Generally, as a DBA, you will administer, develop, maintain and implement policies and procedures to ensure the integrity and security of a company's database. Depending on the company for which you work, you may specialize in business analysis, security, architecture or warehousing. Landing an average administrator job usually requires at least a college degree, one to three years of tech work experience, and one to three months of formal training. You'll want to have excellent number skills and be familiar with standard concepts, practices and procedures within a particular technical field. Those of you interested in becoming a DBA should also be comfortable working some odd hours and with being on-call in case of emergencies.
Database administrators are often critical to a company's success.
Not only does this make you more valuable to a particular firm, it will qualify your skills so they better match requirements of more specific outside positions. Hence, your marketability increases as you acquire unique skills. Perhaps more the case for DBAs than any other techies, folks with a strong business background have a huge leg up on the competition. A college degree is one thing to help get you an administrator job, but a bachelor's in computer science or M.I.S. will give you significantly more pull when it comes to salary negotiations, advancement and managerial aspirations. Perhaps more the case for DBAs than any other techies, folks with a strong business background have a huge leg up on the competition.