10 years as Sql server dba but still fears of Interview and lack of Confidence

  • I dont know whether i may asking question at right or worng place but i have 10 years of experince in sql server admin but still i have sql interviews fears ,most of time i run away from giving interviews.My mind is always wandering that i may donot know answere of x/y/z question and it would embarrass me.i seriously donot know anything specially form tunning point of view.I want to gain confidence and that i know can come only when i have knowledge. that i want to test my knowledge of sql server admin.Where i can test my knowledge of sql server apart from microsoft certiifcates ??? website/link

    IS there any professional institute/firms/bodies were i can give interview and get rated.

    Please advice me

    Thanking you

    Anoop

  • If you search for interview questions for DBAs, you'll find a wealth of questions.  I also want you to be aware that, while the questions can be pretty good, some of the example answers such so bad that they have their own gravitational field.  Use the questions as a study guide and then figure out the answers on your own if you don't know them right off the top of your head.

    It's not exactly a DBA ONLY question but, one of my favorites it "Explain the differences and similarities between DELETE and TRUNCATE TABLE".  It's amazing how many supposedly smart people (they're supposed to be because they're posting interview questions, right?) get it totally wrong.  If someone got something that simple wrong, it would make for a very short interview.

    If you look into "Geeks for Geeks", they offer interview "training".  Again, consider it only to be practice and use it as a source of questions.  IIRC, they have question for admins and developers in two separate tracks that do have a bit of an overlap.

    My and, by default, your biggest problems with interviews is that the interviewers are frequently the same kind of balloon heads that are writing the questions on the internet and they're frequently just as wrong.

    If you're going on a DBA interview, you DO need to be well versed in all the correct configurations for SQL Server and you need to know BACKUP and RESTORE by heart.

    I can't give you any advice on any Cloud stuff because I don't work with the Cloud (hoping to retire before I have to).

    About your 10 years of experience?  Only you can know if if it will serve you in an interview or not.  I've interviewed DBAs that have never done a native backup and I even interviewed one "expert" on performance tuning who, when I asked him about clustered indexes, told me he'd never worked with one.  When I asked him "why not", he told be it's because he'd never worked on a clustered server before {head-desk}.

    Say what you know and don't be afraid to say you don't know but explain what you would do to find out and give an example of how you've done that in the past.

    And, remember... a DBA actually DOES need to know some SQL.

    --Jeff Moden


    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.


    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

  • I have a magic phrase I've memorized and you can have it too.

    "I don't know, but here's how I'd find the answer..."

    Now, you have to have a plan for finding the answer, and it really, really, should be more than "google it". And honestly, that, how you'd find the answer, is to me, what separates someone with 10 years of experience from someone with 1 year of experience x 10. So, do you have that answer?

    You know what you know. You don't know what you don't know. The only thing that's going to change that is learning, practice and experience. Of course then, youj start getting old and forgetting what you know. Ha!

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • Jeff Moden wrote:

    If you search for interview questions for DBAs, you'll find a wealth of questions.  I also want you to be aware that, while the questions can be pretty good, some of the example answers such so bad that they have their own gravitational field.  Use the questions as a study guide and then figure out the answers on your own if you don't know them right off the top of your head.

    It's not exactly a DBA ONLY question but, one of my favorites it "Explain the differences and similarities between DELETE and TRUNCATE TABLE".  It's amazing how many supposedly smart people (they're supposed to be because they're posting interview questions, right?) get it totally wrong.  If someone got something that simple wrong, it would make for a very short interview.

    If you look into "Geeks for Geeks", they offer interview "training".  Again, consider it only to be practice and use it as a source of questions.  IIRC, they have question for admins and developers in two separate tracks that do have a bit of an overlap.

    My and, by default, your biggest problems with interviews is that the interviewers are frequently the same kind of balloon heads that are writing the questions on the internet and they're frequently just as wrong.

    If you're going on a DBA interview, you DO need to be well versed in all the correct configurations for SQL Server and you need to know BACKUP and RESTORE by heart.

    I can't give you any advice on any Cloud stuff because I don't work with the Cloud (hoping to retire before I have to).

    About your 10 years of experience?  Only you can know if if it will serve you in an interview or not.  I've interviewed DBAs that have never done a native backup and I even interviewed one "expert" on performance tuning who, when I asked him about clustered indexes, told me he'd never worked with one.  When I asked him "why not", he told be it's because he'd never worked on a clustered server before {head-desk}.

    Say what you know and don't be afraid to say you don't know but explain what you would do to find out and give an example of how you've done that in the past.

    And, remember... a DBA actually DOES need to know some SQL.

    Hi jeff thanks for advice , i went by website you suggested geeks for geeks and i found it to more for programmers . .I didnt see anything related to DBA there hope i was on same site which you referring possible kindly dm me website link so i am sure i was on correct website .

    I am  what you call programmer dba so i know basics of sql but not good at that ..

    once again thank you

  • Grant Fritchey wrote:

    I have a magic phrase I've memorized and you can have it too.

    "I don't know, but here's how I'd find the answer..."

    Now, you have to have a plan for finding the answer, and it really, really, should be more than "google it". And honestly, that, how you'd find the answer, is to me, what separates someone with 10 years of experience from someone with 1 year of experience x 10. So, do you have that answer?

    You know what you know. You don't know what you don't know. The only thing that's going to change that is learning, practice and experience. Of course then, youj start getting old and forgetting what you know. Ha!

    Hi Grant thanks for quote , my problem is facing interview so i want to prepare for interview. I mean one can ace only if one had practice enough and thats what i lag (specially tuning part) .I mean on something which i not worked in industry i may work in home lab environment but you are not that confident enough to answer .I donot know i will update  more later

    Regards

    Anoop

     

     

  • anoop.mig29 wrote:

    Grant Fritchey wrote:

    I have a magic phrase I've memorized and you can have it too.

    "I don't know, but here's how I'd find the answer..."

    Now, you have to have a plan for finding the answer, and it really, really, should be more than "google it". And honestly, that, how you'd find the answer, is to me, what separates someone with 10 years of experience from someone with 1 year of experience x 10. So, do you have that answer?

    You know what you know. You don't know what you don't know. The only thing that's going to change that is learning, practice and experience. Of course then, youj start getting old and forgetting what you know. Ha!

    Hi Grant thanks for quote , my problem is facing interview so i want to prepare for interview. I mean one can ace only if one had practice enough and thats what i lag (specially tuning part) .I mean on something which i not worked in industry i may work in home lab environment but you are not that confident enough to answer .I donot know i will update  more later

    Regards

    Anoop

    It really is going to come down to what you know. You can memorize a bunch of interview answers, sure. And then they ask you something not on the list. What then? Or better still, they ask you an open-ended question. One of my favorites in an interview was this: You get a phone call. Someone is complaining that a database you're responsible for is running slow. What do you do?

    Now, there's literally not a right answer here. We're going to explore your thought processes and understanding of SQL Server and how best to troubleshoot it. This is what I mean when I say it's all about your knowledge and skills, right now.

    As for prepping for interviews, I do agree with this. I focus that prep on the organization I'm going to interview with. What do they do? How big are they? All this sort of stuff so when I go into the interview, sure, I'll answer their questions, but I'm going to have more than a few of my own. How big is the team? How do we integrate with development? Where are we with automating day-to-day operations? When was the last production outage and what was the cause? How did you deal with it? Interviews are a two-way street, and your focus should be on the stuff you literally don't know, the organization. If you've got 10 years of real experience in SQL Server, you should be able to answer most standard questions and then, when you hit something you don't know, you trot out my magic answer.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • anoop.mig29 wrote:

    Hi jeff thanks for advice , i went by website you suggested geeks for geeks and i found it to more for programmers . .I didnt see anything related to DBA there hope i was on same site which you referring possible kindly dm me website link so i am sure i was on correct website .

    I am  what you call programmer dba so i know basics of sql but not good at that ..

    once again thank you

    Near the top center of the page, they have a search box.  Search for "SQL" and that'll get you places.

    Of course, this site also has some more "advanced" stuff in their selection of "Stairway" articles.  There's a clickable link for STAIRWAYS at the top of this page.

    Being mostly a "Programmer DBA" myself, let me ask... do you know what a "Tally or Numbers" table is and how to use it to replace all sorts of loops, cursors, and recursive CTEs that read one row at a time to do something with?

     

    --Jeff Moden


    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.


    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

  • Jeff Moden wrote:

    anoop.mig29 wrote:

    Hi jeff thanks for advice , i went by website you suggested geeks for geeks and i found it to more for programmers . .I didnt see anything related to DBA there hope i was on same site which you referring possible kindly dm me website link so i am sure i was on correct website .

    I am  what you call programmer dba so i know basics of sql but not good at that ..

    once again thank you

    Near the top center of the page, they have a search box.  Search for "SQL" and that'll get you places.

    Of course, this site also has some more "advanced" stuff in their selection of "Stairway" articles.  There's a clickable link for STAIRWAYS at the top of this page.

    Being mostly a "Programmer DBA" myself, let me ask... do you know what a "Tally or Numbers" table is and how to use it to replace all sorts of loops, cursors, and recursive CTEs that read one row at a time to do something with?

    Hi thanks for revert and Sorry for late revert but i am short administrative type of dba so my may not be rright person to ans your query about "tally or Number"

    Regards

    Anoop

     

  • anoop.mig29 wrote:

    Jeff Moden wrote:

    anoop.mig29 wrote:

    Hi jeff thanks for advice , i went by website you suggested geeks for geeks and i found it to more for programmers . .I didnt see anything related to DBA there hope i was on same site which you referring possible kindly dm me website link so i am sure i was on correct website .

    I am  what you call programmer dba so i know basics of sql but not good at that ..

    once again thank you

    Near the top center of the page, they have a search box.  Search for "SQL" and that'll get you places.

    Of course, this site also has some more "advanced" stuff in their selection of "Stairway" articles.  There's a clickable link for STAIRWAYS at the top of this page.

    Being mostly a "Programmer DBA" myself, let me ask... do you know what a "Tally or Numbers" table is and how to use it to replace all sorts of loops, cursors, and recursive CTEs that read one row at a time to do something with?

    Hi thanks for revert and Sorry for late revert but i am short administrative type of dba so my may not be rright person to ans your query about "tally or Number"

    Regards

    Anoop

    Understood.  Be advised that I've found that even "pure" sys admin jobs require some knowledge of T-SQL.

    --Jeff Moden


    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.


    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

  • This was removed by the editor as SPAM

Viewing 10 posts - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)

You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Login to reply