Who Do You Rely On?

We tend to think of ourselves as self reliant. Sit and think for a second, how many people do you rely on?

Help Desk

Our angry callers hit them first. They let us know if something's down and our monitor doesn't see it. The more information we can give them, the easier they can make our lives. If you know you have a planned outage, give them a heads up. They will appreciate it immensely.

Developers

These are the people that build the applications your business is making it's money from. They connect customers with the data you're protecting. We need to get along with them. If we put ourselves on an even level and make sure we keep a good balance, we can get so much more done. Protect the data, but not at the cost of the business.

Network Admin

When you try and hit a server and can't because the routes were updated again, instead of just being mad at the Network Admin, consider this. All those times you had no problems? It's because they had it working. They're in the same boat as us. Noone notices how good of a job we're doing until it all catches fire.

System Admin

I haven't built a production system from the ground up in years. I love my Sys Admins. They get tasked to setup 50 new SQL boxes, 100 new IIS servers and half a dozen DC's for various projects. Once they do all the heavy lifting, we can use a single PS script to install SQL for us across all the new servers and just go to lunch. Give them credit for working on all the things they do so we can concentrate on what we actually want too.

Management

Good managers go to bat for you. They are the ones that argue for new budgets to get more tools, people, hardware and even that soda fountain in the break room. They're the ones trying to make sure no one calls you while you're on vacation or tries to get the SQL Saturday hotel room paid for when you sneak off on the weekends. The more you work for them, the more they'll work for you. (Bad managers excluded, terms and conditions apply, not available at all jobs, see supervisor for details)

Mend The Fence!

Take the time now. Think of some way you can make it easier to work with them and get the projects completed that needed to be done. The easier we make it to work together, the better we can make our companies. I hate seeing posts of an SA or NetAdmin trying to lock down the DBA just as much as I hate seeing the DBA lock out the Developers from even staging. There are times when it's required, but others it just simply isn't. I'm not saying give the DBA's Domain Admin or the password to the proxy servers, or even giving the Developers SA on production... But sometimes a little read only helps a lot when isolating a problem at 2 am on Christmas morning.

Final Thought

I'll end with this. Where I work now, our Network Admins are great. They go the extra mile to take care of us. Our first line support staff goes out of their way to get all the information they can. Our SA does what he can to make our lives easier and our Developers talk with us when they have a question. This may sound like everyone doing their job, but let's be honest. This is the exception. This helps raise retention. Get your people involved, make them feel equal and make sure to take a day and let them enjoy it. Maybe a little Dave and Busters with a long lunch. You'd be surprised what wonders that'll do for your staff.