Career advice from a Technology Researcher Jim Gray
- Career advice for others: Follow Mike Stonebraker’s advice, Go for the home run.
Don’t go for singles and doubles, don’t even go for the outfield, go for the bleachers. And that’s a very courageous thing to do. I don’t believe in an afterlife, so I think this is it, and I’m trying to spend my time as best I can, and I’m trying to spend my time so I’m proud of what I’ve done, and I try not to do any things that I’m not proud of.
So I have, in fact, only worked on things that I thought could really be significant, and I haven’t really worried very much about getting tenure or actually getting a job.
- On getting a paper published: Send it in again. Send it in again.
-Advice from Jim Gray, Database Researcher as part of ACM SIGMOD Distinguished Database Profiles

Temptation
- Temptation is temporary. Resist cravings long enough and you’ll win out.
-Don Chao, Men’s health
Vision and Spirit
- You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to allow the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget the errand.
-Woodrow Wilson
Better than you
- When we’re trying to be as good as or better than someone else, I think envy is a strong motivator, but a weak navigator
-Steve Smith in a blog comment