This month Mike Walsh hosts T-SQL Tuesday. It’s been quite some time since he hosted (back at #4), but he answered my call for hosts and I appreciate that. He has a really good end of year invitation that asks us to look to the past and the future.
I’m trying to keep T-SQL Tuesday alive, but I’ve been struggling for hosts. I need more of you to host, and more people to blog.
Blogging is incredible for your career. Take some time to get started, and if you do nothing but respond to these monthly blog parties, you’ll look better than most other candidates for jobs.
If you want to host, ping me on X or at sjones at sqlservercentral dot ***.
A Message to Steve in 2015
The world seems to be changing quite quickly in in our lives. You bought a new Pebble watch this year, database automation is becoming a bigger part of your job, and there’s lots of data analysis you can do.
Power Bi is a tool from Microsoft that is going to grow in popularity and it’s a place you ought to invest. New places to store data, new features in SQL Server, new platforms for building analytics will appear, but Power BI is a place you should spend more time in and improve your DAX skills.
Learning to build better visualizations, especially for your volleyball coaching (which is going to continue for some time), is an investment that will really pay off in the future.
A Word from the Future in 2035
Steve,
we spent a lot of time early in our career working with networks, helping manage accounts, users, security, privileges, and more. That knowledge and experience helped us understand SQL Server and other database platforms as well from the security standpoint.
Starting in 2026, you need to revisit some of those skills, ensure you better understand how authorization and authentication works in the context of AI and agents. AI technology is changing the world, and it’s going to be heavily used by agents, but security and ensuring there are limits placed on them is going to define who has more success with AI and who has more trouble.
Take the time to ensure that as you engage with MCP servers, task agents with work, and evolve the way you use AI that you include governance in your efforts to protect yourself from runaway agents that might go beyond what you expect, or spend more money than you want them to spend.
Enjoy the next decade, it’s going to be amazing.