The five days were a flurry of scurrying from room to room, chatting with SQL Bingo players and squares, talking to vendors and meeting as many people as I could.

Some quick learns:

• Use Alt-Shift in SSMS to select text vertically.
• Send SQL failsafe alerts to the receptionist, who is most likely always to be at the desk.
• Hover over a column title in SSMS Activity Monitor to see which DMV is being used.
• Don’t use ORDER BY unless absolutely necessary.
• Use sp_executesql instead of EXEC for dynamic SQL.
• Use an OUTPUT parameter instead of result set wherever possible for minimal columns.
• Using a function in the WHERE clause will force SQL to do a scan insteadof a seek.
• Don’t run DBCC FREEPROCCACHE in production!
• The first use of a temporary object in a stored procedure forces a recompile of all temporary objects.
• Add indexes to all foreign keys.

There are so many new things that I want to try out when I get back to work this week that I’m torn about what to do first! I do know that I have to start setting aside time for reading blogs. Blogs are usually a source for troubleshooting issues for me, but I need to be more proactive and learn before the problems surface.

Probably the single item of greatest value that I received last week was the revival of my passion for working with SQL Server, a passion that I hadn’t even realized that I’d lost. I can see now how I’ve let my work priorities slip, and will start to address that with the planning for next fiscal year that’s about to kick off.

I was a bit disappointed by how few people approached me wrt SQL Bingo. By Thursday, I was actively seeking people out; if I saw someone with a bingo card in hand, I asked if they had my square filled in yet. I helped two people finish off their blackouts by directing them on where to find other squares. It sounds like Bingo will be tried again next year and I hope to be a part of it, but it really needs more visibility and advertising.

A big shout-out to all those people I met at Summit (by no means a complete list): Wendy Pastrick, Blythe Morrow, Jeremiah Peschka, Jack Corbett, Kendal Van Dyke, Tim Mitchell, Ron Wildt, Tom LaRock, Wes Brown, Jason Strate, Mike Wells, Rushabh Mehta, Merrill Aldrich, Arlene Gray, Jen and Sean McCown, Stuart Ainsworth, Michelle Ufford, Todd McDermid, Tim Ford and Pinal Dave.

It was also a thrill to meet many authors, mostly of SQL Server MVP Deep Dives: Paul Nielsen, Kalen Delaney, Greg Low, Adam Machanic, Paul Randal, Kimberly Tripp, Itzik Ben-Gan, Aaron Bertrand, Louis Davidson, Bill Graziano, Kathi Kellenberger, Kevin Kline, Andy Leonard, Brad McGehee, Gail Shaw, Erland Sommarskog, Scott Stauffer, Joe Webb, Allen White, Grant Fritchey and Joe Celko.

The whole conference was such a blast that, when the URL for 2010 Summit discount pricing was tweeted on Friday, I immediately forwarded it to my boss, asking him to put it on the training list for next fiscal year. Regardless of whether or not my employer pays next time, I still plan to attend. You should too!!

PASS Summit 2009

There tweeting and twitpics were the next best thing. 

The Twitter feed was like a stock ticker that kept me current on what was happening at SQL PASS.

What did I learn via Twitter regarding SQL PASS?

I should get the conference DVDs.

The webcast "Simplify SQL Server Management with DMVs - the Experts' Perspective"  was hilarious.  I attended.  Buck Woody’s reign of humor continued throughout the week.

Louis Davidson (@drsql) loves sys.dm_io_virtual_stats.

I learned a simple query to find all the DMVs on a server from Buck Woody.

I can hover over the columns in Activity Monitor and see what DMV they are from.

Tom LaRock said "You don’t just get me, you get my network."  A great way to justify SQL PASS attendance to a manager.

The Quest Twitter T-shirts were great. 

Never ever walk out of a Buck Woody presentation.

Never bring a MacBook into a room with Buck Woody.

The keynote speeches will be on the DVDs.

One demo had a 192 CPU machine on stage. Wow.

Tweets to the SQL tweeps’ blogs further detailing their experiences.

Go to SQLServerPedia.com for a list of SQL Tweeple or check out my Follow list @RonDBA.

Next year's PASS Summit will be in Seattle from November 8th - 11th, 2010.  $995 rate if you register soon.

Thanks to all the SQL Tweeps for your coverage of SQL PASS last week!.

https://www.microsoft.com/click/thrive/default.aspx

That, along with $2, will buy you a cup of coffee in most places, providing you do NOT forget the $2.

If you are not familiar with Thrive then I urge you to navigate the site and check on the valuable resources it contains.

So as most of you know this was my first Summit experience and I can’t say enough great things about it… it was probably the most busy week of my life and sleep just seemed to get in the way of all the learning and networking.  I can’t even begin to list off all the amazing people I met this past week and what was so great about it was that they were just as pumped to meet me (or at least they pretended really well).

I STRONGLY recommend picking up the Summit DVDs cause even as an attendee some of those sessions were pure #bacon and need to be watched again…. while other sessions (Bob Ward’s Wait Types presentation) seemed (to me anyways) impossible to take it all in with one viewing.

I’ve never felt so welcome by a group of people I had just met and I think Twitter has to be given a shout out for helping break the ice.  There are a few people that I consider to be “SQL Royalty” and having chatted with them before on Twitter definitely made things very comfortable to strike up a conversation and go for drinks with.

The PASS Summit is a no-brainer for me to attend every year now for the rest of my SQL life and if you didn’t get a chance to go this year and you’re not sure if your company will send you next year…. put away a little money each month cause you CANNOT buy better training, networking, or general awesome fantastical fun than the PASS Summit.

A couple nights we hit a local hole in the wall karaoke bar named Busch Gardens… nothing but pure entertainment here hahahaa… where else can you see….

• @PatrickDBA sing Rhinestone Cowboy
• @MrDenny sing Eye of the Tiger
• @StatisticsIO “rickroll” the entire bar with Never Gonna Give You Up
• 30 of your new closest friends singing Bohemian Rhapsody together to close down the bar

FANTASTICAL!!! 

See you all next year… and if I haven’t met you yet…  you’re ALL on my hitlist for 2010

Enjoy!!

The PASS Summit was a chance to look at upcoming features in SQL Server, share learning in nearly 170 presentations, and networking with peers from across the street and the other side of the world.  It wasn’t always serious and one night at the karaoke bar a fellow DBA Rick Rolled us.

A Great Change

This year was drastically different though (for me at least) – and I believe it has everything to do with social networking.  It started a bit last year, but now with the flood of SQL Server professionals on twitter it seems to have matured quite a bit.  From the first day I was at the conference, I was recognizing people that I’ve shared conversations with on Twitter.  And I didn’t have deal with the nervousness of meeting them for the first time, since Twitter and Social Networking had taken care of that.

Last year at the PASS Summit, I think I met about a dozen new people.  Most of the people I talked to were just people I had met through out that year.  They were a good group of people, but I mostly just continued to develop those relationships.

This year though, I think I met about a hundred people that I hadn’t met before.  True, I had talked with a number of them prior to PASS through Twitter.  But I hadn’t actually met them.  And let’s be honest, I’m just this guy from Minneapolis.  I’m not someone who’s written books or worked on the DBCC commands.

What I am getting at here is that anyone can be a part of the community.  It’s a matter of joining in and becoming a part of the conversation.  And with Twitter anyone can join the conversation at any time.  Or you can just listen, but you’ll eventually join in… it’s too tempting.

Doing It Wrong

I’m going to say it.  I’ve said it to others and I’m going to say it here.  If you are a SQL Server professional and you are not on Twitter yet, you are doing it wrong.

If you are at a company and you are the lone DBA. *POOF*  No more.  Hundreds of others in your same boat, dealing with the same issues are there for you.  If you’re at a large organization dealing with hundreds of servers and run across a new issue that no one at your company has seen.  *POOF* I bet someone out on Twitter has and they might be able to help you through the answer.

I can’t stress the benefits of social networking enough.  It really gives you a door into the office of hundreds of other SQL Server professional who can help you solve problems and give you a sense of community with what you are doing.  And when it comes to the PASS Summit, it’s a way to find out where people are going, what they are doing, and how to get around town to hot spots that others are checking out.

I hope this little unwinding from PASS helps you decide that you need to get on Twitter if you are not already.  And also helps you reconsider the PASS Summit if you haven’t gone to it yet.  I have more thoughts on PASS that I’ll be posting later.

You can register already for next year…

Hamster? I Hardly Know Her!

There’s a few things you never want to hear your doctor or your database administrator say:

• “Wow, I’ve never seen a case that bad.”
• “You mind if I take a few pictures to show at the next convention?”
• “I’ll be right back.  I have to put on gloves and a mask.”
• “Gerbils?  How did those get in there?”

Here’s a few tips to help you break the news easier.

Start with “Yes.” Don’t start fights by disagreeing – instead, agree with them and guide them towards something else.  Here’s a few ways to get started:

• “Yes, you’re not alone there – I’ve seen that conclusion a lot.”
• “Yes, that was a best practice for quite a while.”
• “Yes, that approach works in many scenarios.”
• “Yes, I too believe that I’m all-powerful and bulletproof.”

Identify with the people who made a mistake. I try not to blame someone for a mistake, even if it’s grievous, without including myself in that same group.  Put yourself in the other person’s shoes, and think of a time when you did something similar.  Even if you can’t imagine anybody being dumb enough to, say, drop the production database, odds are you did it once too.  My favorite lines are:

• “I used to do this all the time too when I got started, and I learned the hard way.”
• “You wouldn’t believe how often I’ve seen this same problem at other companies.”
• “It’s not your fault – it’s the tool.  It shouldn’t allow people to accidentally do this, and we all do it sooner or later.”
• “I’ve been through this before – have I ever shown you my scar?”

If you have to point, point at roles, not people. Maybe that developer just started last week, and he inherited a pile of nasty orphaned code from some nincompoop who got fired.  Maybe an outside consultant set up that database.  Maybe a third party vendor wrote code that – no, wait, we never write bad code.  Anyway, don’t point your finger at a person specifically unless you’re holding proof that they did it.  Even then, hold off, because they may have done it at the advice of someone else.  Your goal is to fix the problem, not get somebody fired, so use phrases like:

• “I know this wouldn’t have been your choice if you designed this.”
• “I can totally understand why you’re so frustrated, and this would make any developer frustrated.”
• “Report writers take this approach to queries all the time – this isn’t unusual.”
• “This is a very typical injury for people in your field of work.”

Give everybody the benefit of the doubt. You weren’t born with the incredible experience, skills, and sharp clothes that you’ve got now.  When you popped out of Mama’s babymaker, you started sticking your toes in your mouth.  Go easy on the new kids and break them in gently.

I posted some blog posts about the keynotes on Tuesday and Wednesday as well as some photo’s already so I’ll try not to rehash to much of that information here.  I attended a wide range of sessions this week.  Some where good, some weren’t so good, and some were very, very funny (twitter commentary).  Most of the sessions that I attended were public, but a few where insider sessions for MVPs, TAP customers, etc and were covered by NDA, so I can’t talk about those.

The Sessions

I would say that the most talked about session of the summit was the Buck Woody (twitter) comedy show.  Also know as his very informative and very funny sessions which he gave on Thursday afternoon.  I wasn’t able to catch Bucks sessions in there entirety, but I was able to sit through most of them, and they were both funny and very informative.  I wish that I was able to be that kind of speaker.  Hopefully some day I will have the skills to do so.

The last session on Thursday was my presentation on “Storage for the DBA”.  I was honestly expecting a very small group to attend, as it was the last session of the day on the last day.  Which is normally not a good place to be presenting.  However with the summit being Tuesday through Thursday, most people didn’t leave until Friday so we were able to keep a lot of people there.  This along with the excellent topic selection (or at least I think it was excellent, but I’m biased) let to a packed room with people standing in the back.

During my session we had some great questions, and we covered a lot of topics.  My session this year was presented as a community session so it was 75 minutes.  Next year I think I’ll submit it as a spotlight session so that I’ll have 90 minutes.  As I review the revamp the slide deck over the next few months I may end up making it a two session presentation so that there is enough room for everything, and plenty of time for questions, maybe even a pre/post con which would give a ton of time. to really make that work though I think I’d need to get a hardware vendor to loan out some equipment so that we could do a hands on.

One this which I thought was a little strange, was that during the first ever Board of Directors Q&A panel discussion, only 16 people attended.  I was expecting a much fuller room to grill the board members about things which people had questions about.

The Summit it self

Personally I always have a great time at the PASS Summit.  However some people don’t, and this is something that we has a SQL Server community need to correct.  I was speaking with some of the board members Friday night at the hotel bar and they told me that 40% of the summit attendees were attending for the first time this year.  This is an amazing number of people coming for the first time.  However attendance was down from last year by ~6-8%.  With this many new people the question becomes, where is everyone from last year?  With 40% of the people being new this year, one would think that we would have a massive attendance growth.

There were some complaints which were over heard in the halls of the hotel that people didn’t know what to do after the summit’s official activities were over.  I can remember back to my first SQL Summit a few years ago and it was hard to find out where the after parties were happening.  It helps if you know a lot of people as the more people at the summit that you know the easier it is to find the parties.  We as the attendees who have been to the summit several times need to do better and making the new attendees feel welcome and show then the ropes.  Here they are in the strange city with a couple of thousand people they didn’t know, knowing that there’s a good time to be had, but just not sure where it is, or who to talk to in order to find it.

I spoke with some of the board about this, so that we can try and come up with a better way to make it easier to identify people so that the first timers can find the people who have been coming for a few years, and the people who have been coming for a few years can find the first timers and get them involved. No decision was reached (decisions really shouldn’t be made over been at 1am) but we got all the ideas down on a list so that they will at least be talked about my PASS HQ, and the board.

PASS can help some with this, but PASS can’t schedule every second of the day.  Even if they could would we really want them to?  Lets face it scheduled parties are fine, but dull.  It’s the after parties at places like Bush Garden (the karaoke bar) or at the Tap House which really make it the event that it is.  Now these aren’t scheduled parties, and the certainly aren’t sponsored parties (most of the time), but of all the after hours events that I went to this week these will be where I did the most networking with people I didn’t know, or that I had only met online.

I think that SQLServerPedia and PASS tried to help get people talking to each other via the SQLBingo, and I met a few people this way, but not nearly as many as I was expecting.  I think that this could have really helped the new people to the summit get to know the longer time attendees if we had some people playing looking for the squares.  I think that most of the squares did a decent job letting everyone know where they where during the week, but we need more visibility for people who aren’t on twitter, or who can’t use twitter from there cell phone to find people.  As an example most of our foreign attendees don’t have data plans on their cell phones so they can’t follow the twitter streams during the day without using their laptops.  The same goes for anyone using a corporate cell phone as it will be locked down so that they can’t install any twitter applications which would prevent them from participating.  I think that the monitor in front of the PASS HQ booth was a good start to this, but I think that we need one dedicated to SQLBingo next year (I’m working under the assumption that we try the SQLBingo one more time) which is constantly showing the SQLBingo feed in real time, no matter what comes across it.  (I’m not sure how many people noticed but the real time twitter feed which was up at the PASS HQ booth went away after the first day or so.)

Another thing which needs to change is the location of the PASS HQ booth.  It’s location my the registration desk is fine for Monday, but after that it should be moved to the top of the escalator on the fourth floor so that it is sitting right where 95% of the attendees will be walking by.  As it is now the only time anyone would go near the booth would be for breakfast or lunch.

I wanted to do stuff, but I couldn’t find out where anything was happening

I would agree that it can be tough to find out what is going on after the official stuff is done.  The typical DBA doesn’t really have the right personality to just walk up to people and talk to strangers and make new friends.  For some people this can be down right scary.  But I promise you that we won’t bite, and we won’t make fun of you for coming up to us, and we won’t send you away because we don’t know you.  The bulk of the people at the SQL PASS Summit are very approachable, and very friendly.  Those of us that have been coming to the summit for a few years know each other so we naturally gravitate towards each other in groups of 20-50.  However we are always happy to cram a few new people into the taxi with us and go drink and make asses of ourselves at the karaoke bar, and no drinking is not required we had plenty of people who don’t drink for one reason or another (religion, recovery, etc) with us.  Heck, I sang for the first (and probably last) time this year (it did take a lot of Jaeger to get .me up there though).

One of the problems with all the after parties being unofficial parties is that there isn’t really a way to find out about them without talking to people.  I’ve pitched an idea to have a couple of screens put out which would have meet up information posted on them as that info is seen on twitter or as people tell PASS HQ of an after party.  This will cost PASS some money as the monitors aren’t free, but if it gets people meeting each other and coming back year after year then it is money well spent in my mind.

A question for you

Of you, who have been to the summit and didn’t go back, I ask a question.  Why not?  What where you expecting from the summit that you didn’t get?  What turned you off of coming back to the summit?  Please feel free to leave me a comment here, or a private email to me directly via dcherry AT awarenesstech DOT com would be just fine.  Obviously I’m not on the board so I can’t make any changes myself, but I know people that are and I’ve got not problem calling them and telling them that my readers didn’t come back because of this.

What do you mean you haven’t been to PASS?

So you’ve read this far down, but you’ve never been to the SQL PASS Summit.  What on earth are you waiting for?  Yes I know it is a pricy event to attend.  You’ve got the entrance fee, the hotel and airfare costs to deal with so the whole thing can run a few thousand dollars (US) to go to, but the education and the experience are well worth it.

If you haven’t been to PASS, I highly recommend it.  If you’ve been before but had a bad experience speak up.  That way it can be fixed and hopefully you’ll come spend another week with us.  If you go regularly like me, then I hope that I was able to meet you (please don’t be offended when I don’t remember your name, I met easily 300 or more people and I’m really bad with names to begin with), and if not lets work on that at next years PASS.

See you in Seattle next November,

Denny

I have been toying with the idea in the back of my head to get a user group setup for SQL Server folks a little closer to home. I love the New England SQL Server users group (NESQL) that Adam Machanic (twitter,blog) runs. I have been to several meetings and the speaker list blows you away. The quality is great and one of the sponsors has recently become a vendor at my company because of their sponsorship (they have a product that fits and exact need at my full time job and they were sponsoring on a night when I was dealing with trouble with that area... had them come up to do a demo and we were hooked, working out great.. see sponsorship does work both ways...  I am sure our account covered their pizza costs and them some.. but I digress, surprised?) and the availability of Microsoft folks is handy.

It's just a 1.5 hour drive from work and then a 1.75 hour drive home with no traffic. So, I have been thinking of trying to get something going to augment those meetings up this way. Perhaps alternate meetings between Portsmouth, NH and Portland, ME each month.

Please comment below if you live in the Seacoast of NH, ME, northern MA (Peabody North on 95, northern end of 495.. Looking to meet in Portsmouth, NH) and you would be interested in attending, speaking or helping run a users group. I am putting this feeler out to see what kind of interest there is.

A few more thoughts to chew on:

Not Competition

There is NESQL in Waltham that meets regularly. There is the NH SQL Server Users group in Nashua that also meets regularly. I am not looking to compete with these events and will do whatever is in my power to not schedule conflicts. I will still likely go to a fair amount of the NESQL meetings and want you to have the ability to also.

If the community up this way between the Portsmouth, Concord, perhaps Manchester, Newburyport/Peabody/etc in MA is large enough to get meetings together, then I think doing this is a no-brainer. The drive from Portland to Waltham or Nashua is brutal on a Thursday night.

If it becomes too much or a competition point, I just don't want to do it. Why disrupt things at a great, active local user community?

Inspiration

I have been thinking of this for awhile but simply thinking of it. Never acting. Some talks with Andy Leonard (Twitter, Blog) had me thinking. Then seeing his presentation at the SQL PASS Conference on user groups and how he successfully setup and runs several user groups in his area (web) had me thinking, I can do this. I asked a question about distance in the class, my paranoia and fear is disrupting a great community and the consensus in the room seemed to indicate the location spread is far more than enough to think about another user group. Thanks, Andy, for the pep talk.

I'm not going to do this by myself

I know a few other active SQL Serverites in the area and I will be reaching out to them. I also know of a great consulting firm in the area I have done some side work for. I may reach out to them about some help/advice/sponsorship. I don't want to make this a "Mike Walsh Users Group", in fact I just bought a domain for "SeacoastSQL" (.com/.org).. I want this to be about a community of SQL Server users growing together, helping new users, nurturing new speakers (which I hope to become in 2010) and helping local companies by improving the quality of the SQL Server workforce.

As such, I don't want to formulate a group around me and on my own. I would like to look at setting up a business entity of some sort with a small board and have a passionate community help grow it. If it is grown by more than one person some event in my life or career won't kill the entire initiative.

Send a comment here, send me a note from the contact us page and let me know if you want to help out.

Balance Speakers

I want to get some good speakers come up here. That means we need to have a budget for it and I am prepared to reach out to sponsors once we form the right entity, or perhaps as we form the right entity. I want experienced folks who have spoken, wrote books, and know their stuff.

I also want to encourage folks who are thinking about speaking but too afraid to submit an abstract to get up and speak. The audiences at these user groups range in experience and even a guru should be watching a presentation to see what new approach or insight they can glean. I want you to speak. If you live in the area and have been doing something with SQL then you probably have a topic to talk about. Let me know.

When?

I am a busy guy. The when depends on who helps me, what kind of experience we have finding sponsors, becoming affiliated with a Microsoft and/or PASS type of organization and what sort of speaking schedule we can get. It also depends on what kind of feedback I get from friends, colleagues and their networks. I am hoping sometime in 2010, Q1/Q2.

That's it. Consider this your early warning and a request for a quick bit of feedback (can't do polls with this blogging setup, at least I haven't yet figured it out) in e-mail, comments or on twitter (mike_walsh). If the interest dies down, the group dies down. If there is enough interest (at least ~10/12 people to start talking) then this will get off the ground.

I hope to hear from you and in the meantime, if you want to carpool down to Waltham's meetings each month (second Thursday of each month) from Portsmouth or a park and ride between Portsmouth and Waltham. Let me know. I would love to help someone get down to a meeting that has never been. You get a LOT and it's free (even get pizza ;-) )

As I was leaving the MVP dinner on Friday night I was told those exact words by a politely smiling gentleman. Confused, I responded with “How so?” After all, how could I do big things for the MVP program?

“We”ll, we elected you for a reason. You got my vote in particular, because I know you’ll do great things for PASS.”

Oh. PASS. Right.

Big things? OK. As I type this I feel I missed an opportunity to nail down some specific requirements on what is meant by “big things”. I was heading out the door to the airport, and walked back with my very good partner in crime friend Tim Ford (blog | @sqlagentman). All of this happened less than 24 hours ago, and I think it is important for me to do my best to summarize what this Summit meant to me before the memories slip away.

Ghosts of Summit Past

Every previous PASS Summit I have attended, I have always made it to a session in each time slot. Even if there was no topic of interest, I would sit in on a session simply to absorb some additional technical knowledge. This year I knew I would not be able to attend every session as I had commitments as a member of the Board of Directors that would not allow for me to be in two places at the same time.

I did make it to a handful of sessions, including ones by Bob Ward, Paul Randal, and Buck Woody. I even sat in on one by Itzik Ben-Gan for about an hour before I had to leave. So, I certainly do not feel as if I missed out on anything as far as technical materials go. Actually, I think Paul’s session may have helped solve a current production issue but I won’t know for certain until I review some additional details next week.

This Time, It’s Personal

In the past week I met over fifty people for the first time. Most of them were familiar to me through the use of Twitter, including my brother-from-another-mother Colin Stasiuk (blog | @BenchmarkIT). Some of my twitter peeps are independent database professionals, others are working for vendors. But they were all filled with liquid awesome.

When I was not in a session I was spending time connecting with individuals. I probably spent more time in the Exhibit Hall this year than any other year, speaking with new vendors. I spent about an hour with Buck Woody one day (blog | @buckwoody). Can anyone really put a price tag on that experience?

What this means is that this conference was not necessarily about technical content, it was about building and managing relationships. As I continue to progress in my career, relationship building is a valuable skill to acquire. This past week hammered home that point to me quite well. Learning about people, helping them to connect with others, sharing experiences with one another…all good things that will serve me well not only while I serve on the Board of Directors but these are skills I will have for life.

Technical skills are hard skills, and hard skills usually put a ceiling on where your career can lead. Soft skills, such as building and managing relationships, are the skills that allow for you to lead your career, instead of the other way around.

“I’ve Got This Idea…”

Being able to spend time with people at the Summit not only allows for them to get to know me, and for me to know them, it allows for us to bounce ideas of one another. In my case, I did not want to leave the conference without getting some feedback on the events from the week. We had a Board meeting on Friday morning where I expressed my passion and interest for the next year is on growing the conference. I have been helping to grow and build my own network and brand for the past two years and I want to scale up, if you will. I want to take a 2,500 conference, make it larger, and still retain (or enhance) the current user experience.

The only way to find out what your customers want is to ask. So, on Friday afternoon I found myself talking with others about some of my very general ideas about the conference. Should we grow to five or ten thousand attendees? Should we have different tracks? Should we offer sessions after 6PM? How do we find ways to improve our customer retention?

And I did not only ask about conference ideas. I also spent time asking about chapters. I have never run a chapter. I have never even been a chapter member. I have attended a handful of chapter meetings, but nothing more. I asked leaders simple questions in order to get an idea about what it is they want from PASS. I asked my questions in the lobby of the Sheraton, in the lounge, during the MVP dinner, and even at the airport while waiting to board our plane home.

I ask the questions because I want as much information as possible in order to make informed decisions about where the community should be heading towards. In the coming months I am going to look for different ways for the PASS community to provide some feedback to the Board. The first step is that I promise, here and now, to arrange for a live UStream feed on a regular basis where people can attend and ask me questions related to PASS. If I can go one better and use LiveMeeting and allow for people to ask questions rather than typing in a chat window, I will.

I am promising to do what I possibly can in order to keep the community informed about what I am doing as a Board member. In the coming weeks I will find out what my assgned duties are along with the metrics that will be used to determine success. As soon as I know them, so shall you, and I hope we can have a dialogue together on the progress we make in the coming months.