{"id":83,"date":"2014-09-24T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-01-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sqlhammer.com\/blog\/let-your-burdens-drive-you-forward"},"modified":"2026-03-18T21:51:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T21:51:15","slug":"let-your-burdens-drive-you-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/2014\/09\/24\/let-your-burdens-drive-you-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Let your burdens drive you forward"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few nights ago my wife and I were talking over dinner. We were discussing her co-worker\u2019s behaviors regarding stress and deadlines. For the sake of this post let us call this person Jill. Jill is responsible for a work load large enough for two people to fill their time. This puts her at a disadvantage right out of the gate and causes a lot of stress. This is a difficult position but the people around her look down upon her for not being responsive, delaying tasks excessively, and producing poor quality work.<\/p>\n

Up to this point I think that we all can feel for Jill. After analyzing anecdotes of her performance I began to realize that Jill had an opportunity for a positive relationship with her co-workers but, instead, crumbles under her work load and causes even more problems. For example, Jill is regularly seen socializing for hours at a time in the hallway and then walks into a meeting where she explains that she didn\u2019t get her work done because she has too much to do. Another example, after being at work for three hours, Jill is approached by a co-worker asking if she has seen her new action items yet. The action items were sent the night before and Jill\u2019s response is, \u201coh, I haven\u2019t logged into the system yet. I\u2019ll check it in a second.\u201d After three hours in the office she hasn\u2019t logged into the system yet.<\/p>\n

We put ourselves in Jill\u2019s shoes and theorized that this might be a cycle out of her control. Some people, when they feel stressed or overwhelmed, will avoid the stressors. This provides momentary relief, but when the stressor is an inbox that is too full, then the avoidance does nothing other than elevate the stress. In addition, the people around Jill see her avoidance. This makes them attribute any failures as truly Jill\u2019s failures and not a product of being over worked. This also prevents management from hiring because they see the issue as a disciplinary issue and not a capacity issue.<\/p>\n

This brings us around to our moral of this story. We are all bound to be in a challenging position but how we act in that situation is what defines us as professionals.<\/p>\n

If you let your burdens bend you, they will only push you down. But, if you stand tall, they can drive you forward.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Forgive my lack of artistic skills. The jet-pack represents the force of your burden.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

\"\"Written by Derik Hammer of SQL Hammer<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Derik is a data professional focusing on Microsoft SQL Server. His passion focuses around high-availability<\/a>, disaster recovery<\/a>, continuous integration, and automated maintenance. his experience has spanned long-term database administration, consulting, and\u00a0entrepreneurial ventures.<\/p>\n

Derik gives the SQL community credit for plugging the gaps in his knowledge when he was a junior DBA and, now that his skills have matured, started SQLHammer.com<\/a> as one small way to give back and continue the cycle of shared learning.<\/p>\n

Derik is the owner and lead author of SQL Hammer, a Microsoft SQL Server resource<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For more information, visit http:\/\/www.sqlhammer.com<\/a>. Follow Derik on Twitter<\/a> for SQL tips and chat<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A few nights ago my wife and I were talking over dinner. We were discussing her co-worker\u2019s behaviors regarding stress and deadlines. For the sake of this post let us call this person Jill. Jill is responsible for a work load large enough for two people to fill their time. This puts her at a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":567,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":346,"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83\/revisions\/346"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sqlhammer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}