Blogging and Community: A Journey of Self-Improvement and Learning

For a change, this won’t be a technical blog but more of personal one. I’ll write about my experiences writing blogs, presenting sessions and the effect it has had on my career.

How it all started

When I started in my current job in September 2011, I had no idea about anything community, SQL Saturdays and other community events. It just never came up. This started to change when I had to google to solve issues. Not only was I amazed by the amount of blog posts out there connected in some way to the issues I was facing, it also gave the first hints of a community. Because the people writing blog posts were describing experiences at events.
Many of these events were somewhere abroad, mostly in the USA. Which for me translated as unreachable.

Fast forward a few years. I found out about events in Europe and, even better, in my own country! That’s when I, an introvert, ran the gauntlet of SQL Saturday Holland. All of a sudden, the people who wrote blogs became real people. And no way I was going to walk up to them! Because I’m a nobody and they are the rock stars. Right?

But, this first experience was quite amazing; even though I kept to myself all day. I experienced first hand the amazing sessions Hugo Kornelis can create. I saw the legendary Ola Hallengren. As I was digging my way into SQL Server at the time, I had a blast. And knew, I’m going back next year.

The next few years were spent in the shadows. I was there absorbing knowledge but totally without confidence to talk to other people. As a small side note, at the time groups were standing in full circles effectively blocking out newcomers and introverts. Nowadays we are encouraged to for a U-shaped group to encourage people to join us.

Little did I know about what the future held.

The first leaps forward

At some point in time, I attended a pre-con by Brent Ozar and he suggested that to improve your learning, you need to start writing blogs. That suggestion hit home; I can write things. Next Monday I went up to our resident marketing person and shared an idea; what if I write blogs about something SQL Server, not too technical, and we publish it on the company website? It took some convincing but in the end we found a way that worked.

This meant I had to put in some work. Writing flimsy things for myself is vastly different than explaining something in a way most people can understand. Let’s just say my first blogs weren’t the best and let’s keep it at that. But over time, improvements came and more inspiration hit. The thing is, I was looking for more freedom to write. At that point I decided to get my own website. As hosting websites isn’t my forte, I decided to get a subscription at WordPress. 5 minutes work and done. I am able to blog about whatever I wanted to.

The first year, I had around 200 visitors. And that made me very happy, 200 people had seen my blog, opposed to the 0 before. Next year, a few more people visited my blog but no large numbers. It’s easy to get discouraged by these things but please don’t. The first three years you’re just building an audience and honing your skills. It does take time and it is difficult. There will be times when you think you’ve written the best post ever, only to see it attract ten readers. Don’t give up when that happens, learn from it and ask someone to read the blog and give you feedback.

The major effect that blogging had, and still has, on my work is that it improved my communication with customers massively. Because of the experience and feedback I get, my explanations to customers get more structured. They are a match with their level of knowledge and they contain some sort of storyline making it easier to read and digest.

Welcome to the danger zone

In 2020, I was sitting at home scrolling through my twitter feed and I found a tweet about an online conference looking for new speakers. The idea of speaking had been there for some time and I had presented things in my company. I loved doing that and was wondering how to take the next step. New stars of data was that next step. I thought about it for some time and on a very warm summer evening I decided to go for it. Create an account on Sessionize, submit an idea and see what happens. Next thing I know I’m accepted and got to present a session.

The first time was very scary, yet I got through it. The next ones were very different in quality. Some were good, others were average at best. It happens, we’re all humans and can have an off-day. Again, don’t be discouraged by that. Learn from it and move on. And yes, it’s much easier to write that down than to actually do that.

Fast forward a bit and I’m presenting at multiple online and in-person events. Standing in front of a live crowd can be scary, but it can be a thrill ride as well. As a speaker put it, you’ll find there’s a difference between being very excited and being scared.

Something you have to be prepared for when speaking is feedback. Some people can be harsh, a lot of the times it’s nothing else than ‘great session’. Though lovely to hear, you won’t learn from that. At times I’m seeking out people and ask them for feedback and when I get the feeling they are holding back, I push a little. This has lead to incredible learnings, improving my presentations with each iteration.

In my work, this has helped as well. Every time I’m explaining something to a customer, I’m giving a mini session. Every time I’m explaining something to a coworker, I’m presenting. And my experience at the community sessions is a massive help in getting better at doing that.

Turn that around, if you’re doing a lot of these mini sessions, chances are you can become a community presenter as well.

Another bonus of speaking is that you’ll become part of the community where people start a conversation with you. The people I mentioned at the start of blog? I meet them regularly and have a good chat. So no more hiding in the shadows but a happy part of the data family. On the other hand, when my introvert takes over, no questions are asked. I can be who I am. And so can you.

Finally, when presenting a session, some technical mishap can occur. Like this weekend when I presented a session in Glasgow, the HDMI connection failed. It was fixed but as a presenter, you have to accept, adapt and move on.

This helps in your job as well where you can prepare for many things but still things can go wrong. And you have to be able to adapt to that. Not only when writing code and testing it, but also when communicating with customers.

Concluding

Because the community inspired me to start sharing knowledge, welcomed my contributions and provided much feedback to improve, I’ve gotten better at sharing knowledge, better at communicating and became a better human. Both in the community and at my work.

It also broadened my network, my world and my view on everything data platform. I’ve met a lot of people who are the same species. Humans willing to learn, share and connect. And help in any way possible.

If you want to learn more, you can go and visit the New Stars of Data website, a great starting point to many other sites where you can learn, improve and be all you can be.