[Music] hey all Lauren here inviting you to get your first look at the now platform Washington DC release the service now developer Advocates are hosting our Tech now webinar on February 1st 2024 this webinar spotlights all the cool features service now admins and developers care about so sign up today at Dev link. sn/ t97 regge to claim your spot that is Dev link. sn/ t97 reg hope to see you there it doesn't matter what your background is if you're thinking about getting into service now or know someone who is we have a story for you welcome to breakpoint the service now developer [Music] podcast hello service now admins Builders developers and of course all of the curious individuals that I always say with the utmost love and respect welcome to or welcome back to breakpoint the service now developer podcast where we bring you the latest tools tips and tradecraft to accelerate your career my name is Chuck tamasi senior developer Advocate and I am joined by the one the only the Posh programmer senior developer Advocate Lauren McManaman how are you today Lauren you know what I'm doing great I hit 5K on LinkedIn today so I'm starting my new year off with a bang woo good Milestone yeah let's hope a few people listening to this also decide to follow you if they aren't already we are also joined This Time by the senior program manager for NextGen veterans programs the one and only also popular on LinkedIn herb Thompson how are you herb hey Chuck hey Lauren happy to be here this gonna be a fun conversation I hope so you seem to be a funny guy online let's see if that translates to a podcast no pressure no pressure at all we like to throw some softballs at you to start off so tell us a little bit about yourself first yeah I mean I'll go back many years ago since I don't think people would be able to see this and all my gray hair but no I joined the army when I was 17 years old that was I always wanted to be a soldier that was my dream more specifically to be a Green Beret which people kind of refer to as like Rambo that is not me though that is probably the most pop culture reference I can give people and then to be a drill sergeant so people that train America sons and daughters Army and I got to do both and then I was like what am I going to do next I was not yet 40 years old and said who I got a lot of life left of me so hopefully uh so let's figure this out so I you know retired out of the army went to Cornell got my MBA got on it ex centure and that's actually where I heard about service now about five years ago because I I had no clue what service now was back then they said you're hired start looking at service now because that's the work you're going to be doing I was like oh okay I'll go figure out what service now is uh so that's me I live in the DC area with our blended family of four kids uh and Corey and our two dogs well how appropriate for the release that's coming out in just a couple weeks so it's very well timed location wise also thank you for your service as always uh we really want to stand by all of our vets that's a fantastic accomplishment glad you're here and doing well so aside from your fun colorful history of former veteran turned Accenture turned service now employee what does a typical work day look like for you now in comparison to what it did before much different and it was an adjustment for me this remote work environment uh working you know wake up in the morning I I usually wake up very early uh get some coffee maybe exercise go for a walk uh play around with the dogs and then open up the laptop and uh but usually before that there's some thoughts for me I do a lot on LinkedIn so I always have some posts queued up probably to you know copy over and put into LinkedIn and then go about see what I'm going to do through the day and it's every day is a little different but like anyone else probably in the remote environment some meetings with team members and then you know either some internal work or some external work uh which would be more meetings and then really just hey how can we get more people into the ecosystem and that that's really what I focus on most mostly veterans but now you know broaden my horizons to get more people in the ecosystem how do we break down doors and get them a through you know a Tech Career doing service noww work another LinkedIn will be sure to plug in the comments down below of this podcast and then finally tell us a story that something that you might have done in your career that you thought you were potentially getting fired for it's a kind of a fun question we've been asking a lot of our guests we've gotten some pretty wacky stories out of it so do you happen to have any yeah I'll give a quick one and a slightly longer one my quick one was the first time I emailed Bill MC and then my boss here at service now was like wait you emailed bill and I was like yeah why I mean his emails there why not and he responded within two hours so I was like okay I guess I'm not getting fired so uh apparently if you email Bill he at least I still email him every once while he'll email me back so sure there was that in my military career though probably more may not be as understandable but really hits home for me is we're on a combat Mission firefight people shooting at us this has been going on for hours maybe seven eight hours and my indigenous Force because as a green Bray I work by with them through an indigenous population uh so there's me and there's a bunch of them and we're trying to uh ride safety and freedom for this Village and they quit uh quite frankly it had been a long day and I was like we have to keep going so uh we had to go in clear rooms and make sure there was no enemy in there so I would throw one of them in one room I would throw another in another doorway and I would go in the third doorway and that kept going because they they had stopped and I thought I had lost all all my rapport with them I was worried that like let alone get fired like is my life in danger more than it already was and the next day when I walked in to their leader which there was like a hundred of them and there's just me he was like my guys love you oh okay I guess it's going to be okay but they they had respected the warrior mentality that I wouldn't give up and I probably that probably sums up my life is I just won't give up yeah the similar gumption much different con quences on both those EXs but when you're not at work what do you enjoy doing herb uh I try to find new hobbies now as a boat we got a boat and it was probably a very I live close to the Chesapeake Bay so taking the kids out tubin while they're just cruising around it's probably one of my most favorite things to do now we've had it for almost two years and it's just really therapeutic and I love it it's fun to be on the water which I was never a water person I may like going to a lake or something but I had never been so that like said that we like to go hiking uh at one point I still have roses I trim roses and go out there uh not just to grow flowers not to win any awards and stuff but that's and then I like to go hunting so outdoors I like to be in the outdoors nice I have some land here so it's always good to be out there and probably my as my boss knows um bald eagles I'm a bald eagle like nut so if bald eagles fly by and I can see them out the windows here like I just I lose it I don't know I start Fang girl or whatever you want to call it what kind of boat do you got uh it's a like open boat rider so it's we can kind of allpurpose do everything with it okay fit like 10 12 people on it so we take the kids out their friends tubing fishing just cruising around the ches peak Bay been practicing up on your knots yeah uh TI a knot or Tha a lot and I'm in the Tha a lot category usually I don't think I've ever heard that I've been involved with voting you know for 50 years but uh yeah you just have to master a few Basics how to how to tie up to a cleat properly a bowet is a good idea a rolling hitch and a half hitch in case you get up to a post and there is no cleat you could still tie off on something so yeah there's a few Basics yeah it was an adventure learning two years ago I not really ever I had a like a fishing boat little bass boat way back when but yeah it was a learning experience I I am a firm believer in you take one of those public Coast Guard auil courses and you know learn the basic rules of the road so you're not just some Johnny donut bag Johnny Bag of Donuts out there on the water causing danger to everyone around you yeah I think it's like everything else you get a little training a little assistance it makes life easier right you try to do it on your own oh it's difficult you could wind up going a ground if you don't know which side the red buoy goes on definitely now moving kind of more into our service noish types questions You' mentioned you had gotten your start in service now kind of by being uh for lack of a better word drafted into it by Accenture but so kind of maybe go into how service knowledge changed your career what were kind of you doing prior projectwise at Accenture huge change for me and it happened there's a big career transition when people leave the military especially someone like me who you know served 20 years it's it's a change of a way of life and it's like wait can I can I make it in the outside world if you will uh because quite frankly a lot of times in the military easy show up Bey on time and work hard and you can uh go up and they told me to learn service now change management consulting is what I was doing and I loved it you know it was it was something new for me to learn and I was just I asked a lot of questions and I know some of my co-workers be like hey keep asking questions and I at some point they probably regretted that because I just kept asking hey why is this working how's this and I just got to understand more from like an admin side of it because a lot of what I was doing was uh creating training for users to then use it or hosting Town Halls to gather feedback so not as technical but I had to you know what I say is know enough to be dangerous and was really just by asking questions but it opened up this whole like oh wow I can be in this world of tech and when I saw the opportunity to come here service now I I hopped all over it and you been here just over two years now herb there's something I've been wondering and I want to clear this up for the listeners as well we've got these various career transformation programs I've heard of NextGen I've heard of rise up I've heard of skillbridge can you help me figure out how those all fit together or what the relationship is yeah great question Chuck because I I hear it quite a bit and that's usually the first couple minutes of a conversation I have with someone is is clearing this up so I'll start with rise up uh you know a little over a year ago our leadership here service now said hey rise up aspirational goal to train a million people and I'll never forget when I was sitting here I saw pop up on on my laptop and I was like oh my God a million people because we had already been doing that in nextg next gen specifically is to break down barriers for people who traditionally can't get into Tech so we have three pillars but we're as inclusive as possible so gender Equity racial equity and those affected by generational poverty those are the three we most want to work with but we're as inclusive we we want to really open up doors for people and we've been doing it for number years even before I came here veterans fall up into that piece and that's kind of where my focus started here as and that is nextg skillbridge is actually a Department of Defense program along with the Department of Labor and Veteran Affairs to really decrease unemployment when people get out of the military so they have a skill an easier transition into a job so it came about a number years ago service now has been doing it now for a couple years one of now up to 3,500 uh companies in the US they have skillbridge traditionally most of them are in their last six months of military service if their military command approves it they could come to our training program they learn service now skills and then in theory go out there and work in the service now ecosystem so that's the difference skillbridge military Focus nextg we're focused on breaking out doors globally that's not just here in the US we do it through Europe and also in into Asia with Australia and Japan and then you know rise up being hey let's train a million people because we need talent ecosystem for us to keep growing in addition to those programs we've also heard some Rumblings about potentially a new hybrid program is there anything that you can leak about as well most happy to talk about our hybrid program and I'll go back a little bit so we had skillbridge and it was being successful our first ones uh start in 2019 actually right before I got here was our first uh cohort and then we we did an in-house program so we took that skillbridge model and said hey we'll do it for non-veterans too well uh we realized it's kind of hard for people to take 10 12 weeks off you know to go through a full-time program so we had to meet our students where they were and really what our hybrid program focuses on those career transitions people that hey maybe I'm in a customer support role I want to learn more about service now or uh just you know underemployed unemployed so any anyone really would would fall under what we're looking for in the hybrid program and we we do at night so a couple things that make a hybrid nighttime learning so you sit in a class with an instructor but you also are doing some ond demand coursework from now learning library so the blend of learning is different too because now you're doing on demand traditionally or instructor-led training with you know servers now we kind of Blended it so you get some instructor-led sessions and you do the on demand training and after 10 weeks your successful you complete that you have your Ser um certified system administrator voucher go take your certification we provide additional services to help gain employment to help you get your actual CSA and then one year of now learning continues to be free so you can continue on your career Journey learning more skills with the eventuality of you you get a care you know a job in the service now ecosystem so we're really excited about it we just graduated finished up at the end of 2023 our first iteration of it with a little over 700 people that did that and our goal for 2024 is 2,000 people nice that's amazing I also heard you are an author can you tell us about that I I didn't plan to and for you know maybe I should have said this at the beginning of the podcast I failed ninth grade English so you know manage your expectations there I I transitioned out of the military and actually there was a soldier I was doing a lot to help other service members I felt I was pretty okay I'd got to Accenture I'd found my way and I I had a conversation they were like hey I'm lost I was like I need to do more so actually in one weekend I wrote most of the book I got home from uh that call I hung up on the call when I pulled on my driveway about 6 pm on a Friday night and I didn't really get up out of a out of the chair except to you know for a bio breaker to eat for about 48 hours I had most of a career transition book that's focused you know with a military uh flavor to it and you know I won an award for best how-to book a couple years ago forers and it was just my way of I I want to serve others and I saw so many people in need in that career of transition that I I could easily put together my thoughts and put it out there you might be a developer Advocate if that's what I'm hearing is you like we have very similar paths here where you like to learn something and then share it now you I also think you have a a book in the works I'm in the works and Corey my fiance soon to be white We're essentially married we just we haven't done the uh done the actual ceremony yet she's been pushing me to help and I open up a little more and I've seen how many people I help I do some public speaking outside of what I do at service now so really it's it's life lessons I've learned from you know starting way back when we got kicked out of the trailer park and my uh parents had to go on welfare to me joining the Army to you know what I learned through 20 years of working with so many great people and then on to Cornell and Accenture and now here at service now it's just kind of life lessons with my my of flare of what that means what someone can learn from that I look forward to that and we'll be sure to have a link to your book in the show notes as well now you were kind of talking about sharing just in general so is there any one particular success story that you would consider you know the highlight of what you've done thus far that is a really tough question because it's like asking who's your favorite kid yeah or you could say more than one we're not going to limit you there's no time limit on the podcast so if you ask my kids they'll tell you who the favorite one is it's my dog but um yeah no I always start with this one because I I think it's very unique and you have to understand the military transition it's a whole way of life and then and a guaranteed paycheck twice a month you don't have to worry about all that yes you could go overseas you could do all that but at the end of the day you you have a guaranteed income benefits all that uh and the structure around you and you say hey I'm going to leave that uh so I highlight the infingers all the time Jeremy and Emily jmy did some it work in the Navy actually service now came in and worked with the Navy chaplain and they were able to develop an app very quickly like within a week and he goes oh I that is special I want to be a part of that so instead of going to Microsoft or anywhere else he could have done a skillbridge he said I'm going to service now and I I'm I'm going all in on service now when you say all in it's different when one person does but a whole family so Emily who's a dental technician uh by trade has a little bit of uiux kind of background with you know artistic flare says okay I'm in two quits her job and goes through the program with Germany so not put their business out but they downsize where they were living to essentially a one room and say hey we're going to go through this and they went through side by side on lap tops um different pods but going through the same classwork and by the end of the program Jeremy ended the program on a Friday and on Monday he started as a senior platform architect here at service now in Emily uh the same week if not the next week after that started out at one of our partners as a senior developer uh so and consultant so to me that's just like wow one family said hey I'm all this and and power couple yeah and they worked their butt off really and Jeremy you know going through his interal process here like nothing was handed to him they they both did and that's a lot of the success we see of people coming out of a program most of them have not heard of service now when they you know start this journey sure they go H what's this service now thing and now it's it's becom a little more common a little more known but still people are like wait I don't know because you could be like Stephen Israel he's he's a mechanic on an airplane and works on airplanes and goes I don't want to do that that's tough living turnning wrenches I want to get into this world of tech finds out about our program comes in here for four months to our skillbridge program Dives in within you know shortly after the program ending he has two certifications per service now and now he's out there working at Wells Fargo you know working on their service now platform doing that so it's just people like that are you know Josh Hamilton who's now out to Atara Consulting one of our smaller partners he went from a dismantling roadside bomb said hey what am i g to do when I get out of that oh my gosh yeah and uh another one of his friends Chris Stevens had been through our program he also was a EOD explosive ordinance uh technician who you know roadside bombs deal with bombs you know bomb disposal he had come through our program got hired out as a developer at one of our partners and told Josh about it said hey you got to check this out so Josh came in here and he worked his butt up within four months he had four certifications from service now wow and uh just learning the platform and really dove in and said hey I'm gonna make my own success and we have so many stories like that you know I think of Amanda who was a you know a spouse spouse of a veteran who said hey I'm gonna come here I you know we saw a lot of happen with the economy right 2023 especially early on rols were eliminated produced and said I'm going to learn this service now came in here worked very hard learning service now earned a certification shortly after our four-month program earned a second certification landed a job in the ecosystem as a junior developer but also said hey I'm going to come back and be a teaching assistant for that new hybrid program when we reached out to people so it comes full circle many of these people yeah have come back and our teaching assistance for our program so that that to me is something special always when I came here to scale the skillbridge program was that's what it has to be this community and I I think you you guys obviously is you know develop rkids you you get this you live and breathe the community but that was something that we needed to do and they all help each other and there's they just bend over backwards to you know you have to work hard but help help someone hey here here's a here's a job over here hey here's a study tip over here or here's you know check out this app over here and it's really special to see them come together just make that bond that is um really come a Hallmark of our program it's also very special when the person who is teaching or training assistant says a year ago I was sitting where you are a year ago I was dismantling bombs a and it's like really I can I can be like you in a year you you listen to some old fart like me like yeah 15 years ago I was a customer and things were different we didn't have no idees little different story definitely and that's a lot of what NextGen does is uh just in general we need to be able to believe in ourselves right and need to be able to think we can do it and US thankfully we're able to do this as part of service now and service now obviously puts a lot of money into this and efforts that you know our conscious effort to grow the ecosystem but you see it day in and day out with these people that like and even some of our other you know from our partners out there and people coming in the ecosystem just hey I was a truck driver and I don't want to be a truck driver anymore and then you know they learn to come uh service now and next thing you know they're working in the ecosystem that's a brave thing to do a little closer to home though I understand you have someone in your family joining the ecosystem yes Corey who's had a pretty diverse career a lot of marketing a lot of uh recruiting experience uh is is joining the service now ecosystem so she will be in a associate director of program management at kindrell one of our partners and I'm really excited because she's gonna work uh with one of my favorite people Marilyn neth and Kindra who's been uh around service now a long time worked on one of the first service now projects I I also if I remember right grew up with Fred luy so she's like I call Marilyn this is probably the worst thing you could say to a lady is at one time in a call with her I was like hey you're like Forest Gump and then I was like oh that that that did not oh I'm sorry like but I meant you know it was it was but it was met as like wow you've been in like she was yeah Pentagon in 911 when it got hit she grew up with Fred luy like was on the first service now project at Tia I mean like wow and she's all around good good person that her you have to call her up Lauren yeah her her you should because her and then you talk about a good person I'm like hey you know I went in Austin because I'm gonna propose to Corey a little over a year ago she's like hey yeah here's three people by the way one of these is my daughter so her daughter took my engagement photos kro is one of my favorite people so yeah Cory's going to be doing it so now all the time when I'm talking about service now you know at the house it'll it'll start to make sense to her because she's gonna be e too she'll start telling you things that need to be fixed probably like oh all of our dreams that our loved ones actually understand what we do for a living and that's one way of getting that accomplished I'm excited I'm looking forward to it we talk this all the time because I'm always dealing with veterans and transition people in career transition so we talk about it all the time but usually there's this like okay now that goes to servers now stuff and like it kind of clouds out there but now and quite frankly probably soon she will surpass me in service now knowledge because quite frankly you know I I my I tell everyone my my coding expertise stops you know my APM pin code sorry Chuck uh that is like I'm good if I can get my APM pin code I remember or my phone you know unlock it so I haven't even figured out that I could use my face to unlock the phone so you are not alone in that pin thing I I I always transpose two digits and have to call my wife and go what was the number again she's like how do you remember all this other stuff I'm like I don't same way I also get a gallon of milk like hey go to the store get a gallon of milk gonna forget it every time I can remember Mac addresses from 1993 why I don't know I remember when I was in the Army so I started on the Army doing Pap before I went to be a green bra doing all that combat stuff and I had to everyone that was up for the promotion board I had to look at their record s and when they' walk up I'd be like oh you're Johnson last foure social 2172 your here's which and they were like how do you know this and this was like thousands of Records I knew that but I I can't rumor my pin Cod or or to get milk at the store well you could have been a pastor too they seem to remember everybody's name yeah definitely so herb what do you consider the highlight of your career to date you mean besides being on the breakpoint podcast um a that that was nice nice try nice try that's I I think I'm very fortunate right and I say this is you know I always think people that say I'm saying this humbly that's probably as UNH humbly as you can say something but I I had two dreams when I was a kid was to be a green Bray and to be a drill sergeant and I was able to earn my green bra I was the Army's drill sergeant of the year so I'm the only person ever to do those two things uh together in the Army no way yeah all that being said like when I went to the coffee shop this morning I didn't get a discount like I still had to pay my full share no one really cares but it's my claim to fame so so I'd say that and now I don't know I I like to think you know whatever that's going to be isn't written yet and that's probably what drives me is okay I accomplished my two dreams but not what's next and I don't know what that is but I always say make an impact and I know it when I see it so um continue to be able to do that here service now and just I I want to do more I just don't necessarily hard to articulate what more is you're definitely making an impact based on the the stories you've told the successes the people that are coming into the program that's that's a good reason to get out of bed in the morning it is I'm very very fortunate and a lot of veterans will reach out to me as like Hey how do I find a job like yours and I'm like well there's like one or two of us here at service now and if you go to you go to any other company go to Microsoft there's one or two and like it's it's a pretty lucky job because it's kind of you get the you get the satisfaction of the human component of nonprofit but you still get paid at a tech company right so like hey that's pretty nice ni and to have the support of a tech company so it's been huge seeing you know hundreds of people at this point in you know my two years here and I just say like I give them the space and they they have to go do the work yeah and to see them be successful and I always look at it I always look at it different of it's not just that person usually there's a family tied to it right whether it's uh spouse kids Goldfish dog cat so there's a you know but really to me it's it's a generational change because now I look at like my chances in life when I was you know a teenager versus where my kids are now versus where their kids can be that's a big change and I I always think that every time I I work with our students and I'm always trying to give them to be hard and firm and hold standards but also you know uh be as understanding and empathetic as possible as what they're going through in life knowing that it it affects a family can really have a big difference in one's way of life it's a good way to look at it well that's the perfect segue into our final question which is do you happen to have any advice for new developers that might be listening to this podcast or or potentially even current service men or women that are looking to get into it or development or things like that I always say own your journey and I say that for a few reasons of I've that's where I've how I've got here in life right is no one people will help you but no one's going to do it for you and if you put in the work and and a lot of people can work hard but it doesn't necessarily mean you're working smartly and efficiently but if you can work hard and do it kind of smartly just use the resources there's so this podcast there's so much out in the community that if you want to break into service now what we doing next gen there's I don't know if I've ever reached out to someone or heard of someone reached out to someone in the service now Community go hey I could use some assistance or do you have time for a question or you know to answer a question everyone it's almost like a everyone drink the Kool-Aid people are like yeah we we'll have a chat with you so just reach out exactly uh but believe in yourself you can do it whether you were a mechanic a teacher uh whether you graduated from college whether you know English is your second language wherever you came from in the world if you can get access to the internet and you have some Drive um you can be successful in this and I think service now does a great job of showing that throughout our company of so many people from different walks of life that have uh you know found their Career Success and are so happy doing it so uh just gotta get over that one hurdle believe in yourself you can do it and just reach out to somebody and ask for assistance it reminds me of one of my H favorite stoic quotes which is whether or not you believe in yourself or don't you will be right so I like that I like that and there are so many skills from I'll say your former life that translate into that you can capitalize on service now whether it's customer service or soft skills or you know just being present you know there there's so many things that you have accumulated in your lifetime up to this point that will serve you well are there going to be gaps yes nobody's perfect at everything that you me Lauren you we all have areas we'd like to to improve but we can definitely draw upon those uh existing skills to help bootstrap us into this new career and I think to add to that amen Chuck I also think so many people think of service now or Tech in general that I talk with and it's like kind of the old I'll date myself the nerd in the basement drinking Monsters you know just typing away on the keyboard but there's so much more whether you're a system admin or you know you're in the sales part or customer success or support account manager there's yeah just so many opportunities to uh be involved in the ecosystem that even if the text scares you like you can do it this isn't rocket science I know where the rocket ship but it it's not rocket science if I can figure some of this out there's hope for all of you there you go that's the closing testimonial if I can do this There's Hope for all of you we'll put that on a t-shirt for you please do well definitely thank you for joining us for the last 30 minutes or so herb before we leave can you let the listener know how they can get in touch with you yeah please find the Homeless looking bearded guy in LinkedIn herb Thompson SF to Biz you'll see I post all the time uh find me here service now I also have a website uh herb thompson.com for those that failed ninth grade English that's the little like line not down at the bottom but in the middle of the words uh that's a hyphen and Thompson with a p i had a friend I had a friend named Wally Thompson he was in fact his Unix promp was no P because he didn't one I love it well thank you again herb and thank you wonderful listener for joining us today don't forget we have other podcasts you can find them all over at service now.com Community under the events menu you can subscribe to this one for free and all the other ones I guess you can subscribe to those too get them automatically delivered to you never miss an episode we've got more stuff coming up in the upcoming weeks on the Washington release that you are not going to want to miss breakpoint is brought to you by service now executive producers would be me and Lauren as we wave to the camera on an audio podcast you can find out more about the service now developer program by heading over to developer. servicenow.com again thank you so much herb for sharing with us today thanks appreciate Chuck Lauren thank you please let us know what you think about this podcast you can leave feedback or ask questions in the service now Community for more great information on service now development check out the service now developer portal at developer. servicenow.com thanks for listening