Authentic, Authoritative, Unapologetic ServiceNow commentary by Cory "CJ" Wesley and Robert "The Duke" Fedoruk
Lauren: spoiler alert.
We are live now.
Who?
Duke: Here we go.
Well, she blew the punchline.
Now everybody knows who show how.
Stranger.
Why don't you introduce yourself?
Lauren: Hi everybody.
My name is Lauren McManamon.
I am one of the senior developer
advocates at ServiceNow.
So alongside the likes of Chuck
Tomasi, Earl Duque and Prada Bagot,
Duke: Welcome to CJ and the Duke.
We are so happy you're here.
Lauren: I'm so happy to be here.
I'm so flattered to be on your podcast.
Thank you for inviting me.
Duke: Oh, it's our pleasure.
It's our pleasure.
CJ: No, absolutely.
Duke: So I guess the first question
is, how did you find ServiceNow?
I.
Lauren: Well, I think, honestly, I think
like a, like a lot of people, it was
almost kind of by happenstance, you know?
so.
ServiceNow kind of came onto
my plate in an interesting way.
One of my first jobs out of college
was for a major defense contractor.
It was one of those, entitled
like dream positions that you're
just really excited to get.
but it wasn't that good of a match.
, not only was the project kind
of different from what I was
anticipating, but there was some.
Weird safety concerns, like
in the area I was working in.
It just, it just wasn't
overall a good fit.
So I was like desperately
looking for a new job.
I was, I think I'd only been the defense
contractor for a couple of weeks.
I was like, this is not for me.
And so I was panic
searching for a new job.
, there was this car reinsurance company
in Dallas and they were looking for
just general full stack developers.
I got the interview.
they were interviewing a couple
other people and I think I talked
a little bit more about, I.
How comp Psci applied to the business
side more than the other applicants.
And so, , basically the CIO of that
company was my final interview and
he had said, well, we have this thing
called ServiceNow and currently only
one guy's working on it and he's doing
a great job, but he needs, someone
to bounce ideas off of someone to
help him with projects and stuff.
Would you be interested?
And I said, to be honest, I've never
heard of Service Now Day of my life,
but will I get a job if I say yes?
Oh.
And he's like, well, you get
the job either way, but that
would be a great spot for you.
I was like, okay, perfect.
So I joined their ServiceNow team.
And it was, , headed up by
this awesome guy named Ben Tr.
So shout up to Ben.
He's awesome.
And he and I kind of worked alongside
each other, I think it was around
six to eight months on ServiceNow.
So he taught me the ropes.
He was the one that kind of brought me
into like knowledge and things like that.
And then he actually kind of quickly
left to join another company.
So all of a sudden I went from this
like new hire kind of right outta
college to someone that was leading.
A good portion of the ServiceNow
trajectory at this, at this company.
CJ: Wow.
Lauren: Uh, which on paper was I
think terrifying initially as well.
Cause I was, you know, he had said such
a strong precedent and he had really
positively turned the trajectory of
ServiceNow in his tenure at this company.
And so I, there was very big
shoes to fill and luckily it
worked out pretty positively.
CJ: Yeah, it, it sounds like it did.
one thing you said during that is that
you talked about, um, how, uh, com
psci affects the business more than
any of the other applicants, right?
And that's, if anybody, anyone who's
listening following along, with CJ
and the Duke, everyone knows that
that's kind of like my thing, right?
It's, it's talking about how
technology helps the business
and, helps it grow, right?
So the business can, realize, more value.
Out of their technology investments
and just more value in general.
talk a little bit more about how you
came to be centered along those lines.
Lauren: Well, it was something that I've
always kind of been keenly aware of.
Cause I think in actuality I'm probably
more of a business oriented person
than like a tech oriented person.
I think it's very interesting to see how.
The addition of one piece of technology
or, or the removal right of one piece
of technology can greatly transform
the production and the orientation and
overall even organization of a company.
And I've loved seeing
how that has played out.
I love seeing how that played out
in like case studies in college.
That was always what
really piqued my interest.
And so ServiceNow, as I learned
more about it, seemed to be a really
interesting origin point between the two.
Not only could I build, but I could
build in a way that also allowed me
the capacity to easily see the overall.
Impact of what I was building, right?
There's so many powerful like
builtin analytics and reporting
aspects of ServiceNow that you don't
have to spend, six to eight months
building as well to see the overall
impact of even simple applications.
So that was something that really,
really piqued my interest too.
CJ: Oh, that's awesome.
I totally agree with you, right?
Like it's, the impact of the platform
is one of those things that is really
hard to, uh, broadcast to folks.
Right?
Until they, until they actually see it.
Lauren: Absolutely.
Yeah.
Duke: I hope that, you're
allowed to talk about this.
If not, we can come up
with another question.
But, what was one of the coolest things
that you built on the customer side?
Lauren: Ooh, I think probably the
thing I was most proud of, and I think
it's probably something I'm most proud
of to this day, was there was one
holiday season, so the owner of this
company was very generous and he would
always give every employee like a
Christmas gift, which was very sweet.
And one year he gave us all 50.
Bit.
So I was like, oh, I like,
that's such a cool gift.
And like we were all trying to be healthy.
Like there was a bunch of
like health challenges like
that were being done in it.
I don't remember whose idea it was.
I definitely don't wanna take credit
for it, but someone had suggested
, a step counting a tho, right?
Like, oh, who can get the most steps?
And we do it to some extent for charity
cuz we had been given these Fitbits,
so we kind of wanted to give back.
And so I, I was like, I think we could
track that on ServiceNow at the time.
I'm trying to remember.
I don't know how many custom maps we were
dipping our toe into, but it wasn't many.
And so I think when we mentioned
ServiceNow as a, like a governing
body of this challenge, it kind of
raised like a couple of eyebrows.
I'm like, yeah, sure.
Okay.
But um, Luckily at the time, they
still had that in its old version,
the share website, and someone had
built a semi working integration with
Fitbit and I was like, oh, perfect.
And so I fixed what
wasn't working in that.
We got everyone hooked up and
so we had this big TV that
would show everyone's steps.
On the
CJ: That's awesome.
Lauren: that's what we ran
the charity thing through.
To be honest, I nuked our company's like
productivity for the, I think it was a
two week challenge cuz everyone would
just go on breaks and start like walking
around cause they were so competitive.
Uh, but all in all, it was for charity.
So I guess it was in the
long run, a good thing.
Duke: Nice.
CJ: is, that's awesome.
Lauren: It was definitely fun.
CJ: So you built this Fitbit
challenge, and you onboarded
the rest of your, , colleagues.
And so what made you decide to do it
with ServiceNow, Versus anything else?
Lauren: Well, I think it was ultimately
the speed in which we could do things.
the IT company at the customer
I worked for was so amazingly
productive, but they were almost kind
of a victim of their own success.
The backlog for what they wanted to
do was so long because they were so
good at, at creating stuff, right?
, and so that was something
that we are almost.
Unshackled from like on the
ServiceNow team for the things
that ServiceNow could do.
Obviously it can't do everything,
but for the things that we could
contribute to, we could do them at such
a smaller timeframe just because we
were developing on a platform, right?
We weren't having to build things full
stack from the absolute ground up.
, and that helped tremendously as far as
like a bargaining chip of why things
should maybe go on the service now.
Even it was a non-typical use
case for the platform to have.
CJ: Yeah, no, I totally agree
with you when I'm thinking, when
I have new ideas, that's totally
how I think about it as well.
It's like, well, ServiceNow platform
has all this stuff already built into,
it's got emails, it's got recording,
it's got, you know, scripting platform.
I already have the skillset.
Right.
And, and it already applies there,
you know, and rest integrations are
easy, the whole nine yards, right?
So it's like, yeah, of course.
I'm gonna look at ServiceNow first
before I think about building.
Something and like note js or
whatever, or react or what have you.
So yeah, no, that, yeah, it
makes a lot of sense to me.
Duke: So I'm kind of curious what a day
in the life of, looks like at ServiceNow.
do you still get to work on stuff?
Do you still get to build on ServiceNow?
Lauren: Well, it probably
depends on the time of year.
If you had asked me back in April,
absolutely not cuz that's only knowledge.
, but I would say that most of
the time, so currently I'm on
the developer advocacy team.
So basically our team contributes,
It's mostly content focused.
At the moment we're trying to
expand into more like collaborative
spaces and focus more on like
community and things like that.
But mostly we push out a lot of content,
especially around the new releases.
So currently we're, we have our
heads down a lot for Vancouver.
So I would say a day in the life for me
is that I usually start my workday at
around like, Seven 30 or eight, I catch
up on correspondence that I've gotten.
I, I'm traditionally like very bad
at getting through emails, so I try
to do it first thing in the morning.
We usually have a couple
of team catch up calls.
I would say probably like anywhere
between one to three hours worth,
depending on the day of, the week per day.
And then the remainder
is kind of up to you.
One thing I really like about this
team is that you kind of run it
like your own, uh, like micro.
Company, I guess micro brand.
for example, I really love
advocating flow designer.
I think it's a grossly underused for
the platform that I wish everyone used.
So traditionally, I spend a lot of time
learning about its newest functionality,
creating videos or live streams for that.
Talking to the product side of the
team about what I've said correctly,
what I could include about future
stuff, et cetera, and kind of
guiding my content around that.
CJ: That's,
Duke: Designer.
I love it.
I, I, I just had that aha
moment about flow Designer like,
Lauren: Right.
Duke: the, all the years
are blending together.
So I don't know if it was like two
years ago, three years ago, or one year
ago, but there's a certain point I'm
like, I want, I really wonder if flow
designer is where we need it to be.
And I just like picked it up
and, it was hard to figure out
at first, but then after it was
like hours of catching up, right?
It was like four hours later
and it, it's like, oh yeah.
Lauren: Absolutely.
And if I, gosh, I'm so tempted
to spoil something cause there's
something coming out in Vancouver
that I, I, I really can't say it
cause we, we gonna have done tech now.
But I will say this as a teaser to get
people on my side for flow designer.
There is something that has
been heavily requested for years
that is included in Vancouver.
And that's all I will say,
but get excited for it.
You've heard it here first.
Duke: down my list here.
Lauren: Yeah.
CJ: Yeah.
It's so funny you mentioned Flow
Designer, your passion for it, right?
Because, uh, Robert and I have
a mutual client that is running
ethically, their entire instance
off of Flow Designer, right?
Like the, yeah.
They've replaced like any instance of
scripting, so any business rules, , any
workflow, any integrations, APIs
that running through flow design,
like every single thing that.
Duke: it shocked me how effectively
it could replace business
rules and scheduled jobs.
You know what I mean?
Just, it's not just, , it's not just
a replacement for legacy workflow.
It's a replacement for
so many other things.
I do have a daydream though, and if
you could just kind of like maybe,
you know, if you ever see the product
managers just maybe whisper it
Lauren: sure.
Yeah.
Duke: now I know UI actions can basically
use code to run flow, but not super
clear and easy, but it would be really
cool if there's one flow trigger
action that was like a UI action has.
Lauren: Ah, okay.
I'll, I'll pass it along for sure.
That's, Hey, that's part of my
job too, that that's what I like
about this position is that we work
closely with the product team too.
So I will pass that along.
Duke: Or even like, script actions
Lauren: Yeah.
Oh yeah.
Duke: looks for an event.
It's like a business
rule based off an event.
Like I was, why don't they
do that in flow Designer?
Lauren: You're just making me wanna
spoil stuff, but I can't, I can't.
I'll get in so much trouble.
Duke: I guess you could though.
Could you just do like a record
create and this event table
or something like that, and.
I guess you could do it that way.
Lauren: I understand what
you're saying though.
You, you want it built.
There should be like I understand
what you're saying though, like
it'd be nice cuz it's such a
UI focused environment, right?
If that was somehow more
embedded into the ui.
Absolutely.
Duke: Yeah.
CJ: Yeah, absolutely.
And especially , with the move towards,
, kind of low-code, no-code, right?
Like allowing folks to say,
okay, click this button and
then execute this thing, right?
And you just pick it from a list.
Like, I think that would really
help a lot of folks out, right?
Like, you know, yeah.
Us old, old school folks, right?
Like, we're always like,
no, I just wanna write code.
Duke: that's, I mean, that's why
I love about it too, is I have
a lot of like developer friends,
. And they're just like, why?
Why?
Like I can just code it faster.
Yes.
But you can't give it to
somebody who can't code after,
Lauren: Oh, absolutely.
That's,
Duke: this flow designer
to like almost anybody.
Right?
Almost anybody.
And they'll be able to cobble it together.
Lauren: That'll always be my biggest
selling point when I hear, cuz I used
to hear that argument, especially
when I was on sales all the time.
We can't use flow designer
because I can code faster.
And I said yes, but if you print out
your code, could your boss understand it?
Or your boss's boss understand it And nine
times that tan, the answer was maybe no.
But if you print out a flow designer,
it verbatim tells you what it's doing
and you barely have to label anything.
So it's a nice, it's a nice selling point.
Duke: And there literally is
a competition in time there.
Right?
Because you.
Lauren: Mm.
Duke: When I say I can code things
faster, that means there's a monetary
price to the time I'm saving.
But what people don't forget and we
know that they forget, sorry, what
people do forget and we know they
forget it because ain't nobody out there
doing documentation at scale is, is
Lauren: What whatcha saying?
You saying developers don't,
don't annotate and don't document.
No, never.
I.
Duke: uh, and I don't put that
on the feet of developers either.
I put it on the feet of
the entire deployment team.
From the most junior ba all the
way up to the engagement manager.
It's all their fault.
Um, but, but there's a
speed to inheritance.
Not just a speed to deploy,
but a speed to inheritance.
So x amount of times during a
product's life, the people who
are in charge of it will change.
And how long is it gonna
take them to get it?
Lauren: Absolutely.
Duke: And can I just go
on a little tiny rant?
A little tiny one.
Lauren: It's your show.
Go for all thes you'd like.
Duke: It's just ju if we just imagine
if these things are placed in the
types of workflow that everybody
dreams, it could be life sciences,
pharmaceutical, manufacturing,
manufacturing it, all right, like that.
Time to inheritance is gonna matter
because when the things fail, the
failure is gonna be measured in lives.
Lost, not time wasted, money wasted.
Lauren: Absolutely.
CJ: Yeah, I think it matters, right,
in those situations because it's a lot
easier to quantify, the lost value of
that inheritance that you were mentioning.
So yeah, like those situations I think
are really, really, really, really cool.
Lauren, you've mentioned, right,
like your previous sales background, I
wanted to touch on that a little bit.
So tell me what it's like
a day in the life, of being
on the sales side of things.
Right?
Cause you know, a lot of our listeners are
mostly on the dev side of things, right?
The implementation execution, right?
How does all of this look
through a sales lens?
Lauren: It was really, really fun.
I think I worked that job.
I think if it wasn't five years,
it was very nearly five years.
So after I joined, so I, I worked
with the customer and then I was hired
onto what was called demo center.
Cause I didn't have any sales experience,
but I had lots of, ServiceNow experience.
So demo center was like a
junior sales role essentially
to learn the appropriate skills.
So I did that for a year and then
immediately joined our creator
workflows specialist team as an sc.
So I'm, I was the technical salesperson.
So on the sales side, at least at
ServiceNow, right, they'll take a
technical salesperson and pair them
with a traditional account executive
or or regular salesperson that person
will control all of the aspects of
like the contracts, the monetary
aspects, the relationship management.
They'll more so own the account,
, which I really liked because I.
Never would have to deal with
contract negotiations or any
of like the money things.
I could just focus on
the value of the product.
, so I essentially acted as the ambassador
to the customer, to my salesperson.
I would translate the needs of that
customer to the products that would
best fit them to solve their business
problems or challenges or goals.
And then align that , with
my team for what that would
potentially cost or what they would
potentially need to buy or not buy.
You know, like, Hey,
you already have this.
Did you even know?
And sometimes the answer would
be like, We already bought that.
You're like, yeah, like here's
how you use it, it's great.
So, , that was more so my position,
but it was only about creator workflow.
So it was only about app engine and
building apps, which is very different
than every other sales team at ServiceNow.
Cuz we have all these great
products that are sold as like
those suites, so like tsm, csm and,
and uh, HR and all those things.
But those are essentially done
applications or application suites.
It's like the difference between selling
homes and, and selling land, right?
CJ: Right,
Lauren: you can build whatever you want.
And they go, what can we build?
I'm like, what do you wanna build?
And they go, I don't
know what we wanna build.
So learning how to handle those
conversations, , was very, at,
at least initially very difficult
because I joined the creator
workflows team when it started.
So there was no precedent, , of how to
handle those types of, of challenges.
CJ: the question that naturally pops in
my head after, hearing a lot of that,
and especially, you know, your initial
answers, , earlier in the podcast,
did you choose to like to land here?
Was this like intentional from you to land
because it feels like a really good fit.
For your skillset best based
on how you, , described it
earlier in the podcast, right?
In terms of like articulating business
value and aligning it with it, right?
Like this seems exactly that,
except at at scale for ServiceNow
to a number of customers.
Lauren: Yeah, I, I really just lucked out.
I was, because when I joined
ServiceNow, there wasn't a
creator workflow sales team.
And I, I remember thinking
like, that's a shame cause we've
built so many custom apps and.
When I went as a customer, when I
went to Knowledge, I thought, oh my
gosh, I'm gonna learn from all these
companies that have, that are, 10
times, a hundred times bigger than us.
They'll of course be
building crazy custom apps.
And at the time, that was
about 2016, it was kind of a.
Shattering moment to realize that
we were almost ahead of the curve.
And I was like, how is that possible?
, and so when I joined ServiceNow
in 2017, I was like, oh, I really
wish there was a sales team that
focused just on that aspect.
And then I just lucked out cause
it was created the year I kind
of finished up on MO Center.
CJ: Nice.
Tell us about the transition then from
sales side, then to developer advocate.
. And, having worked with you , on
that side of the house, right?
Like, you bring , this energy to
it that I, that I absolutely love.
So tell us how you move from
sales to, to over there.
Lauren: Well, I think it was more so
learning what I liked about sales.
So, , as an sc my job mostly was doing
demos for individual customers, right?
Someone would come in
with a goal or a problem.
, I would translate that into some
sort of demo, and then they would.
Buy or not buy.
Right.
And I didn't really understand at the
time, but a lot of the things that
I was doing as like pet projects,
, like for example, I was trying
to get better at public speaking.
So I was speaking at any
snug that would pop up.
I was like, I gotta get better at this.
And so I was speaking at
Snugs, not traditionally at sc.
Responsibility, but it was
something I liked doing.
, as we participated in conferences,
sometimes we would get
subbed in to help with them.
Again, not traditionally an SC
job, but I realized how much I
liked them, and I think the more
time I spent with customers, , And
that, I mean developers, right?
The more I liked that audience.
I think in sales you're oftentimes
speaking with leadership and
it's extremely hyper competitive
and , I think that I was fatiguing
a bit of the pace of that.
And also , I didn't really feel
like I had a lot of control over my,
what was quote unquote, my success.
Right?
That, and that is something that is
a, a homogenous problem with being
a solution consultant in general.
You as a solution consultant,
your value comes from your ability
to interpret the needs of the
customer into , the software, right?
But, But overall, you're still
always graded on the sales number,
which traditionally you don't
even have that much control over.
Pretty much you prevent the
sale from failing, right?
, oh, I prove that this thing is
valid for the customer, but I was
never part of like the contract
negotiation or the money, right?
But that was predominantly
how you're kind of graded.
So I was always feeling like I never had
as much control over my quote unquote su
success or fate as I would've liked to.
And so when this job opened
up, I was like, oh my gosh.
Not only does it have more focus
with the audience that I really
enjoy, but I do have more control
to live or die by my own sword.
And it was just a, a
really, a perfect fit.
CJ: Oh my God.
I love that.
There's a couple things in there that you
said that really resonate with me, right?
Like one of those is how you said yes to
taking , some of these responsibilities
that weren't typically in your, sphere
of, expertise or responsibility, right?
And speaking , as snus to better
your public speaking skillset, right?
Like one of the reasons that I
do the podcast , was to better
my public speaking, , and so
I totally resonate with that.
And then, at Knowledge, right.
A lot of what I was saying, and this
completely, I wasn't, I should have
gotten a check from this, from ServiceNow.
, but I, I, I completely didn't.
Right.
I was telling everyone, , say
yes to everything.
and it sounds you said yes to a lot
of things and that led you from a
place where you were doing well, right?
And that you enjoy to being able
to find what you would enjoy more
and give you more control over your
career, and being able to jump there.
Lauren: Yeah, , and I think a lot of
people thought it was because I kind
of, I Seinfeld it a bit, , because I,
I think it was either my last year as
an SC or my penultimate year as an SC
that I was the number one SE for the
world as far as overall like attainment.
CJ: Oh, mic drop.
Lauren: And that's the
way to end it, right?
CJ: Absolutely,
Duke: Use Seinfeld as a verb.
Lauren: Yeah.
Duke: Okay.
For the under, for the under 40 crowd.
Can you, could you
explain what that means?
Lauren: Oh, to end it, like your peak
ver versus end when you've trailed off.
I think that's a really
important thing, right?
Is to not let things spiral into a place
where they're no longer positive, right?
Um, so I, I was like, I still feel like
I'm doing well, but it's maybe not the
best matchup anymore, so I should at
least keep my eyes, o eyes and ears open.
CJ: This is so funny.
Like you, you're telling us right now
that you've left us the number one SC
in the world, and you're like, I'm still
like, I still feel like I'm doing well.
No.
Lauren: It really ha So there were,
there were two deals in particular
it must have been 2020, not 2021.
So it must have been 2020.
And there were two deals that I
had been working on for like years,
and my territory was changing.
And so I asked my boss, I was like,
well, if my territory changes and
those deals close in like January.
Do I get credit for them?
He's like, no.
CJ: What.
Lauren: and so I, I, my poor sales guy,
I was like, you have to sell these deals.
I was like, you have to.
I've been slamming away
for them for three years.
Just one of them, just
one of them has to close.
I don't care if it's both just one.
And then both did.
So it was, it was kind of like a
mini miracle that that happened.
and then our territory switched.
I was like, oh, whew.
Thank goodness.
CJ: that is, that is awesome.
Duke: Did you have any like skills
that you learned in the, SE side
of things that have served you well
on the developer advocacy side?
Um,
Lauren: I still remember my
interview for the, for ServiceNow
very vividly because part of it
was a demo, ? And so my, the hiring
manager had asked me, demo something
that you've built on the platform.
And so I demoed it as a developer,
? This does this and this does that.
And this is cool.
And I think it's cool cause I built it.
And so I could tell he understood
that I knew the platform very well,
but overall the demo was pretty poor.
And so he gave me some notes.
He said, Hey, how about you
orient your demo more like a story
from the person that's using it.
And he's like, I'm gonna come back and
I'm gonna come back in 10 minutes and
you're gonna do this interview again.
And I was like, okay.
Oh my God.
So I start, I start
Duke: pressure.
Lauren: but he was kind enough to
gimme the opportunity to try again.
Right.
And so, That was the first time I'd ever
really thought about a story oriented
presentation versus I think this is cool.
So you think you should
think this is cool, right?
And I think that as an sc honing
that skill is one of the best
things you can take away from it.
And it's something that I still use to
this day of the narrative of the demo
or the narrative of the presentation.
, cuz we're really story oriented organisms.
It's why books and TV and podcasts
are like also consumables because
usually they're oriented around
storytelling and technology
presentations should be no different.
And I think learning
that was most important.
Duke: I think it's a skill that
everybody should learn at a certain
point in their ServiceNow career.
Like there's a threshold of
attainment if you don't learn to
tell that story , like an SE does.
Lauren: yeah.
Duke: because , it is just convincing
people of larger scale ideas, right?
Getting them to agree to the
same worldview as you do.
And it takes understanding their pain
and it takes showcasing how their pain
gets solved and in what degree, right?
And getting them to, like,
getting it to say a back to you.
So they're like really selling to
themselves if you're careful enough
versus, you know what I mean?
Get them to sell it to themselves
versus you do feature functions
and it's like The peril of feature
functions is they can disagree with you.
You're like, I think this is
cool, and like, I don't care.
Lauren: Yeah.
Right.
And that's what my, that's what
the hiring manager was getting at.
Like, I understand you think this is
cool, but why should I think this is cool?
CJ: Absolutely.
It's funny, , so I, do therapy, right?
Like I get therapy, uh, with
my guy once, once a week.
And I like to bring that into the podcast
sometimes just to normalize it, right?
So folks know that it's not something
that you should shy away from.
It's real kind of, you know, something
I feel, I feel like everyone should
do it cuz it helped me immensely,
especially when I lost my mom.
But what I was talking about with my
therapist, just this past week was,
This entire thing, this narrative of
storytelling and how it both, impacts,
you know, ServiceNow, my professional
career, but also my, my political career,
? And it's two things , that I just took
away from that conversation, right?
Is one empathy, being empathetic.
With your customer and understanding
like how they perceive the world and
what their problem is, ? And so that
you can , help solve it better, right?
Because , you can't solve problems
that you don't understand.
Now, you don't have to agree
with the problem, right?
But you have to understand
it in order to help solve it.
And then the second thing is, a lot
of people say, I can't do sales.
I can't do sales.
Well, sales is really,
I'll just make you think.
It's their idea.
Once you understand the problem, once
you know the solution, then you just
gotta make them think it's their solution
and then the problem solved, right?
So, So I just love all of that and I
just wanted to kind of bring all of
that together, for folks listening,
because I know a lot of people
are so, intimidated by sales, but
really you learn to tell the story.
You have empathy for your customer, right?
And then you convince them that they're
just doing what they wanna do anyway.
, and , that's a good start.
Lauren: Absolutely.
And it's so funny that the word
sales has such a bad stigma, right?
Like, I understand where it comes from.
It comes from like,
oh, like the car sales.
Like, no, no shame of car sales.
But, but you know what I mean, right?
Of like, oh, they're just.
They're just trying to nickel and dime me.
However, the art of selling isn't
just necessary in a business sense,
but it's also necessary from a
career perspective of being able
to advocate for your own skills and
advocate for your own talents as well.
Like it's, that's just
selling too, you know?
Duke: And to some extent, I feel like
selling is fundamental to life the better.
you can get better.
So many different things in life.
By learning how to sell.
Lauren: Yeah.
CJ: Yeah.
Duke: It's just a way of getting people
to agree on a shared vision of the world,
CJ: Yes.
Duke: them to
Lauren: a better way of put it.
Yeah, we're, where's Ana's shared
Duke: Yeah.
And, and for, and for them
to take action on it, right?
It's not just, it's not just
that we agree, but you are also
gonna agree to do this thing.
And , there's so many skills and
disciplines in life that are like this.
And if you say I'm bad at
sales, it's like, okay, what
are you gonna do about it?
Cause if you tell me you're bad at sales
and you're not interested in sales,
that means you're not interested in
any other way you can better yourself.
That requires other people.
CJ: like these nuggets I feel
like are so incredibly useful
for our knowledge, right?
For our audience because there are so
many in our audience who are either just
starting out or they're developers, who
have never really had to sell themselves,
.
Or, or feel uncomfortable doing so.
. And I think just talking about
it in this way, kinda unpacking
it and de-stigmatizing it, , can
be really helpful for folks.
Duke: and there was a time when
, okay, like I'm somewhere in the
point of my ServiceNow career and
oh, I don't know how to do sales.
Well, there was a point you didn't
know how to do ServiceNow either.
Lauren: It's true just a skill.
Duke: you gotta do the hard
thing sometimes, right?
when I found out I had diabetes,
like how hard is it to go from sch
flubbing around in life to doing
workouts three times a week?
How hard is it to, completely
change a diet that you've been
strapped to , for the last 30 years?
All that stuff is super
difficult, but so what?
You gotta do it.
Lauren: Amen to that.
CJ: Yeah, absolutely.
Duke: Okay, let's lighten it up a bit.
Um, gosh, man, we had a
lot of dark stuff in there.
We had like mom's dying and diabetes and
Lauren: But it's real stuff.
Yeah.
It's not dark.
Is
CJ: It's Right.
That's life, right?
Duke: Yeah.
I'm just not to cry.
, maybe with the last bit of the show is
like the Lauren that nobody else knows.
Lauren: Ooh.
Okay.
CJ: Yeah.
Yeah.
Duke: so I heard something about
anime, like a you're an anime
person or is it more of a, or a
Japan culture thing in general.
Lauren: I love anime.
I think it's a Japan culture thing.
More in general though.
So originally I, minored in Mandarin
Chinese in college and I took it
in middle school and high school.
So, But the opportunities to use Mandarin,
unless you are in China, are not that
high, at least the United States.
Right?
If you live, actually, if you live
in Australia, there's like tons,
cuz it's, there's tons of Mandarin
speakers in other places, but not
necessarily in the United States.
And so, With not as many options to
travel to China as I would've liked.
I was wanting to pivot that, right?
I'm like, I don't want
all this to go to waste.
, and Japanese is close, right?
, so they use a type of character system
that a lot of the traditional characters
are derived from Chinese characters.
So the grammar is different.
The structure of the
language is different.
However, oftentimes the meanings
of . Nouns and verbs as far as the
character is concerned is the same.
Like the way you write fish in Chinese is
the same way you write fish in Japanese.
So I was like, okay, that
wouldn't be that hard of a jump.
But I don't really know much about
Japan, and so my friends and I went
to Japan in 2018 and we loved it.
Ironically, I have been trying to go
back to Japan since 2018 and something
has always come up for three years, of
which I think we know what that was.
But,
CJ: my God.
, Lauren: and like I was supposed to go last
year and then they weren't opening up,
but I was like, come on, , let me back in.
, but I do watch a lot of anime
too cause I was also trying
to get better at the language.
I'm still very, juvenile and I refuse
to give y'all any, so don't even ask.
I'm not looking to embarrass
myself, but, , it's been really fun.
Duke: Okay.
Throw some favorite titles out.
Lauren: Of anime in
Duke: Yeah.
Lauren: so I, I hate
shows that are too long.
Like people have been trying to get me
to watch shows, like one piece for years.
that show has over a thousand episodes.
CJ: Oh my God.
Duke: mackerel.
Lauren: would take me years.
So I will recommend ones
that are consumable and done.
, my favorite anime of all time
is called Mob Psycho 100.
It is three seasons and it's already done.
It is perfect.
the animation style is unbelievable.
I think there's about 12 episodes
of season and they're only 30
minutes, so you can rip through it
pretty fast, and it is just, it's
a beautiful story, beautiful story.
Duke: Yeah, I don't have a,
a big library to select from.
I think I watched and
enjoyed Princess Monano.
Ages
Lauren: I love Prince Monique.
Duke: Yeah.
I mean, but I, I'd probably like, I'd
probably watch the animes that non anime
fans are supposed to have heard about.
Lauren: Yeah.
That like Evangelion probably.
Duke: I knew of it, but I missed that one.
But as a kid, I was just
obsessed with, Voltron,
Lauren: Oh yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
Duke: different, like, but now, even
now as a grownup, looking back and,
understanding the, like the business
history of the Voltron brand in the
US and how they got it from Japan and
everything is just absolutely fascinating.
Lauren: Oh yeah, that's
always what's so difficult.
Even if you really like anime in the
states, , thank goodness for things for
like streaming platforms becoming popular
because prior to that, I mean, to be
honest, like the only way you could get
it was, uh, You know, probably not the
nicest legal ways cause Cause there's
so, cause there's so much red tape.
Yeah.
Cuz there's so much red tape with
regards to the licensing of it.
But now with like crunchy roll and there's
a couple other, like high Dive I think has
them, there's all these great streaming
platforms that have like all the titles.
It's great.
Duke: Well, I've, I've also
heard that manga is eating
American Comic Producers lunch
Lauren: Oh yeah.
, Duke: like all the demand is
shifted there all of a sudden.
Lauren: Absolutely.
Also, just the speed that they can
put out, like chapters every week
and it's just like pages and pages
and pages, like beautiful artwork.
I'm like, oh my gosh.
How do y'all do like pace of it?
It seems unrelenting.
CJ: Yeah.
See, I love this, right?
Like, cuz more competition ends
up making better content, right?
And so now , and I'm not a consumer of
either Mongo or, , anime, , very much.
But I was very much a, a Voltron fan and.
Duke: Five Lions Voltron, right?
The real Voltron.
CJ: Yeah.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
you know what I love is that just,
this stuff's just popular, right?
And what I love about the
internet so much, right?
Is that you can find your thing
or your people now because the
entire world is connected, right?
Lauren: so nice, like even if you
have a very niche interest, like
there is a community for it somewhere.
It might be on TikTok, it might be
on YouTube, might be on Twitter,
but there is a community for it.
You just have to look.
CJ: Yeah, absolutely.
And
Duke: know, oh, sorry.
Go ahead
CJ: no, go ahead.
Duke: No, no, you're sure.
Go ahead.
Um, I was gonna change topics too,
so I guess we'll just rock paper.
CJ: Alright, cool.
So what is, so you mentioned like, uh, you
meant community, which is a great segue
to, you know, developer MVP and advocacy.
Right.
And, community as a whole.
And what I love about, you know,
ServiceNow is that they really get
com community, You know what I mean?
And you know, and especially
when you think about it from
the perspective of this is a
multi-billion dollar business, right?
And.
When I'm interacting in the community, I
feel like ServiceNow is down the street.
Duke: Yeah.
CJ: know what I mean?
, I know people from across the world and
when I see them, like they know me and
, it's like we've haven't missed a beat.
And all of that is facilitated by the
ServiceNow community that this humongous
brand is putting together is amazing.
Lauren: That
Duke: everybody feels
like one of us, right?
Like my friend Chuck,
just put out a new video.
Lauren: Yeah.
Uh, that means the world to me.
To hear you say that cuz that's exactly
how I felt about the brand back in
2016 when I was still a customer.
And so that's as we've grown
dramatically since then.
I look back to see what my employee
number was and I realized that I'm
one of the few people that has an
employee number less than 10,000.
Right.
I think we're over like
the 30,000 now internally.
Duke: What
CJ: wow.
Lauren: And so I've always
been afraid , at the breakneck
speed that, that we're growing.
I hope that's not something that's lost.
So that means the world to
me, to hear you say that.
I, I know that there's specific
people at the company too
that really fight for that.
Like Earl Duque, I would say on our team
especially is like the number one advocate
for keeping that community so close.
And, , those people are absolutely
like invaluable to making sure this
still feels like , a community,
.
CJ: Yeah,
Duke: tell you, as somebody who did, so
many ServiceNow hackathons and at least
watched hackathons, I wasn't a part of.
Earl knocked the hackathon out
of the park this year at K 23.
I've
Lauren: I'm gonna send him that soundbite
Duke: super, super shout
out to earl on that one.
Lauren: a million percent
Duke: hackathon for,
CJ: absolutely.
Errol's amazing.
Lauren: and we made sure to have some
people s aid you the whole time too.
It was perfect.
Right?
Duke: Oh yeah, the um, uh, the
Lauren: was right next door.
It's perfect.
Right?
No one got annoyed by that.
No one did.
Duke: Didn't show up.
CJ: Develop under pressure.
Right?
That's part of the.
Lauren: Absolutely.
That's part of the first round , it's
like a, it's survivor challenge.
Right?
That's the first of all,
Duke: Hey, listen, at K
13, they had a live band,
Lauren: the hackathon.
Duke: yes for the hackathon, not
Lauren: God.
Duke: the hackathon.
And they had every speaker,
like every speaker in that whole
Lauren: that's really rough.
That's really rough.
Duke: gotta build a
business role to do this.
What I said.
CJ: Oh, man, that's, that's hilarious.
So, Lauren, if there was any parting words
that you would give to folks listening
to the show, any insight or anything that
you'd like to share, what would you say?
Lauren: Ooh, let me think
about that for a moment.
Duke: also say it in Chinese, in
Lauren: Which absolutely not.
I, like I said, I refuse until
I get at least an iota better.
, I will say because I, we've talked
a lot about like community and
advocacy, both for others and yourself.
Oftentimes people are afraid to put
themselves out there, especially on things
like social media and stuff like that.
but, and I, I mentioned this a little bit
when I was talking to people at Knowledge,
the best thing that you can do is be an
advocate for the successes that you have.
, I think a lot of times in life, like
we wait for other people to speak
on our behalf because we're afraid
of appearing like overconfident
or braggy or anything like that.
I know I personally, I just
had , my like half year conversation
with my boss and I was like, all
right, what could I improve on?
And he's like, your confidence level.
He's like, everyone thinks you're
doing a good job except you,
so you need, to work on that.
And I think that's a advice
a lot of people need to hear.
so many people work so.
Diligently and so hard and produce
really awesome things, and sometimes
people just don't know about them, right?
, there's a great book by Austin Kleon.
It's called Steal Like an Artist.
And he talks about a lot
of things that artists do.
To make themselves better at art, but
there's a lot of applicable knowledge
in there as well, just in general.
And one thing he talks about is
that documenting the process should
be part of your process, right?
show you how you built this thing.
Create a little snapshot of
the improvements made, throw
it up on LinkedIn or Twitter.
because if anything too that
documenting the process is
helpful for you in the future.
Therefore, you know, like
what you did, how it improved.
What you have tried and maybe didn't
work, but other people can learn from
you too and learn from your successes.
And I think, , being able to showcase
that publicly is a great skill.
I think that is something
that we should all work to do.
It's pretty cool.
Thanks.
CJ: I love that.
Duke: advice.
CJ: Absolutely amazed in advice.
Lauren: It's advice I need to
follow, so that's why I mention it.
CJ: But it's hard for everyone, right?
Like that's just amazing advice.
Seriously , listen to that and
take it to heart because none of
us really do suffer from promotion.
Well, why?
I think our culture is really kind
of steered to not doing it right.
Lauren: Yeah.
Duke: All right, that's 45 minutes to
record and we'd like to thank you again,
Lauren, for joining us on this show.
, it was our pleasure to have you here.
Lauren: Oh, it was my pleasure to be here.
Thank y'all again for inviting me.
I, this is such a fun time.
Thank you.
CJ: Oh my God.
That's amazing.
Thank you so much.