The challenging journey to overcome lack of knowledge

It should be called a crime when people liken the process of "gaining knowledge" to simply "solving a puzzle."

At least we all have to agree that it's an extremely patronising way of describing the process; mainly because the person in the position of power (in this case "knowledge"), the same person who's describing the process of "gaining knowledge," fails to address the characteristics of that "puzzle" honestly or correctly.

Knowledge has no shape

This is for people like me, who aspire to be good at what they do; those who have a dream to be true professional -no matter whether they put in enough effort or not- and they are very well aware of the fact that "getting better" is directly associated with gaining more knowledge.

This specifically holds for people who aspire to carry the title of "Oracle Scientist."

The fact of the matter is: knowledge is a puzzle; but with no shape or specific boundaries.

You keep discovering new pieces but you have no idea where -in the broad context of this shapeless puzzle- the pieces sit.

And in the case of Oracle, most of the time the pieces can sit right in the middle of the puzzle!

Embrace the pilgrimage!

I'd have to apologise for committing "the crime" too; because the process of gaining knowledge is no journey.

It's a pilgrimage.

You would know it's a pilgrimage when you overcome the initial fear that takes over you, when you realise that the "puzzle piece" you just found can ONLY fit in the middle, not directly connected to any other pieces you've previously found, but can be potentially connected to either of them indirectly!

Easy answers are rare, the path is long, and above all -as Connor McDonald rightfully quotes- "Learning is not a spectator sport!"

Find a guiding light!

Nobody has done it on his own, EVER.

I've been reminded of this, time and time again during the course of my life, and most lately by Kirby Ferguson.

You need to be surrounded by knowledgable people; the kind of people who don't give you the answer, but are patient enough with you so that you'd learn the path to acquire that answer.

There's no shortage of such people in the Oracle community, if you've got the will to find them.

How to start a career in Oracle at the age of 38

Getting back to IT could be  a "bad decision" for me.

After all, I could deceive myself of the illusion of "being an established journalist in a globally known media organisation;" same as many of my previous colleagues did and still do.

But you can not be dishonest to yourself; being "naturally" good at something is not the best that one can be. There has to be an element of "effort to fulfil a potential" involved.

So with the help of a true friend, I left it all at the age of 38, and started in a Telecomm software company; as an Oracle Developer/Admin ... well, "to be admin" to be precise!

I have to say that it didn't start out of the blue; I used to be an Oracle developer (8i) just before 2000 and an MSc in Database systems (2009); so it wasn't a field that I was completely out of touch with.

But in one sentence: It was extremely hard; so much so that it dragged depression's foot into my life and started to threaten my personal life. And that was despite being blessed with great colleagues and understanding managers.

What made it hard?

1. Myself! Obviously I was trying too hard for making the lost ground on learning, therefore I felt obliged to pay attention to EVERY single thing that was being said around me. Also coming form public sector, I was wrongly convinced that I'd be kicked out ASAP if I under-perform.

2. Having extremely talented and intelligent colleagues, and the fact that I wanted to perform like them there and then; although I've been away from Oracle for a decade.

3. Not getting enough/clear communication from my managers about what is expected from me; mainly due the force of -always imminent- release deadlines. I could also blame the first point (above) for not being able to fully apprehend the existing communication form my manager, which generally conveyed a message of sympathy.

4. Oracle is not the most straight forward software to deal with. A HUGE number of factors influence its performance and the presence of mind to pinpoint "the" main one in any circumstance, mainly stems from experience, rather than intelligence.

How can I survive?

1. Refrain from setting vague and all-encompassing goals (such as "being a great DBA") for yourself! Start with small and clear goals through coordination with your manager or senior members of your team.

2. Serialize your tasks. What you need the most at the start of this career is the focus; and trying to do more than one thing at a time would deprive you of that. Just remember that being focused is not generally easy when you're 38, anyway!

3. Communicate! Communicate! Communicate! Try to clarify what's asked from you, and find out if there is a "preferred" way in the company for such a task. Try to establish the appropriate/expected deadlines explicitly, and eventually ask for feedback; whether it's task by task, day by day, or week by week.

4. If you haven't said in your job interview that you've got "10 years of Oracle DBA experience" while all you've done is "once or twice installing an Oracle database," you do not need to compete with your more experienced colleagues. Truly experienced people in Oracle tend to be humble and decent personalities (I had a great experience in OakTable World 2013 - Thanks to Kyle Hailey!, and I shouldn't forget my own colleagues). Ask them to guide you, and they will. In general it is extremely rare to come across genuinely knowledgable people who are jerks.

5. Do not expect yourself to know everything about Oracle; in fact the existence of ORA-07445s would tell you that even Oracle doesn't know everything about Oracle! Looking at the manners of big names in Oracle would teach you that even they (some with more than 3 decades of experience) still regard themselves as a student of Oracle.

Be prepared to be a scientist; not a technician!

p.s. Do not forget about the great Oracle community. What inspired me to revisit my decision to change career path was a tweet by Jonathan Lewis who asked:

Quiz: if you create a virtual column as trunc(date_col,'W') and partition on it - will a query on date_col result in partition elimination?
— Jonathan Lewis (@JLOracle) October 17, 2013

Those are the questions that keep your brain alive, and remind you that you actually enjoy dealing with this thing the world calls "Oracle."

Thanks Jonathan Lewis.