I cant speak directly for DBAs, but as a developer for many years I always responded to people the same way when they used to ask what I did for a living...

"I am a digital prostitute. I will do it for you any time, any place, any way you want it - for a price" and day after day that is what I did - pretty much the same thing over and over again.

These days, now that I oversee a large staff of developers I have found a couple things most important of all for my people - regular verbal thanks for their work, consistent positive encouragement, and ensuring they know my door is always open for any personal concern they have.

We should all remember that nothing any of us is working on right now is going to last. If its around for 5-10 years, you're very lucky. Its just bits and bytes and if you pull the plug, anyone's "extraordinary" work just vanishes. In short, we are not building pyramids that will be around for a few thousand years - we're just building digital kingdoms that have no physical existence.

With that in mind, do great work because that speaks to your own self-respect. Don't sweat or argue over silly particulars because none of the work is going to last. If you've got an inflated ego, leave it at home cause we are not curing cancer, or bringing peace to the world - in fact we're likely just counting widgets. Don't take yourself too seriously and have fun in the simple "doing" of the work. Most of all, put your family and friends first - they are people. What you do at the office is nothing more than shuffling electrons around.