welcome to another episode of Glide chat my name is Michael Lombardo CEO of Glide fast Consulting next to me is a legendary David Nottingham Solutions consultant and along with many other roles uh at glyfest hey hey David how are you I'm doing good Mike thanks for uh hosting us out here in this beautiful Montana and Big Sky for this this Gathering of our of the company it's wild it is wild it's wild and uh man you know I you plan on something and you you try to anticipate what it's going to be like but you don't really know until you get here right and I never in my wildest dreams I thought it would be this cool yeah you know and then you roll with it you just roll with it I mean everyone's just having fun I mean we have a little fun at night but we're all business during the day I mean everyone's collaborating and uh it's it's like yeah I don't know it's just it's pretty wild to see it feels like very servicenow knowledge Vibes you know yeah I agree I agree it's a kind of kind of like a mini maybe even one of their you know they did they did a couple Regional events I forget their names yeah you know yeah the uh circus now at work now it works it kind of gives me that but it's like yes yeah it's us it's just us right no customers no servicenow just us you know vibing and working and proving ourselves but yeah but man I so I've known you for a long time and uh you know I never really like begged you to come to Glide fast but I always wanted you to come to class and I was kind of just like left it out there yeah and um you know I was honored you know when you came when you decided to come here and uh I appreciate that and maybe once you give a little background on on how you got into the servicenow world yeah so I I started this this is quite a quite an interesting and fun story so I started uh I've been in I.T service management for many many years started in the the 2005-2006 range with when I was working on the space program we were adopting a new platform wow back then the platform that that company chose was was Maximo maximum Maximo big you know I've heard of it I've never seen it yeah it's it's it's one of the one of the things that can be the the blessing and the bane of these tools is that it's highly configurable maybe even the nasty customized word yeah but that's the problem with it it's not it's not pre-built for purpose like service like I think service now is yeah you've gotta you have to build it you have to have to yeah yeah exactly you don't have the runway that servicenow's already put out there for you exact or work off of and yeah and and so uh during that time frame I I got into the I.T service management certifications and and working through that became change manager for United States base Alliance who was doing the the NASA program at the time the space shuttle program so it was it was a blast to doing that fast forward a few years I had switched jobs was with a health care company and we were selecting tools yeah and I got the job to select the next tool wow so and I went nuts I I sent RFI I sent rfis to 20 companies wow and yeah 20. how many employees are at this Healthcare organization uh at the time we were 1500 1500 okay yeah it was 1500 to 3000 I think was that was about the time frame I mean it's a healthcare performance Improvement Alliance is what they do so so they were they were looking at a new tool we had been using uh HP service manager yep yep and uh we've all formerly Peregrine formerly Peregrine yeah exactly and and so we were looking at the tools now we had we had different stakeholders involved and we had to bring them in so we had to interview some incumbents we had some non-respondents some really surprising non-respondence so during that that crazy process yeah and we were leaning towards two primaries yeah the company acquired a company that already had service now so we were able to say we're just expanding the use of a tool now we did not use their instances because they were highly customized and we set up back then you everybody was oh yeah yeah it was it was crazy I mean they were they had I think in order for them to upgrade off their version they had to they had to fix 400 scripts that they had written man it was crazy I mean it was literally sounds like I wrote them it was it was literally crazy so but I've always been on the process side of things very much but I always felt it was important from a process perspective to know enough about the tool yeah probably know enough about the tool to be dangerous yeah and but no enough so you could give good requirements to your technical team that's supporting you in exercise that's a huge skill set being able to communicate what you need and then the other side of it is knowing the not not necessarily like the Deep architecture but the high level hey this should go here because right servicenow one of the challenges is there's there's a lot of ways to to do anything you want a lot of ways to get the work done one best way you guys hear me say it all the time is one best way and that's our job right that's our job exactly that is an organization and we were just in our Coe meetings today and and I think that's one of my key points is especially with clients that are not as far along on the maturity scale where they're green to service now I think we need to be a more prescriptive to them yeah and and tell them here's why we think this needs to be done this way and and here's what the roadblocks are that or the hurdles you're going to face if you don't go this way you know it's like we've seen this before trust us yeah and sometimes the biggest challenge is like just conveying that Hey listen I know you want to do it this way but this is this is the way it should be done we've seen it work both ways right but here's the best way it can it can work yeah exactly and that 2015 time was was really my first exposure to what has become Glide fast because we use servicenow Professional Services to implement yeah and they subbed and Mia was Mio was our portal person yeah and she she did a great job for us on our first portal I mean portal portal things have gone way above and beyond what was being done in 2015. yeah and what was cable being done but it was a it was a fit for purpose portal for us to get started with and it was it was great it was a good experience that was at the logistics company I was at the healthcare oh wow yeah oh wow literally it was that we worked we also worked with you at when you're at the logistics company right you guys bid on an HR version we never let it oh they never happened we had we had four four people who came and did worlds and they never executed on the game they never they never released it to anybody yeah Bob was working that right yeah yeah okay yeah remember that yep yep yeah but I remember you working with Mia and uh yeah shout out Mia she was uh literally like the first first oh yeah employee of live fast and yeah so many people um just just loved working with her you know just just whatever it took in the portal to get there oh yeah yeah she was good and the uh and then you know fast forward you mentioned the logistics you guys bid on that on that HR deal I got involved in HR based on proximity yeah my the team was located in North Carolina and I was the only rep from the servicenow team for XPO that was in North Carolina wow so my boss is like you're in he's like you're it you're gonna go represent this team and they thought I was going to be their assist admin yeah for HR and I'm like that's not my role why did you come to Glide Fest so I had an opportunity from a a company head Hunted Me Out somebody I'd worked with at the logistics company had had hunted me out and um they were in another platform and during the interview process I found they were in another platform and they weren't going to go to service now anytime and and any any soon time yeah and I just felt that I invested so much of my own time and effort into the platform that I was like I'm not gonna jump that ship at this point so I kept seeing you guys you guys at the time this was 20 20. 2021 and it was like everywhere we're hiring all rolls all positions hiring our roles in all positions and I said you know what I might as well throw my hat in a ring so I reached out to Andreina because she was the last she was the one that I was seen shout out to Andreina yeah exactly and long story short I got offers from both companies that were very similar and in the service now and the the Glide Glide Glide fast not fast yeah where exactly at Glide fast but we are Glide fast and uh so that was it just you know it was it was really good and you guys had a good a the culture was part of it I mean I had been to your guys events at one or two of the knowledges that I had been to and and it just you know it was an easy decision once I once I got there any regrets none whatsoever not so far it's okay yeah I mean it is it's work I mean but it's good work yeah and and you know like I like I said in my Keynotes somebody actually like repeated back to me because I I was just going off I didn't plan any of my kids wrote a couple things down and even some notes them I didn't even didn't even get to my notes right you speak from the heart I just speak from the heart one of the things somebody said that I said is like listen you know we're we're gonna continue to grow and it's gonna be harder it's not going to be easier right to get to that next level it's going to be harder but it's going to be more fun and it's fun to be on the winning team it's not fun to be on a losing team exactly like you see you see the professional athletes or you know you think back to when you you know maybe it was a kid played in sports losing sucks it does it's not fun so that's like the one thing I love about Glide fast is like you know for me I'm not the best you know basketball player or anything but in the servicenow world we're the best you know exactly and that's what I love about everybody here is here we're Best in Class like the exact best team in the league exactly and that's that makes work fun you know being being part of the best and best people and doing good things for our clients and and getting them getting them to where they need to be with the platform so I mean it's it's been a wonderful Journey on on the platform since 2015 back in Fuji days Fuji Fuji man it was it was it was it was an area yeah Fuji to Eureka was big right well Fuji was a big UI too yeah Fuji was a UI I think that was us 15 to 16. 16 yeah yeah so right in there so yeah it's been good I've enjoyed the work I mean I joined as a senior bpc and then I've moved to the solution consultant role I still play at BBC when I'm on projects but I mean I love being on calls to you those calls it's it takes so much just body language and just like you knowing when to speak and I'm knowing like when to feel like we we really do work well together on calls like yeah no I've really I've you know I have to say I was I was a little bit when I saw your name on one of the scoping calls I was like oh it went off oh but it went awesome man it was you know I learned something I mean I even asked you for feedback on those things you know what can I do better you did I did you did you gave me an initial feedback and yeah and then you know it was I was there there was an implied more coming but you know the initial feedback was plenty it was great but the it's hard to give feedback when when you're when you're when you're going you're good when you're good when you're good you know what I mean appreciate it man it's like yeah really good it's not much we all have room for improvement yeah so yeah everybody and that is special about us too exactly we know where you know we're best in class but we know is a long way to go too yeah so yeah so it's been great I'm really enjoying I'm really surprised at how much I am enjoying the the pre-sales work and and helping clients select us that's awesome and uh go from there so um I've had a few good wins I've had a few a few uh disappointments but you know we'll get there I know which one you're talking about we're gonna get that back David thanks for all you do IFS [Music] thank you [Music]