PASS Summit Memories Blog Series – Day 9 – Aunt Kathi

It’s 2005 and one morning I am standing at a table talking with Chuck Heinzelman (profile | @SQLBoyWonder), asking him some questions about technical writing and such. Chuck did a masterful job in redirecting me to someone that could actually help and introduced me to Kathi Kellenberger (profile | @auntkathi). [Note: it just occurred to me that at the time, neither of them worked for Microsoft, but they both do now.]

Kathi had recently been one of the authors for the Professional SQL Server 2005 Integration Services (Programmer to Programmer) book. We struck up a conversation and I asked her if she wouldn’t mind helping me by reviewing a few tech articles that I might want to submit for publication. She agreed, in exchange for the same favor being returned. So we helped each other a handful of times over the next year or so. Kathi helped me write my very first article over at SQL Server Central, and helped with a few subsequent articles as well.

One of the biggest benefits of joining a professional association is the willingness of it’s members to help one another. Kathi had no idea who I was, had never met me before. She was a successful author already, as well as a speaker, and could have easily just passed me along to someone else. But she didn’t. It turns out that she needed help and recognized that we could help each other.

And I look back on that meeting by the escalators in Grapevine and realize how those ten minutes in time helped propel my career forward.

Thanks Kathi.