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We discuss the ServiceNow Rise Up program, strategies for Rise-Up cohorts to learn ServiceNow, and the many ways our ecosystem can help.
Authentic, Authoritative, Unapologetic ServiceNow commentary by Cory "CJ" Wesley and Robert "The Duke" Fedoruk
[00:00:00] Duke: All right. Corey, what are we talking about today?
[00:00:02] CJ: man. Dude. Today we gonna talk about rising up.
[00:00:04] Duke: The rise up episode?
[00:00:06] CJ: Oh, let's do
[00:00:07] Duke: waiting for it. So now it's here. We're do. Okay. We're doing it Yeah. And I just wanna take a, set the record straight. I think like a lot of us have talked about rise up in various conversations in various communities, it, I, I will take the responsibility for it. I know some of what I have said has been misunderstood as Robert's not all about rise up.
Robert wants to, gate keep opportunity and that is absolutely not true. Absolutely not true. I spend hours of my week trying to figure out, like a, trying to help the people that are coming to me, right? Rise up or not. And also how to force multiply, you know what I mean? So I can teach more people, more wisdom about doing this ServiceNow thing.
[00:00:53] CJ: Absolutely,
[00:00:54] Duke: I want that, I want that out there, loud and clear, double underlined, is that I am all about it.
[00:00:59] CJ: dude, there's no one I know in this ecosystem who devotes more of their free time to helping other people than you. So for me, that's not even, a question
[00:01:08] Duke: I mean, that being said, we wanna talk about the smartest way. Like how do we get these people risen up the absolute smartest way, right? And how do we make sure that the biggest portion of them, get to the opportunities And get paid . Cause that's a lot of people.
[00:01:24] CJ: Yeah, man. And it's all about the coin at the end of the day, right?
[00:01:26] Duke: that's right. And it's just like, it doesn't take, it's not, it doesn't take like super math degrees, there's a lot of customers and that, and, and there's a lot, a lot, a lot targeted, resources for rise up. So I'm all about let's get people opportunities, real opportunities where they are paid.
And so we can learn a lot, a lot of lessons about how the ecosystem is now and apply that to what the ecosystem would've to change about itself. To facilitate rise up, you know what I'm saying? Corey?
[00:01:54] CJ: Yeah, no doubt, man. So, you know, duke, as a person who entered the technology space, right? Like from coming from the hood, I can tell you that that opportunity in tech was really life-changing for me, and it was even life-changing once I left. You know, technology proper and entered the ServiceNow ecosystem.
Right. And be, and became an in independent consultant in this, space. Right. Like the freedom that I gained was life changing, to be here for my kids all the time. Anytime. the financial freedom, Where I'm we're, we're not worried. for living from paycheck to paycheck or, you know, anything like that, right?
Like it's, there's so much you get from jumping into the ServiceNow ecosystem, right? Like, I, I feel like I've effectively risen up, right? . Yeah. And,
[00:02:34] Duke: me too, man. Yeah, let, go ahead, finish your sentence. Uh, sorry.
[00:02:38] CJ: no, no, no, no. Absolutely right? And so I was gonna say, you know, I, I, I just wanna share that with everyone else, right? Like, I want everyone else to have that opportunity, especially, you know, since I know we need more quality folks in this ecosystem.
[00:02:49] Duke: And I gotta say like, I didn't come at it from a position of, poverty, right? Uh, so some would, someone would argue, I, I had life exactly where I wanted it before I encountered service now, but I did not I was the least valuable person in my IT department. a long shot. I was just, filling whatever Joe Jobs I could do. Typically useless, ticketing tools on their way out. And I was not there to provide advice. I was just there to switch the category tree for the umpteenth time that week, and it was, it was soul crushing. And so you know, I had a rise up moment too, because ServiceNow just provided me a way bigger lever.
You know what I mean? And you, like, once you get a big enough lever, you can, you can move mountains, Just the right lever, the right leverage, and there you have it. So it took me from a nobody, absolute, nobody to somebody that was pulled into all these conversations because I was a gateway to organizational value, Suddenly my ideas mattered.
[00:03:48] CJ: Bloody hell man. Like that's, that's such a good point, right? where would we be if not for a service now, you
[00:03:55] Duke: I would, yeah, I for sure, for sure. I would be a drunk. I, I'd, yeah, I'd be a drunk. I'd have a totally wasted out body and I'd probablyor, I'd probably be divorced with, with kids that hate me because I wouldn't have been able to make it you know, I mean, I was like late twenties when all this happened, you know, late twenties, maybe 30, and.
I was miserable
[00:04:19] CJ: Damn
[00:04:20] Duke: yeah, me with my tech job being miserable. Sorry, privileged check there I guess. But, um
[00:04:26] CJ: no, man. I get it. Right? Like, I mean, there. as you just said, right? Like you went from the guy in the tech department, right? Who was at the bottom of the heap, largely doing a commoditized job, you know, to, to the Duke, Hosting a podcast name pretty well known throughout this ecosystem, you know, helping others get into it, right?
Like it's, there's a, a distinct difference between those two ends of the spectrum, right. That you just described. And you know it Same, right? Like, when I was in tech, you know, I, I, when I felt like I was in a good space, right? But I was, I was also, entry level management, right?
I was. A pretty a I was pretty, no, I was a, I was a goddamn really good problem solver. Still am. Right? . But, but I mean, to a certain point, there's Windows guys and network guys and application kind of stack guys, our diamond doesn't. In the, in the Microsoft Windows network in Spear, right?
There are a lot of people who are good at solving problems, right? There are a lot of people who are good at Windows networking and, and running operations teams, I mean, I might not have been one of many in my company, but I was definitely one of many in the ecosystem and. , I def and I wouldn't have had a podcast, right?
Like, I wouldn't be, you know, well known throughout that ecosystem, right? I wouldn't have the opportunity to touch so many lives as I've had now. And, the freedom that I enjoy in all, in all dimensionality of that word, right? The freedom that I enjoy, I probably wouldn't have it now, that doesn't mean I would be hurting, right?
But there's a different level, right? And that's a different. await that's no longer present. Right. And, and I'll a lot of that to, you know, an opportunity from ServiceNow. So,
[00:06:02] Duke: All right. So how do we get as many people as we can to the same path we got to,
[00:06:07] CJ: Yeah. Right. Like that's the thing. , I just kind of fell into this, right. I kind of tripped into it. Right. We, I mean, we both, you know, were working in the same product before Service down, you know, magic Total Service Desk and, you know, then ServiceNow comes along. As the new kid on the block and it's the best kid on the block, right? Like it's the kid
[00:06:22] Duke: The biggest, toughest kid with the best bike.
[00:06:24] CJ: Right. He's got the best bike, right?
He got the, you know, it is the kid that shows up, he's got the sunglasses on the leather jacket, right? And everybody was like, whoa. Right. You know, and this kind of happened and, and then it was like, all right, so we're, we're leaving this thing and we're going to that thing. And I was like, whoa, Shshsh, I got, gotta learn how to, how that thing works.
[00:06:43] Duke: Mm-hmm.
[00:06:44] CJ: For folks who are in that position, that is the number one easiest way to get into the ServiceNow ecosystem, right? If you are in IT or technology and you're, and your company is transitioning from an legacy, , service desk, or service management tool to ServiceNow, get in on that implementation,
[00:07:03] Duke: Yeah, it is an easier path when you're already in it.
[00:07:07] CJ: Absolutely right.
[00:07:08] Duke: dealing with the same stakeholders, You, it is the same kind of expectation. Whatever you're doing in it has similar expectations to what you'd be doing in ServiceNow.
[00:07:17] CJ: Yeah,
[00:07:18] Duke: the thing I take though, Because I don't believe the opportunities that you and I had are available anymore.
Right. The accidental shift into
[00:07:27] CJ: I think it's a lot harder.
[00:07:28] Duke: yeah, like there's a little bit more fight there's a little bit like a wall you gotta climb now. not because people want to keep you out. The wall isn't there to hold you down.
The wall is just there because everything's come. The ground literally moved up. So it's just like back in our day it was like, can you spell ServiceNow? Great. You're on the team or you, you don't look like you're busy enough. You also have ServiceNow to do. And that was just the way it was. But now you, you'll have a barrier where people's like, oh, you want us to employ you to do ServiceNow stuff.
Like what do we get out of it?
[00:08:00] CJ: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:08:03] Duke: so go ahead.
[00:08:03] CJ: No, I was gonna say, not to mention too, right, was that we got in at their own ServiceNow's like growth curve, like at the very beginning.
[00:08:11] Duke: beginning. Yeah.
[00:08:12] CJ: Yeah. You know,
[00:08:13] Duke: Like lost several multimillion dollar opportunities to capitalize on that early That's how,
[00:08:21] CJ: Like I should have put all of my 401k in it.
[00:08:28] Duke: In, in some ways that same opportunity isn't there for newcomers, but they need to almost double. What we were doing to sustain our spot there, right? Like we were survival. Like, oh, we're here now, and now we have to have all the answers for service now, and nobody's got the answers for service now.
So what did we do? They have to do that to get over the wall. The rise ups have to do that to get over the wall, just to learn it and be on the same.
[00:08:58] CJ: Right.
[00:08:58] Duke: Because we were pulled in before we had the expertise. They must have expertise before they're pulled in.
[00:09:04] CJ: That's a good point. because there's competition now and there and there wasn't competition then.
[00:09:10] Duke: Yep. And so what do you do when you don't know? and, and this is an honest question, like I don't, I didn't ask this question having an answer handy, but we get asked every single day, Hey, show me the. , how do I get good at this?
[00:09:24] CJ: Yeah.
[00:09:25] Duke: Maybe, maybe, maybe we can deconstruct, maybe we could like, you know, maybe we could go over our plan of like, what would I do right now to get good at Salesforce or something else I've never seen before.
[00:09:34] CJ: Yeah. No, that's a good way looking at it, right? Like what would I do? Right? Having been having, being an expert in service now, right? Looking to learn a new technology, what would I do to, skill up in that one as quickly as possible?
[00:09:46] Duke: would you do?
[00:09:47] CJ: Yeah, that's a good question. . so the first thing I do is I seek out people who know this already, who are looking to share the wisdom.
I wanna find all the people who are talking about the thing I wanna learn, Who are sharing all their knowledge. And then I learn, I like, literally, almost like, to me, it, it reminds me of like, you know, uh, what you read about it in the history books? Well, Socrates and Play-Doh, right? And they're sitting in the garden and they're teaching, they've got all the students ranged around them at their feet and they're just, you know, they're picking up the breadcrumbs, right?
So that's, that's me. Like if you're on Twitter and you're talking about this stuff, I'm following you and I'm, I'm eating. If you're on LinkedIn and you're talking about this stuff, I'm following you and I'm eating it up. You know, I, I'm learning the things that somebody else knows and thinks is important to teach. Because I feel like that that gets me above that initial beginners hump, right? Of trying to figure out what's important. I have somebody who's literally, who knows what's important and is literally telling me. So that's the first place I start, right? I find people who are experts, who are sharing their knowledge and let them teach me their mistakes, right?
And teach me what was meaningful to learn. What about you?
[00:10:57] Duke: I'd go to their website and I would be looking for any official education programs, and that's one of the things that just, Hmm, it, it grinds my gears a little bit when people are like, Hey Robert, how do I get good at service now? And I'm like, have you even looked at the webs?
Like, do you know about now learning? No. What's now learning is like you. Just at least look for official education channels.
[00:11:19] CJ: Yeah, that's
[00:11:20] Duke: for a fact Salesforce has 'em all over the place, right? And if I'm like, I can scroll for LinkedIn for 15 minutes and find information on Salesforce education even though I have no interest in Salesforce.
You know what I mean? So I guess the raw start would be to just scroll LinkedIn under that hashtag for a little. Scroll, Google, How do I learn X for a little bit? So now that I have the official channels, just dig in and start there. Then I would like, I, I'm just put this in the link below.
I would listen to our podcast about how to get help that you need. Cause getting help isn't about, hey, That can get you some help, but knowing how to ask really good questions gets you better, help faster. And so I would be very, very careful with my questions. Like if I had to learn sa, if you've told me next month I have to learn Salesforce, beyond taking their courseware, I would maybe, I'd maybe go to a a, a Salesforce expert and say, do you have time?
Can I ask you a few specific question?
[00:12:25] CJ: Always specific
[00:12:26] Duke: Right. Specific questions cuz I want them to, I want them to feel like I'm considerate of their time. Not, not, I'm not gonna message them and saying, what's your thoughts and insights?
[00:12:38] CJ: Uh, well, you know, it also makes it easier for me to help, right? Like, you know, when I get asked a question, a specific question that gives me a specific thing to respond to, and I'm a bit long-winded. So you'll learn a whole bunch of other stuff in the process,
[00:12:51] Duke: you go. Yeah. And that's why you get like three or four of these people at a time. But then I'd be very careful about the specific questions, and so they can be general questions framed in a specific way. Like I don't even have good specific questions about Salesforce, so I might say, what was the most important thing you learned in your first year?
[00:13:09] CJ: Oh yeah.
[00:13:10] Duke: What are some simple problems you had to solve at the start of your.
[00:13:14] CJ: Oh,
[00:13:15] Duke: And now I'm, now I'm they're telling me about things that I can go and try and solve.
[00:13:19] CJ: Yeah. Editors note, write those two down. Right. Cause I mean tho cuz those are great, right? Like those are two things that I think you should ask now. Right? Like when you're starting off and, because that, I mean that kickstart a conversation, right? And look, When you ask someone, when someone is agreeing to mentor you, right?
Like, and whatever that mentorship looks like, it could be one-off questions. It could be like a, complimentary, uh, relationship, right? Whatever it is, there's something in it for the both of you. , And when you start asking, Hey, what are the the most impactful things or the most important things that you learned in your first year of being, doing this job? You know, it makes me think like, huh. I think back to that well, First thing I learned is I didn't need to know all of JavaScript. I need, I just needed to know JavaScript, like things, right.
like, that's one of the, that's one of the first things I learned is that I didn't need to know how to build complex objects and things of that nature. Largely just needed to know how to count the characters in the string and how to strip some of them out, things like that.
You know, like command lits is what I call 'em. Right? You know, like little 3, 4, 5 uh, lying pieces of code.
[00:14:25] Duke: Mm-hmm. here. Now here's, here's the kicker. If I got the, if I got engaged to them on a, on a couple of, specific questions, and so I've built a rapport through the exchange of question, answer the last thing I would ask them, like, thank you for your time. could you possibly tell me a question that I should be asking?
[00:14:43] CJ: Oh, absolutely.
[00:14:45] Duke: right? Like, I don't even know what questions I should be asking. So let me capitalize on somebody who's been there and done that
[00:14:52] CJ: Yeah,
[00:14:52] Duke: and they're probably dying for people to ask them that question cuz they're tired of the the same old, same old questions, right?
[00:14:59] CJ: yep.
[00:15:00] Duke: Tell me how to become a Salesforce person. So anyways, the two takeaways for everybody in the ServiceNow ecosystem for this is number one, if you're trying to rise up, Spend some time trying to figure out good questions to ask.
Maybe we should do an episode on what constitutes a good question. At any rate, we'll have a link in the description for our, like how to get the help you need. That's a great episode for learning that. But the second thing for people who aren't rising up is to start loading up into the ecosystem stuff you had to learn at the beginning.
I think one of the big things we lack is like a library of exercises,
[00:15:36] CJ: Yeah, right. Like a, like a you, you know, zero to one, one to three, three to five,
[00:15:41] Duke: Yeah. And people ask me all the time, Robert, can you just gimme a bunch of exercises to do? And it's like, I would, but these things aren't just like, it's not like getting coins outta my pocket
[00:15:51] CJ: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:15:52] Duke: It takes some thought, some really serious thought.
So I think, you know, if we're gonna do this big, if we're gonna like two x to five x, the number of people out there doing this, Then we need to have a way larger, easily accessible library of lesson plans. Small ones like, okay, you got your csa. What do you do to build on the platform? Make sure you got credibility.
Here's like five scenarios you should build.
[00:16:16] CJ: Yeah. Because what I've learned, right, is that people really want instructions, right? They really want a blueprint. They want some kind of guy post. you know what I mean? Like it is. There, there are some people who play the open world simulator, right? Like there's some folks who go out on an online rpg like Warcraft, and they're just gonna go and do all the side quests and, and all that kind of stuff.
Those people will figure it out. They will find their way. There are other folks who like that conventional, uh, R p G, right? Like from back in the nineties, right? Like the Final Fantasy, something that's got you on, on the rails. And I think Fan, okay, I haven't played Final Fantasy in a while, but you know what?
I, you know what I'm getting at, right? you jump, you jump in this role playing game, and there is a storyline. There's a main storyline, and the game doesn't allow you to deviate too far off of that main storyline. You know, it's entertaining. It's exciting. You know, there's a couple of side quests, right, where you can express a little bit of creativity.
Maybe you can get some power ups. but the game keeps you on rails from the beginning and the end, some people , are much more,, like the characters in those role playing games, right? On the rails that you get dropped in at the beginning in the village and by the end of your journey, right?
Like you're facing the boss and you knew where to go step after step after step, We need lesson plans for those folks. We need to ensure that we are providing those guideposts, those blueprints, so they can stay on track and they can get from the beginning to the end.
[00:17:40] Duke: like we've got, we've got a, like, you know what I mean? Exercises, right? It like, we gotta equip the weight room. Some people are gonna use five pound weight, some people are gonna use 50 pound weights. But we gotta stack a weight room for people to work out in because I think
[00:17:54] CJ: Dude, this is a flow. We need to build a flow This is a, this is a flow. Think about it, Like you go in a picture this rightly. You go in, you sign up for the, and you sign up in your Service Now instance, right? And the first thing you do is you get a task, task says, go to now learning and do and complete this. this course, right?
You go and you do that and you complete the course, and you come back and you attach your certificate, right? Like you close that task. The flow automatically generates the next task. Right? Now, go to LinkedIn and follow these people. And then come back here and, document like three key insights from each of these influencers that you followed.
three key insights that you've, gained, Close that task, and then you go to the next one and on and on and on until you get to the end. And by the time you get to the end, you've picked up a c s A. You might have picked up a c i s in something, blah, blah, blah. You know what I mean?
It's a flow
[00:18:45] Duke: We have now learning courses and they've got tests, and we've also got exercises that are on the, , developer servicenow.com.
[00:18:54] CJ: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:18:55] Duke: like you can have people, and I get it all the time, people that go through, a bootcamp or a program or get their CSA and they're still like, It's, you have conversations with them and it's still like they don't make the connection that you gotta actually keep building on the tool.
It's the only thing that's gonna make you good. it's the only thing. And so whatever we have right now, I'm so glad we have it, but we're gonna need like 10 times more of it. We're gonna need like a hundred times more of it. Because if we're gonna Tech 10 x where we're at right now, we don't, I don't even think we have enough of that material right now.
we don't have enough things that are just like, okay, great. You got your csa. You don't know where to go. Like for crying out loud. Like, just take three or four of these real life scenarios that have happened and ship away at it.
[00:19:38] CJ: And we have that, right. That's the our, that's all of our collective experience,
[00:19:43] Duke: Yes, we have it. It's in our heads, right? It is. But that's a terribly difficult gateway to breach. I cannot get inside your head. Right. So this is again, another thing. The community at large can take this upon themselves is like, how do we get more bite size scenarios we can store in a library somewhere so people have something to hone their tools against?
I'm an amateur leather worker, very amateur leather worker, less an amateur leather worker,
[00:20:14] CJ: I've seen leather
[00:20:15] Duke: Everything. Everything I make is ugly and rough and whatever, but it's like the only thing, the only thing that's gonna get me better at it is doing more projects.
[00:20:26] CJ: Yeah, no, I mean, absolutely right.
[00:20:28] Duke: That horse doesn't look nearly dead enough, man. Just hit.
[00:20:34] CJ: we probably say this every episode at this point, right? Like, it's like Bill something, right? Like Bill anything, you know, just figure it out, bill. Build whatever it is that you wanna build and, do it over and over again until you learn. I mean, we didn't have the luxury, right?
We, like, there was, we got thrown in the kind of fires and we had to put 'em out and through putting them out, we learned, right now, like the industry is a bit more mature, so you're not always getting thrown into a fire. So you're not always learning immediately in that.
But, that's still the avenue here, right? Is, is really to build something. It's really to jump in and, again, that's open world, right? That is go out and slate a dragon. But you gotta find a dragon first, right? And you gotta hope that you, you know, as you wandering off to the east, that you bump into the one villager who has actually seen the dragon who can direct you there, right?
Like we, we gotta make it easier than that.
[00:21:20] Duke: I got another, uh, another one that's kind of off topic.
[00:21:23] CJ: Yeah, go for it.
[00:21:23] Duke: okay. So we talked about, more exercises into the community, more asking better questions. we need more contributions to the community in general. So there's armies of people on sn, uh, community, sn dev Slack, who are providing answers in real time.
that's awesome. There's gonna be more opportunities for everybody to do that. But we need more, not more just in times answers. Cause that's always gonna be there, but we need more, projected wisdom into the space,
[00:21:52] CJ: Yeah.
[00:21:53] Duke: right? Like after action reports, demonstrations of builds. And twice this week I've been asked, Hey Robert, like, let me show you something I want to write.
Or want to put out into this, uh, like a blog, a video, And can you tell me if people are gonna, like, who cares? Who cares? , who cares if they like, put it out, put it out? If you've ever thought about writing a blog, making videos, doing a podcast, like we just need way more of it. And as more and more of it gets into the ecosystem, more and more of it will be index.
and the indexes will help people get to those good materials.
[00:22:31] CJ: Absolutely. we all have a responsibility and dare I say, we all owe back to the ServiceNow ecosystem at large. To contribute in some way. and maybe I feel that way because, you know, I've been around this thing for about a decade now, and I know all of the help that I've get gotten from various people, some anonymous, some not, right?
Like some still around, some not. But like, there have just been so many, like, it's almost like that xkcd. What did you know? What did you see? Like I've just run across random blog posts from like eight years ago and it's like, how did you, like, how is this still relevant? Thank you. Random ServiceNow guy who.
Probably is gone. we need more of that. We need more people who feel like it's incumbent upon them to lead the way for the others. And to drop those breadcrumbs and to contribute in some way, shape or form. Like you said, you don't need any permission. let's state this explicitly right now.
You do not need permission to write a blog post, a LinkedIn post, a tweet, a start a podcast. A YouTube channel, publish a PowerPoint, whatever else I can think of, right? you do not need anyone's permission to put this content out there. In fact, you are doing folks a favor. If you do so, please do it.
[00:23:49] Duke: please do. Yep. Rise up isn't gonna help him by happen by itself and for the community. if you wanna be part of it, If you want skin in the game, that means more, more of your content, more your wisdom on display in public.
[00:24:03] CJ: Oh my God. Write what you just said, rise up isn't gonna happen by itself. Right. We gotta help
[00:24:09] Duke: Yeah.
[00:24:11] CJ: We gotta help. Right. Like, so like I, I know ServiceNow, is putting a tremendous amount of effort and resources behind this thing. But I know part of their.
thought process has to be inspiring us that are in the ecosystem already to put our resources in with them, to get that next generation of talent into the ecosystem. this won't happen without our, without our help. We gotta all help. This is, this is a collective, this is the group project y'all,
[00:24:37] Duke: Now we don't know, right? Uh, some, maybe some kind advice to mothership,
[00:24:42] CJ: Yeah,
[00:24:43] Duke: they probably already have plans. Right. You know what I mean? Like, we don't know what's, what they're planning, but it's like maybe if they weren't planning now, they might know
[00:24:51] CJ: yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Some of the things that we've identified that, that we feel like need to scale in order for, uh, rise up to scale successfully as well, right.
[00:24:59] Duke: Yep. my number one would be, more focus on knowledge material That is not, how do we describe it? okay, docs for learners, not docs for reference,
[00:25:12] CJ: Ooh,
[00:25:12] Duke: that makes any sense.
[00:25:14] CJ: it does.
[00:25:15] Duke: You can, you can look up stuff on Doc, on Docs and it's very like, you know, it's like looking stuff up in a dictionary, right?
But it doesn't give you that, you know what I mean? From a learning perspective, it's not optimized.
[00:25:27] CJ: Yeah, so there.
[00:25:28] Duke: this is basically like, it's, it's the last, you know, 15 minutes conversation we had with, there has to be a lot more different scenarios and step-wise, how do you do stuff? Than just what's on now learning, if that makes any sense.
Now that being said, I haven't looked at now learning in like a few months, so maybe they, maybe they've got a lot more of this stuff, but just something that says like, how do I build a simple flow?
[00:25:49] CJ: Yeah, I, I, I follow exactly where you are with that, right? Like, so I feel like Docs is, docs is probably six months to a, a year of experience of service now before it makes sense,
[00:25:59] Duke: Yeah, well like look at S P M, right? , docs can't guide you through S P M.
[00:26:04] CJ: Yeah.
[00:26:05] Duke: You know what I mean? I can't tell you how it works. You have to almost know how it works. And then docs fills in the blanks.
[00:26:13] CJ: I mean, docs requires you to have experience. Right. And, and honestly, I wouldn't wanna change that. I like the fact that docs is helping me. When I know what I'm kind of trying to do, I can go to Docs and figure out like what the platform will allow me to. I like that I have to bring a little, a little bit of experience and a little bit of knowledge to docs. and if I do that, then I'd kinda get what I'm looking for. Um, but like you said, that audience of the learner, like how do I,
[00:26:42] Duke: Yep.
[00:26:43] CJ: I, I don't think docs is that and I think now learning is that, but I think there is also a, an opportunity to have a more docs like. Experience coupled with a now learning experience.
[00:26:56] Duke: Yeah, I just think like, I just think like playbooks, right? Like when you're learning football, I've never, I've never played football, never learned football, but yeah, I imagine there's those plays and nickel plays, right? What does that even mean? Right? But somebody's gonna show you like, how do we run a dime play?
How do we run a nickel play? Like somebody's gonna show you with an illustration. And I think there just needs to be more playbook stu type stuff. I do this all the time for my customers with, with, with s p M, it's like, how do I baseline a project and then compare it to other baselines?
[00:27:32] CJ: you know what? It is guided towards.
[00:27:35] Duke: Yeah. I mean anything, I don't care if it's just screenshot after screenshot, but something that, pulls you away from the, you know, here's all the tables and the columns and roughly how it works. you've gotta see how it works cuz there's a hundred things working. In s SPM especially, it's like, how do we plan a project?
How do we plan project costs? How do we resource plan? How do we baseline, how do we, write status reports? How do we view status reports? How do we view status reports at the program level? And it's, you know, enough of those things. And now, you know, s P. But I don't know any other way to teach it than breaking it down to the playbooks.
But I don't see a lot of that in the ecosystem, and I'd love for ServiceNow to start, you know, looking at it more from the plays that get you the outcomes. Teaches you the thing.
[00:28:22] CJ: Here's the next thing, and I'm sure ServiceNow's already thought about this, but you know, we're gonna need a lot more pdis.
[00:28:28] Duke: Yeah.
[00:28:29] CJ: You know what I mean? And, and I, and I'm sure they're already looking into that and they're probably, and they're figuring out how to scale that. . But , the only way, in my opinion, the most effective way to learn ServiceNow is to build something.
And the only way to build something on ServiceNow is to have an instance. Right. And that's the P d I. So, the more people we, bring it to the ecosystem, the more people gonna need an instance. And, in the ServiceNow is probably thinking through like, how do we scale this program?
How do we ensure that everyone can get an instance? How you know that it's not going to, uh, cripple the experience for anyone? Uh, how we can make sure that, the program continues to exist and scales with the intention in which it was built.
Like I said, I'm sure they're already thinking about it, right? Because, um, they know the same way that we do like that the only way to really get great at the platform is to do. . Right. And the only way to do is with instance. but yeah, I just, I just think it bears mentioning, right, that we're gonna need a lot more of these things we're.
[00:29:19] Duke: Yeah. Yeah. . I'm certain somebody over there is already like, kind of wondering. and man, however else we can help. We would love to. just kind of hand in hand with that, like not only just the capacity, but the communications as well. Like, I don't expect much outta my p d I cause I know what it's like to live without one.
so I just, every time I see that thing in the morning, I'm just like, oh, the Lord's blessed me today, But you know, sometimes, you know, there's been a couple outages. Or news about it that didn't scale across the ecosystem very well, so it was like days of churn and people being mad and frustrated and, messaging an echo chamber and stuff like that.
I hope that soon there's a easier way to communicate with the people who have pdis, that there's a problem or there's an outage or, or whatever. Just so that this, it's clear. , , because if, if it's loud and crazy when it's just this amount of people, what if we two and five x, that amount of people , it is just gonna be that much louder and crazier.
So the cure to crazy is communication.
[00:30:19] CJ: Yeah, that's a, I mean, that's a fair point, right? Like, folks will, definitely get frustrated if they go to, to use their pdi and, and it's not there,
[00:30:26] Duke: but, oh, sorry. Sorry for interrupting. I just gotta get this one thing out. another way this matters is because like a few people have come to me, it's like, oh, I built this on my P d i, I can't find it anymore. And it's part of my, like people are being advised in their programs to build their, their capstone projects on the pdis, right?
[00:30:45] CJ: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:30:45] Duke: it's like, what if they just. Like everybody should be touching their p d I once a day. . But there's risk there because the pdis are not under their control. So they can have an outage, they could have like a wipe, you know what I mean?
[00:30:56] CJ: Yeah, so this is, this is a good point, right? Let's dive in on this one cuz I think this is phenomenally, uh, interesting. I think if you're a part of a program that's recommending that you get a P D I that you build on it and they aren't teaching you the, uh, restrictions around A P D I, then your program is useless
Right. And, and you know, and I'll, I'll just be, I'll
[00:31:17] Duke: still informed anyway. Yeah.
[00:31:19] CJ: I mean, because, there are very well documented restrictions around how you can use a P D I.
[00:31:25] Duke: like I'm, I'm, I'm pretty sure, and somebody from ServiceNow, please chime in. I'm pretty sure that, the NextGen program gives them like special NextGen instances that last a bit. But if that's the case, like that's where they should be doing their capstones is. an in between instant a rise up instance, right?
that is a little bit more, reliable is the wrong word, but a little bit more invincible than a standard p d i, like a standard p d i for when you're out in the wild and on your own, but while you're in these programs that are rising you up, you need something with a little bit more continuity.
[00:31:57] CJ: Know Duke, I think I'm gonna disagree with you on this one a little bit. yeah. You know, cuz personally that learning how to back up your work and ServiceNow is important. , you know, because in any given point, ,, when you're in a professional instance or a client instance or a clone down might happen, right?
and your work might get wiped in that way. So knowing, the transient nature, nature of data in instance, that should be like the first thing you learn, export you're a update set, right? Or sync the GitHub, right? So that you have all, so everything's backed up there, And if, you're not learning those things right, like again, right? If you're not learning those things, is one of the first things that you do when you start to work on A P D I, right? Like how to, how to actually keep and manage your code. Like I did, I feel like that that program has probably failing on you to start.
and I'm not familiar with any programs of what they teach and, and how they teach it where they start, right? But for personally, for me, the first thing I'm teaching anybody is, all right, now you got an instance. This is, first thing you need to know is this instance, we will disappear. So if you got stuff on here, you want to keep export, update backup, figure it out, right?
Like this is how you do it.
[00:33:02] Duke: Ah, great point. And yet you get to learn about updates. That's along the way.
[00:33:05] CJ: And which, yeah, which is phenomenally useful. You're only ever gonna use them like all the freaking time
[00:33:11] Duke: All right. That seems like a great place to leave it then.. Hope to see you on the next one.