What Do You Call a Group of Experts?

on April 25, 2011

What’s an expert?

A variety of definitions of “expert” get tossed around – a specialist, someone with comprehensive knowledge, the person who knows more about a topic than anyone else within six feet. Many people go the way of the Supreme Court and say they know an expert when they see it.

You might be an expert if:

Lots of obscure facts seem obvious . If you’re a bit humble, this creeps up on you– then you realize you wouldn’t expect someone with general knowledge of a topic to know many things you take for granted. Your experience has just grounded you and made you comfortable with complexity in your area.
You research in a topic for fun, and genuinely enjoy proving yourself wrong. When being wrong changes from being frustrating to being an exciting opportunity, you’ve covered a lot of territory on a topic.
Looking at a new technical environment is like a trip to a candy store.

What do you call a group of experts?

There’s a mob of kangaroos. A band of jays. A swarm of butterflies. A down of rabbits.

What’s a group of experts?

We’re going to call it: Brent Ozar PLF

I’ve joined up to start a new venture with Brent Ozar (t), Jeremiah Peschka (t), and Tim Ford (t). We’re Brent Ozar PLF. The “PLF” stands for: Peschka, Little, Ford.

What’s special about our team? We have a lot in common and a boatload of technical expertise. But here’s my favorite aspects to our team.

Tim

Tim makes difficult things into a party. He’s saying something so funny you spit water through your nose when you’re talking about dynamic management objects. He’s sneaking up on you with a sea turtle and also with a suggestion for a new way to identify contention in your applications. When you’re working with Tim, you’re learning even when you’re having fun– and the opposite.

Jeremiah

Jeremiah sees the magic in technology. He knows how to do things now, and he also knows how to think about possibilities. Jeremiah likes to imagine new kinds of indexes, new kinds of teams, new kinds of applications – this means when you need to reinvent something, or get unblocked, you should talk to Jeremiah.

Brent

Brent shows you the big picture– and it’s not what you expected. He digs into the details, then steps back and shows you a pattern you hadn’t noticed by emphasizing a few subtle points. He brings together people who ordinarily can’t get along, and he’s more generous than almost anyone you’ll ever meet.

And me!

I’m all about creativity. I like to get a team playing hard together and figuring out how to make the most of a bunch of crayons, paste, and a stack of servers. I’m obsessed with documentation and communication – from clear prose to pictures that help start conversations about things like Isolation Levels.