Re: To be or not to be a DBA

Santhosh Kumar wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> I have been working in this industry for more than 6 years and have
> good experience in J2ee (Design and development) and Oracle
> (development and dev admin) (lots other like vb and c++, although they
> are not my primary skills).
>
> I had always been curious about Oracle and wanted to know in detail
> about the same. So around one and half years back, I took the
> certification and completed 8i recently. I started mere out of
> curiosity but learned a lot in detail at the end of whole process. Now
> I'm thinking, as I have completed the cert and also have good amount
> of knowledge in Oracle administration, to get into the DBA profession.
> As everybody else, obviously I'm looking for some lucrative career.
>
> Any suggestions are welcome regd,
> 1. Whether to get into the dba profession or not
> 2. Is dba is any lucrative career than J2ee architecture and design?
> 3. Or any other thoughts you have regd this
>
> Santhosh.

Lucrative? Not any more.

I have worked, over the years, in every capacity from designer to developer to DBA to instructor: Often all in the same day. Here's how answer your questions.

1. Depends on whether you enjoy the work? And depends on whether you will enjoy the job as it will be in 5 or 10 years or whether you are attracted to it as it is today: They are not the same.
2. If by lucrative you mean dollars I'd suggest you are motivated by the wrong thing and I'd prefer to not work with you. The compensation can be roughly comparable ... but your decision making process is one that gives me very negative feelings.
3. I already have. Your emphasis on money rather than on doing something you enjoy leads me to believe you are setting yourself up to be a very unhappy person.

-- 
Daniel Morgan
http://www.outreach.washington.edu/ext/certificates/oad/oad_crs.asp
http://www.outreach.washington.edu/ext/certificates/aoa/aoa_crs.asp
damorgan_at_x.washington.edu
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