Introducing DBA On a Yacht

Part of being a consultant, and emergency response DBA is being available when customers need us, and it does not always conform to an 8 to 5 Monday through Friday type job. Now that is okay, and I am used to it. My wife is a nurse, and she has some interesting hours to work around too. We are also both volunteer firefighters and EMT’s with our local fire department, which also has its own scheduling.

Just to get one thing clear, this is not me complaining or a rant of any kind, it is just explaining how things are. I am good with all of it, and happy to help each client as best I can. I love owning my own business, working with clients, and helping them all.

Every client has their own emergency schedule, and I do my best to accommodate those. Part of that is being as available as I can when it is needed. But I also have a life outside of the office and that usually means that I need to stay a bit more connected than I would if I had a different job. The more clients I work with the more likely it is that I will need to respond after hours and on weekends.

Given where we live in the Pacific Northwest, near the water with vast boating opportunities, my wife and I have a boat to take advantage of those opportunities. It used to be going boating meant being completely disconnected, and out of cell phone range, but as the carriers have improved their coverage over the years, and now with the right equipment we can get a pretty good mobile internet connection at most of our boating destinations. Combine that with a boat that is large enough to stay on multiple nights, with internet on board, a built in generator and solar panels for extended power, top notch laptop, and a 30 inch 4k monitor on board to hook up to my laptop, that leaves me pretty well prepared to take on any customer issue without having to cancel my boat trip.

Earlier in the year I had a boat trip with my 2 sons (both in their 20’s).  Due to multiple unexpected issues with clients, I ended up having to work about 10 hours over that weekend. By the end of that response I had earned the nickname of DBA on a Yacht.

In that past that would have meant 2 things:

1. I would have just been out of touch and the customer would have to wait until I got back or until they contacted another team member at Stedman Solutions.
2. Or that I would have to abort my weekend trip and return home to be able to help them out.

What that means is just a bit more challenging work life balance.

Things that are difficult to do and keep clients happy:

• Multiple days away from connectivity, and away from the ability to respond to questions, problems, and emergencies.
• Just telling clients that I will be out of touch for more than a day leads to quite a bit of chaos.

What I am doing to reduce the challenges:

• Growing the team at Stedman Solutions, and having other team members who help cover the emergencies.
• Planning vacations in areas with good connectivity so that I can respond remotely if needed.
• More automated monitoring like our SQL Daily Checkup that alerts on issues as they happen so we can resolve them before they become bigger problems.
• In January 2021, we added an admin assistant / customer relationship person to help with many of the administrative tasks, and to allow me to focus more on customers.

Here is our autopilot steering us to our next location.