer, and I wouldn't know where to start in order to resolve it. The best I can hope to do it provide as much information as possible so someone with the required skills and replicate the issue and fix a solution to it.

RE: Bring Solutions

Jeff Moden — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 22:33:16 GMT

RE: Bring Solutions

kapfundestanley — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 22:21:14 GMT

In our industry solutions should really come under immense pressure.Business managers and users ask how long should we wait for the system to be up?Do I know? When I proactively prevent problems and systems are stable they wonder what I do in my office everyday. That is our job, provide solutions and create ideas that avoid problems at all.

RE: Bring Solutions

TravisDBA — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 12:26:14 GMT

[quote][b]Miles Neale (2/14/2013)[/b]By the time you add up all the federal, state, and local taxes, then add in the fees, licenses, social security, medicare, gas tax, phone tax, and so on some say you are paying over 40% of everything you make to some form of government. So we all already work for the government, they just do not pay us we have to pay them. We get a lot but they sure take a lot as well.[/quote]Agreed Miles, but they are not done with taking either. Don't forget Obamcare that's right around the corner.. That will kill most of the remaining surviving private business in this country. Only the private industry giants will survive that one, but like I said, they are slowly being federalized anyway. The government is playing PAC-MAN right now, and it is only the first phase of things to come.. Most people don't even realize (or even care) what is happening around them right now. :-D

RE: Bring Solutions

Miles Neale — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 12:22:10 GMT

[quote][b]TravisDBA (2/14/2013)[/b][hr][quote][b]Stephanie J Brown (2/14/2013)[/b]Fortunately, I don't work for the government..[/quote]Oh yeah? wait a while. With the way things are moving towards federalizing,borrowing, and offshoring everything today in our society, we will all be working for them soon, or at least until the country goes belly up and taps out.. Then it won't matter, because China will own us all.. Small and medium private enterprise is doomed in this country right now IMHO. They are being taxed out of existence, while large private enterprise is slowly being federalized by all the litany of government regulations they now have to abide by and enforce.. It's a brave new world now people. :-D[/quote]By the time you add up all the federal, state, and local taxes, then add in the fees, licenses, social security, medicare, gas tax, phone tax, and so on some say you are paying over 40% of everything you make to some form of government. So we all already work for the government, they just do not pay us we have to pay them. We get a lot but they sure take a lot as well.But I diverge...

RE: Bring Solutions

TravisDBA — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 12:04:31 GMT

[quote][b]Stephanie J Brown (2/14/2013)[/b]Fortunately, I don't work for the government..[/quote]Oh yeah? wait a while. With the way things are moving towards federalizing,borrowing, and offshoring everything today in our society, we will all be working for them soon, or at least until the country goes belly up and taps out.. Then it won't matter, because China will own us all.. Small and medium private enterprise is doomed in this country right now IMHO. They are being taxed out of existence, while large private enterprise is slowly being federalized by all the litany of government regulations they now have to abide by and enforce.. It's a brave new world now people. :-D

RE: Bring Solutions

Stephanie J Brown — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:59:40 GMT

While I agree with Steve that we are "problem solvers" (and per the discussion board, creative ones at that), I disagree somewhat with some of his other statements. While managers may not be interested in hearing the root of the problem while the system is down, the moment you bring it back up they DO want to know what happened, and more importantly how you will prevent it from ever occurring again.Unfortunately, managers often want to avoid funding the actual solution. For instance if you have a server running out of disk space, you'll get nickled and dimed to the nth degree with "can't you just remove some of the data to free up space" instead of getting a budget to asses the actual need for space and bring in the additional hardware to allow for growth. (We hope your company is growing if your space is! :hehe: )I've experienced most of what others have already addressed.- I help create solutions to business needs- I help resolve problems when they occur- I attempt to pro-actively provide solutions to upcoming issues- I get called "negative" if I point out a problem that's likely to occur, regardless of how many solutions I bring to the table- I get called "negative" if I point out the risks of following a particular path (some managers really don't understand risk evaluation and risk management)- The relative force of the "negative" appellation appears to be in direct proportion to the cost of the proposed solutions- I'm not supposed to work on anything without a ticket. (However, I can create my own tickets :w00t: )Fortunately, I don't work for the government. I applied back in my younger days and was rejected; my counselor told me it was because I was too smart. "The hiring managers won't hire you because you'd have their job in six months." I never did learn to dumb down the applications; I think now that was a very good decision.

RE: Bring Solutions

Miles Neale — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:40:52 GMT

[quote][b]john.martin 5194 (2/14/2013)[/b][hr]i am not saying we are not problem solvers.I am saying that problem solving is part of the journey in order to create something worthwhile.I see problem solving as a subset.When I approach life I ask myself what are we trying to create.This assists to prioritise what I tackle.If I see that solving problems is not trying to overcome an obstacle, but rather a step in the creation of something, my creativity and vigour are much more engaged![/quote]John,There is much to agree within this post. And this is well said. And I greatly appreciate the statement "what WE are trying to create." Finding a problem in an existing system and solving that problem we find that we are joining with the originator of the solution and recreating the solution into a more correct one. As you have found we cannot always start everything from scratch, we stand on the work of others and make it into a better solution. Thank you!

RE: Bring Solutions

Chris Harshman — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:36:04 GMT

[quote][b]TravisDBA (2/14/2013)[/b][hr]"We just can't go out and find problems on our own. The goverment sector does not work that way." I then replied "Oh, then that explains why the government is in the current shape it is in"[/quote]LOL this reminds me of a famous quote from a few years ago from the mayor of Cleveland:"The problem is we have a problem. It's not that we don't know what the problems are; we've known those for years. It's not that we don't know what the solutions are; we've known those for years. The problem is we haven't done anything about it."

RE: Bring Solutions

john.martin 5194 — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:32:41 GMT

i am not saying we are not problem solvers.I am saying that problem solving is part of the journey in order to create something worthwhile.I see problem solving as a subset.When I approach life I ask myself what are we trying to create.This assists to prioritise what I tackle.If I see that solving problems is not trying to overcome an obstacle, but rather a step in the creation of something, my creativity and vigour are much more engaged!

RE: Bring Solutions

Gary Varga — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 10:19:46 GMT

[quote][b]Miles Neale (2/14/2013)[/b][hr][quote][b]john.martin 5194 (2/14/2013)[/b][hr]Please do reflect on this:Let's be creatorsnot prbolem solvers.[/quote]John,Reflected and rejected! Not that I reject being creative, if you have read the post of the past you will find I have supported the creative side of this industry for over four decades. But I would also reject that we should be problem solvers and not creators.In this industry we have to be both. I think what Steve was getting to was that we supply the creative solution to simple and complex problems and that skill is imperative to success, and is highly sought after as a job skill. And I agree with him completely. You know this but I have to say it to make the point. You can create an excellent system that is highly creative and really slick on the backend with the best processing and database structure. And you can employ the latest bells and whistles in such a creative way that other skilled technicians marvel at the entire thing. But if the intended user looks at it and asks what does it do? And they cannot use it, you have been creative and have solved nothing. Your creation lays idle.Many in the past have echoed the idea that we are scientists and as such we analyze, visualize, speculate, prove, and apply. In short we are applying the science of IT to processes and problems to make solutions possible or easier. In this there is a huge demand for creativity, but there must be the ability to visualize, understand, and solve business problems or the work is only imperical, and theoretical. Einstein use to be able to visualize the flows of data and processes as waves of light in a multi-dimential universe. And he would play those waves like music in his mind until he found harmony, thus a solution. This type of abstract reasoning and problem solving is crucial to our industry but we also have to be able to visualize what others have done before us and how they were thinking to be able to find the problems they missed and to build on their efforts. So I reject the idea of one and not the other. We have to have the creative and the problem solving.[/quote]I concur.

RE: Bring Solutions

Miles Neale — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 09:58:50 GMT

[quote][b]john.martin 5194 (2/14/2013)[/b][hr]Please do reflect on this:Let's be creatorsnot prbolem solvers.[/quote]John,Reflected and rejected! Not that I reject being creative, if you have read the post of the past you will find I have supported the creative side of this industry for over four decades. But I would also reject that we should be problem solvers and not creators.In this industry we have to be both. I think what Steve was getting to was that we supply the creative solution to simple and complex problems and that skill is imperative to success, and is highly sought after as a job skill. And I agree with him completely. You know this but I have to say it to make the point. You can create an excellent system that is highly creative and really slick on the backend with the best processing and database structure. And you can employ the latest bells and whistles in such a creative way that other skilled technicians marvel at the entire thing. But if the intended user looks at it and asks what does it do? And they cannot use it, you have been creative and have solved nothing. Your creation lays idle.Many in the past have echoed the idea that we are scientists and as such we analyze, visualize, speculate, prove, and apply. In short we are applying the science of IT to processes and problems to make solutions possible or easier. In this there is a huge demand for creativity, but there must be the ability to visualize, understand, and solve business problems or the work is only imperical, and theoretical. Einstein use to be able to visualize the flows of data and processes as waves of light in a multi-dimential universe. And he would play those waves like music in his mind until he found harmony, thus a solution. This type of abstract reasoning and problem solving is crucial to our industry but we also have to be able to visualize what others have done before us and how they were thinking to be able to find the problems they missed and to build on their efforts. So I reject the idea of one and not the other. We have to have the creative and the problem solving.

RE: Bring Solutions

Gary Varga — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:18:58 GMT

[quote][b]Eric M Russell (2/14/2013)[/b][hr][quote][b]TravisDBA (2/14/2013)[/b][hr]I completely agree with Gary, it depends on the culture, particularly if you work for the government. They look at this a whole different way. For example, once I found a major problem with a system that I found totally on my own investigation. When i brought this up to my superiors in a meeting, the first question I was asked was "Who requested you to do this, and what is the ticket number?" I then replied "No one requested it, I found it through proactive research." One manager then replied "That is not the way we do things here. There must be a request from someone for all work done and a work order attached to it, since all of our hours have to be billed to someone or some department. We just can't go out and find problems on our own. The goverment sector does not work that way." I then replied "Oh, then that explains why the government is in the current shape it is in" That remark was met with complete silence. I was flabbergasted but after thinking about it awhile, that is exactly how our government works nowadays. Inefficiency at its best. It's no wonder the country today is broke and upside down. Look at the philosphy of the bozos that are running the show! :-D[/quote]LOL! The only way to change governement's mind about anything is in the voting booth.[/quote]I only wish that were true. No exclamation marks. No smilies.Unfortunately for a change to occur from the voting booth it requires that there be options on the ballot paper that would instigate change. Here in the UK I remain unconvinced.

RE: Bring Solutions

cdonlan 18448 — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 08:00:33 GMT

Nice article. For years now I've considered myself a creative problem solver who happens to work in the IT space.

RE: Bring Solutions

Eric M Russell — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 07:55:04 GMT

[quote][b]TravisDBA (2/14/2013)[/b][hr]I completely agree with Gary, it depends on the culture, particularly if you work for the government. They look at this a whole different way. For example, once I found a major problem with a system that I found totally on my own investigation. When i brought this up to my superiors in a meeting, the first question I was asked was "Who requested you to do this, and what is the ticket number?" I then replied "No one requested it, I found it through proactive research." One manager then replied "That is not the way we do things here. There must be a request from someone for all work done and a work order attached to it, since all of our hours have to be billed to someone or some department. We just can't go out and find problems on our own. The goverment sector does not work that way." I then replied "Oh, then that explains why the government is in the current shape it is in" That remark was met with complete silence. I was flabbergasted but after thinking about it awhile, that is exactly how our government works nowadays. Inefficiency at its best. It's no wonder the country today is broke and upside down. Look at the philosphy of the bozos that are running the show! :-D[/quote]LOL! The only way to change governement's mind about anything is in the voting booth.

RE: Bring Solutions

TravisDBA — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 07:46:56 GMT

I completely agree with Gary, it depends on the culture, particularly if you work for the government. They look at this a whole different way. For example, once I found a major problem with a system that I found totally on my own investigation. When i brought this up to my superiors in a meeting, the first question I was asked was "Who requested you to do this, and what is the ticket number?" I then replied "No one requested it, I found it through proactive research." One manager then replied "That is not the way we do things here. There must be a request from someone for all work done and a work order attached to it, since all of our hours have to be billed to someone or some department. We just can't go out and find problems on our own. The goverment sector does not work that way." I then replied "Oh, then that explains why the government is in the current shape it is in" That remark was met with complete silence. I was flabbergasted but after thinking about it awhile, that is exactly how our government works nowadays. Inefficiency at its best. It's no wonder the country today is broke and upside down. Look at the philosphy of the bozos that are running the show! :-D

RE: Bring Solutions

john.martin 5194 — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 07:43:14 GMT

Please do reflect on this:Let's be creatorsnot prbolem solvers.This means not even considering that we are solution providers - because having a solution implies a problem has to be solved.Rather what do we wnat to create.Within a family stting what sort of family culture do we watn to create.In an organisation, what are we creating?Compare that to what are we trying to solve!Solving something is a smaller viewpoint.If an organisation is actually doing soemthing useful, that that is what we are a part of. We are part of the creation of that something. The myriad issues that need to be resolved are because of the requirement to create something that would otherwise not exist. Let's see ourselves as part of a grander, more purposeful existence that just solving hundereds of problems. The problems are needing to be resolved because someone had an idea to bring into existence, to create a useful thing.

RE: Bring Solutions

GeorgeCopeland — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 07:33:20 GMT

Quite right, I deliver technology to solve business problems.

RE: Bring Solutions

Eric M Russell — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 07:24:33 GMT

[quote]Competition for jobs gets more intense all the time and the employees that look for problems and provide solutions without being asked will be the most valuable. They will stand out from their peers and are more likely to not only keep their jobs during down times, but will get asked to solve the interesting and challenging problems. [/quote]That is so true. Wherever one is, one should always strive to be the solution and not the problem. Follow that rule, and one will never be hungry from lack of employment. I've met a lot of people who I considered to be smart and even talented, however, they were also totally useless on a good day and a disaster waiting to happen on a bad one. I'm talking here about drama queens, passive aggresive types who sabotage the efforts of other team members, blind risk takers, etc. Those guys should be weeded out of a team when spotted.

RE: Bring Solutions

NULLgarity — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 06:40:09 GMT

Interesting timing for this editorial. In two weeks, I'm switching jobs for the first time in nearly a decade. Along with the switch, my title is going from Database Administrator to Solutions Architect. When I looked back at my career to date (> 15 years), I realized "architecting" solutions is what I've been largely doing all along, the new title just makes it a bit more official.

RE: Bring Solutions

Gary Varga — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 06:00:01 GMT

I find that it totally depends upon the culture. Some really value the proactive approach but others ask why have you spent time that they would have valued more elsewhere. I find the worst cultures are the ones that claim to be the former but are the latter. These are often the politically charged sweatshops which hire creative talent just to chain them up and then wonder why productivity goes out of the window. Ho hum.

RE: Bring Solutions

john.martin 5194 — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 04:33:58 GMT

Some years ago I was introduced to Robert Fritz (robertfritz.com). Hughly recommend him.One perspective he gives is this: Viewing ourselves as problem solvers is too small an aim. One aspect (minor) of this is that once we have solved all problems what then. Let's consider instead what do we want to create. That is is - but it is a major change of focus!

RE: Bring Solutions

herbaltea001-winter — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 03:28:30 GMT

[code="vb"][/code]In my limited experience, anyone who spends their time looking for problems, I.e. engineers and I.T. Support personnel, are often accused of being negative by those in marketing and h.r. management areas.

RE: Bring Solutions

call.copse — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 02:52:32 GMT

@archie No it counts as being a smartarse (actually I hadn't thought of your answer so it was mildly interesting).On the editorial, indeed, if you are someone who offers a smorgasbord of potential solutions and a decent reason for choosing one, it gives your boss one thing less to consider, and makes you if not indispensable at least a useful asset. It's definitely a good way to proceed.

RE: Bring Solutions

archie flockhart — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 02:26:14 GMT

In the graphic that illustrates this artlcle, you can save yourself the bother of working out the exact value of 2008 squared and then converting to mod 7, because the answer is the same as finding 2008 mod 7 ( which is 6) and then squaring it (36) and reducing to mod 7 again (1) ... does this count as "bringing a solution " ? :-)

Bring Solutions

Steve Jones - SSC Editor — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 21:19:11 GMT

Comments posted to this topic are about the item [B]Bring Solutions[/B]