I just realized that I have not written a blog post since the end of May. Instead of backfilling let’s just start again here towards the end of September.

New Career, New Adventures, Still Training

First, the big news. After 17 years as a Senior Technical Instructor for New Horizons, I made the decision to make a career change. On June 3rd, I joined Microsoft as a Premier Field Engineer for SQL Server.

The first three months were filled with training on Microsoft culture and processes. I even had to take two courses on how to teach technology classes. I have already achieved accreditation for the delivery of three workshops.

• SQL Server: Performance Tuning & Optimization
• Writing High-Performance Queries
• SQL Server: Security Essentials

Those really were not that difficult since I’ve been teaching that material for 20 years. I am eagerly waiting to get back in the classroom.

Exams and Certifications

I still found some time to take some Microsoft exams and earn some certifications. I took the MS-200 and MS-201 Exchange 2019 Messaging exams in beta. These were mainly for my previous position. But I didn’t find out until June that I had passed both exams. This allowed me to earn the Messaging Administrator Associate certification. I also was able to pass the MS-900 and AZ-900 exams that allowed me to pick up two additional fundamental certifications.

Finally, the AZ-103 which really bridges my previous job and my new job. My last four weeks at New Horizons were spent teaching the Azure Administrator course and my first job requirement at Microsoft was to get the certification. I would highly recommend Microsoft Learn and the Pluralsight courses if you are interested in this exam. (If you go the Pluralsight route, really focus on Tim Warner’s infrastructure courses, I would not have passed without them.)

Secondly, since starting Microsoft, I have decided to focus only on SQL Server and will start growing into the Big Data and Data Science fields. Which means that I will not be keeping up to date on Windows Server, Exchange Server and Active Directory. I have really enjoyed teaching these products over the last 20 years, but my immediate focus will now be on SQL Server.

Out with the Old, In with the New

Which means… I am rebranding this website. Say good-bye to ThatAwesomeTrainer.com. It will still be around for historical purposes and maybe just for personal blogging. But most of my attention will be towards SQLMCT.com where I am slowly moving all of my current SQL Server posts and will start adding a lot of Performance Tuning, Query Writing, and Database Administration posts.

The SQL Saturday Speaking Tour Continues

Finally, this year I have spoken at SQL Saturday’s in Nashville, Cleveland, Chicago, Cincinnati, Columbus, Chattanooga, Louisville, and I will be going to Memphis in October. And of course, I was again a co-organizer of the SQL Saturday in Indianapolis. We had a really awesome event of networking and learning and reached our 9th straight year of sustained growth in registrations (616) and attendees (318).

The Wrap-up of a Long Summer

I guess to wrap up is to take a look ahead to the future. For the first time in 6-7 years, I will not be working or speaking at either Microsoft Ignite or the PASS Summit. The main reason is that they are both the same week and I really could not plan for one or the other.

However, I will be in Orlando the Saturday before Ignite to attend MCT Day. Then after a quick stop at home, I will be attending PASS Summit in Seattle. I can’t remember the last conference I’ve gone as just an attendee. I will definitely be attending a lot of Big Data and Data Science sessions. A year from now I plan on having earned all three of the current Data and AI certifications.