The Mentoring Experiment

  • Comments posted to this topic are about the item The Mentoring Experiment

  • Steve, this is a fantastic opportunity, thank you!

    Rich

  • Within the next 5-7 years my career will be over and finally, I will retire up north to my cottage where I expect, for the first time in my life, to do absolutely nothing - if I can pull that off. As I look back over 30+ years in this business I think the greatest gems of advice I have gotten were from dedicated mentors - far more so than say my postgraduate degree or any 'formal' education - and a good mentor's advice extends way beyond merely answering a simple question as it can set the course for a mentee to learn how to answer their own questions.

    I think what you and Andy are doing is simply great. I am a little confused because your mentoring web says that you are taking only SQL professionals - so I hope you realize that true mentoring has less to do with a given product, than it does with the person involved, but I still think you've got a great idea going there and I wish you success with it.

    Well done gentlemen! A great idea, and I hope it takes off for you!

    There's no such thing as dumb questions, only poorly thought-out answers...
  • Brilliant!

    Now if we could get more organizations to recognize the need for mentoring programs and start establishing them.

    I started to say "companies", then remembered a newspaper article I read about a city using mentoring programs as a way to cut down on gang related violence.

    Not quite what we're talking about here, but the concept definitely applies to all areas of life...

  • Blandry, we kept the focus on SQL as one of the ways we scoped the experiment to keep it manageable. Absolutely mentoring goes beyond SQL, even beyond career. We wouldn't be disappointed if we could find a way to serve a lot bigger chunk that just SQL!

  • I think the idea of mentoring is fantastic. I am fairly new to SQL and I know that I struggle all the time just trying to get the exact data back. So far I have had to learn the old fashion way, books and trial and error. So the idea of this out there gives us newbies some comfort in the knowledge that not all is lost when we try something new. THANKS :w00t:

  • I know mentoring was a huge part of my last career. I hope that some of the more timid people break out of their shells to be part of this, because more often then not their ideas and thoughts go unheard when they're valid and needed. Mentoring brings to the surface a greater person and a better career experience.

    Here's hoping for a good mentoring experiment.

    Cheers,

    Gabe

  • blandry (4/20/2011)


    I think what you and Andy are doing is simply great. I am a little confused because your mentoring web says that you are taking only SQL professionals - so I hope you realize that true mentoring has less to do with a given product, than it does with the person involved, but I still think you've got a great idea going there and I wish you success with it.

    Well done gentlemen! A great idea, and I hope it takes off for you!

    It's a limited experiment for now, and we have knowledge and friends in the SQL community that we trust. Likely we will open this up generally in the future as we learn some lessons.

  • I'm always interested when people rediscover the master-journeyman-apprentice system, or pieces of it. It solves so many problems.

    - Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
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  • Steve, Andy may I congratulate you and those you select as mentors on this endeavor. Microsoft should add an award for the two of you.

    MVPE .. Most Valued Professional Extraordinary

    If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something.

    Ron

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  • Sounds like a great program!

    Dan

    If only I could snap my figures and have all the correct indexes apear and the buffer clean and.... Start day dream here.

  • Mentoring seems to be the theme of the day. I just received an e-mail from a company on mentoring.

    If any of you received the same e-mail should we be concerned that they clam to have super powers that include Mentor x-ray vision? :ermm:

    Dan

    If only I could snap my figures and have all the correct indexes apear and the buffer clean and.... Start day dream here.

  • And all this time I thought reading your daily editorials, you were already being a mentor to me.

    Good luck with the project!

  • Thanks, and I hope it does go well. I'll be writing about it more.

  • I see that one can register to be mentored, and that you have a list of Mentors. Is there a process to expand on the list of mentors?

    Jason...AKA CirqueDeSQLeil
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