What to look for in a good sysadmin

I hate job interviews. Too much performance, not nearly enough reality.

Do you know what the most important characteristic of a good Unix sysadmin - someone you can trust with your data, your users, and your machines - really is?

I'll tell you - but first let me point out that, in my world, traditional mainframe data center role separation doesn't play - so the sysadmin becomes the most important delivery person in the data center: someone who works directly with users to keep things humming along.

I want that person to be lazy, bored, inquisitive, and forever sticking a nose where it doesn't belong. Why? because Unix pretty much runs itself, so bored is good - busy a trouble indicator.

So what's the first clue I look for after the ability to structure a sensible English sentence? The courage to say "I don't know" and the drive to follow up by finding out.