[Music] the Aldis podcast is brought to you by Aldis International supplying your expert Ai and digital transformation staffing needs across the US and Europe today you are listening to our service now Series where we interview the best and brightest of the industry to share their story advice and views on the exciting world of service now and digital transformation [Music] hello everybody it's Mark Kelly Chief CIS officer and co-founder of Al this welcome to the AL this service now series I'm very very happy to welcome we have Chris Nanda on the podcast today and I've had the pleasure of chatting with Chris before this session just as a prep call and I'm so happy to be sharing his insights and his guidance on the episode today uh Chris is going to talk a little bit more about his background and work that he's doing done but in terms of formal titles go Chris Nanda and he is the manager of Technology at veteran enhanced technology Chris thank you very much for joining us on the show today thank you so much Mark um it's great to be here I love the podcast and everyone that you've had on so far thank you very much for the kind words Chris tell us a little about your journey and how did you get into the world of service now well I've been in uh software engineering for about 20 years now and it's interesting because I actually got into service now as a fluke um after joining the military I was uh kind of on my way out I was looking for some work afterwards uh I got a phone call from a gentleman asking me if I wanted a job as a JavaScript developer uh I laughed at him this was in 200920 and um JavaScript was still kind of a new language you really didn't hear people who were JavaScript developers and so uh talking to him and and getting deeper into what he he was at looking for uh it was working on service now and I just kind of dove in head first and after that it was it's 14 years later it's crazy how time just completely flies and you've worked in a variety of different roads W within this ecosystem tell us a bit about them sure so I started off doing implementation your standard technical consultant role um architecture but I always approached it in an engineering fashion just because software is software to me um so I've done implementations as a technical consultant worked as an architect worked as a a business owner started my own consulting company also somewhat by accident um I just started getting too much work for myself and I'm like well I guess I need to hire someone and eventually I partnered with someone else we became CA Solutions which is became part of third era and was just absorbed by cognizant um after I uh left uh Cerna though um I decided to part ways just because I was looking more for a product site to build versus Sol uh services and so I actually took on a job at service now for um and I was there for about five years uh three primary roles one of them was uh as a technical Alliance architect um where I helped external uh isbs venders things like that build out their Integrations moved into core platform engineering where I had the opportunity to to build some amazing Solutions into the platform um most of which many people don't understand even today so I'm actually building my own podcast around like those Solutions um and then finally I I was tapped and asked to be part of the customer success organization as it was starting up under uh John Dono and uh that was an amazing experience just being first off being called and said hey Chris we we'd like you to be a part of this and it was one of two technical roles in customer success now uh the impact team um we did some amazing things after about a year they decided to restructure a little bit and uh so I moved back into engineering um and then in 2020 I decided to kind of go out on my own again um I missed the full life cycle of development one of the things that service now's grown uh they're a little bit past uh where you can have multiple roles within the organization you do something that's fairly specific I like doing uh working with customers doing re ments Gathering software development testing everything through the life cycle and so uh then I found vets and the owners in My Views aligned on the ecosystem and on implementation specifically around customer success and here we are your service now is such an interesting ecosystem that you can join service now go out to the Wilderness go out to the Ecco partner and user come back into service now and it's open arms I can't take of any other ecosystem that is like that it is truly incredible and you're getting so many different perspectives you're you're walking in different people's shoes and it's a fantastic foundation really really good I love that aside and then your your current role as a manager of Technology at veteran enhanced technology tell us more about your company what you guys do your your Niche so realistically I lead the tech techical resources at vets um all of our Architects and TCS roll up under me and I partner with our service delivery director so I don't run Service delivery but um that he is a partner to me and we assist each other uh one of the things that we kind of aim for here is that technical roles uh roll up to a technical person just to make sure that you have a little bit less disconnect between people I also support our sales organization for pre-sales so I can can tap an architect and say hey we need you to come over here and do uh some scoping and then the nice thing is they kind of have uh their their uh their state in it when that scoping goes out and if we get that particular contract because they help to put it together um so they know that they might get that so it gives them a little incentive to help uh ensure that that scope is correct so you've seen a few different sides of Defense customization versus configuration what's your take I think it's extremely important but I also think that in some ways it is uh misunderstood service now is a platform at heart when it first started out it actually didn't even have any applications Fred lovey tried to sell service now as a platform to build on and it didn't really take whole at that time people wanted a product now people want the platform and with service now across the Enterprise customization vers configuration is more important than ever because we want to ensure that we can maintain our platform we can ensure that we're going to be upgradeable long term but at the same time we don't want to be scared of customization again it's a platform for you to build on and if you can't Implement your processes then what's the point of the platform it has to support your business and so realistically there's some key aspects to customization that that come into play number one again don't be sced of it number two demand management whether you use service now built-in module for demand management or some paper process or something else the key goal here is understanding what you're changing why you're changing it and the risk that's involved in changing it then accepting or denying that risk having a a change approval board essentially most companies don't actually call it that for demand management but essentially a change board being able to say yes we accept this risk or no we don't and then documenting that so that way when you come back to those decisions and say hey we're having this issue down you know 5 years down the road why did we make this decision ah yes okay it's because of this and and continue to support your business um those are some of the the key things around that and again the goal here is to ensure that you can upgrade in a timely manner also the faster you upgrade the more often you upgrade the better position you're going to be in with that and also be able to maintain that code because also a lot of customers these days do not have HTML and JavaScript developers or people who can do heavy scripting and things like that and so taking advantage of the tooling that's in front of you um I actually just ran into this two days ago which was I I had a problem in front of me that I could go through and build out in a script but the first thing I wanted to do was say hey can I do this in a flow or in some way that's going to be a little bit more maintainable for the customer in that circumstance it actually ended up not being but taking that as uh looking at all the options great advice and you you're saying listen you're going to make this decision you need to be an adult about it you need to own it you need to have your eyes wide open you know you can keep going to the local womm poool but if you're going to go and build a swim pool in your backyard you're going to have to maintain that pool right and what comes you know you may not know so there's there's quite a bit in there and a lot of insights uh in it in terms of you what what do you really need do you really need to go H kind of go on this journey or can you just stick with what the tools are and be cognizant that you know if they work and they you can fit them around you then that's that's a really really good place to be from a team Dynamic perspective and you've worked with so many different types of teams big and small and that diversity teamwork work implementations we know when they go wrong they can be really expensive to fix and time consuming but when they go right they gel and you've got that kind of flow what have you learned from that the team that is involved in implementing or working on a service now project whether it's a new implementation or uh a new project on an existing implementation is going to be somewhat Dynamic based off of the needs of the customer and the needs of the project um you want someone who's Tech Tech which is a no known uh but you also need someone who's process efficient now often times a technical consultant can fall into both of these roles because they've just kind of gotten used to it oftentimes logic assists with process and things like that but when you're trying to expand a team and scale it you need to make sure that you've got each of those roles and the reason you know everything gels together as you mentioned is communication communication is key and we live in a different world right now um almost everyone's distri I've worked uh remotely for almost 14 15 actually more than that now years and being able to communicate efficiently while remote uh whereas in a software engineering team often times I would just stand up knock on someone's cubicle and say hey I need this from you um being having a team that is uh across time zones as well as across countries um being able to communicate efficiently is key and you can't use the same tool that we had before um a standup let's say at 9:00 a.m. when I walk in central time is going to be uh 7 am. uh on the Pacific uh Pacific time so ultimately we need to make sure that we've got systems in place to communicate uh progressively in that way um there's many ways to do it I use spreadsheets sometimes and other things there's great tools out there of and things like that where you can actually help with your communication and task management um and this is outside of stories and things like that um and and the actual project itself when it comes down to stor stakeholder involvement is absolutely key so communication leads straight into stakeholder involvement and the thing about that is those same people need to be able to communicate with the stakeholders I've often had times where a project in order to streamline Communications we've tried to have things go through one person and often times that that might work um but the telephone game gets a little bit difficult and so um having a team that is able to communicate internally and communicate externally is going to be absolutely key um and then when it comes down to it your technical team gets broken out I'm leaving this to last to a couple of different things you've got an architect this is a a changing role in the service now ecosystem uh I would say service now has almost redefined the role of architect most organizations you'll find deem an architect as the next level of a technical consultant or developer so it's just kind of the natural progression up the ladder um personally I don't see it that way but we have to function in that way uh an architect to me has a very different role in an implementation the key thing about an architect is looking at everything holistically and ensuring your platform is stable um ensuring that the solutions that the PCS are coming up with to implement is not going to impact outside of that project is not going to um have issues down the line some of those customization vers configuration Point um a technical consultant whether junior mid-level senior level um a senior level TC oftentimes has just as much implementation experience if not sometimes more as an architect they just have a different focus and so understanding these roles and saying hey I need a senior TC on this because I need someone who's going to be Hands-On keyboard to develop this solution is going to be a better understanding than saying hey I need all of your senior Architects everyone on my project needs to be a senior architect those Architects sometimes aren't supposed to be hands- on keyboard all the time they're not supposed to be developing those Solutions they've got a different focus and they may not actually be as good at doing that if you've got a senior TC who's been doing CSM for seven years versus an architect who's like who understands CSM itsm and how they merge together and how everything goes together that senior T level TC on CSM is probably going to have a better knowledge on that than the archetype loads of advice loads of advice there you know even from this basic of the time zones you're getting up at a different time somebody could be halfway through their day and so trying to catch them in the context of their flow and then working through who's who's leading that project who who's actually taking control of certain aspects what are you accountable for and making sure that you are using the right tools that are fit for purpose at that moment in time and then just constantly re-evaluating to say you is this serving what we need to serve at this moment in time are you playing the role you need to play and are we giving Maximum Impact either internally to our customers or externally to our customers and it's a really really nice play to ask my next question is you've implemented so many successful service now projects and you've worked in service now and You' you you've seen what that other part of the ecosystem looks like what are some of the you know success steps that you need to be cognizant for to to really get these projects over the line rather than just do a statement of work to some somebody they actually reap the value for the work that that's being done you you touched on one the S so is going to be key because you have to start somewhere um I will say that eight out of 10 sows probably are extremely underrated uh they don't have enough content in them and and that there's reasons for that you have legal and all of that so I understand it but realistically when you walk into a project having a good s so or a good mission statement for project is going to be the number one goal um from there identifying and working with your client whether you're uh an admin working at a client you know you're working with teams internally or you're a Consulting organization working with a client um you need access and so identifying exactly what is the overarching goal because oftentimes we'll get lost in the wheat uh if a technical team jump jumps into things and doesn't see the uh see the forest for the trees you're going to have issues down the line because then they're going to be so head down and focus um they're not going to be building to what the client actually needs um CL that which brings me to client involvement service now is not the you can do waterfall development so everyone's going to think I'm going towards agile agile agile honestly service now doesn't even do Agile they they suggest a hybrid agile approach um but the key thing is having it is that service now is not designed where you tell me what you need I'm going to go build it and then six months bring it back to you and say here you go here it is that's not the goal the goal is to have stakeholder involvement that they can see it ongoing however you do that it doesn't have to be a rigidized format it could be ad hoc meetings actually I found that those ad hoc meetings can be the best saying hey Tom do you have time to to meet with me today uh to go through what we've built out for case management up till now and the nice thing about it with service now oftentimes that will become a working session enabling you to get even more close detail for that implementation ensuring that Tom is saying yeah I need that oh that sounds great etc etc um after that having a good structure of understanding testing um this is actually somewhere that I've seen that's service now implementations go wrong so many times um everyone talks about testing at the beginning of a project we need to test we need to test what are we going to use to test we need the unit test integration test all these things but then as we're going along and we're not making as much progress as someone might want to see or some someone might expect to see because people are trying to set up tests and things like that um it falls by the wayside a lot for velocity and so ensuring that you have an internal if you're a Consulting organization having internal QA process um whether that's your ba who's going to step in and say okay I'll test what you just did yeah it looks okay no it doesn't or if you've got an external team or an external process ensuring that those things are tested um by and blackbox tested by someone who doesn't really understand the solution is going to be key um because then once you go into uat uh it for some reason because it does happen a lot you didn't get that stakehold holder involvement you're probably going to have a very formalized uat process the nice thing about that is uat then is geared towards the business and understanding does this meet the business's needs versus hey this thing doesn't work because too often uat ends up becoming a catchall for testing and that's not what it's designed to be um and then finally uh post go live support is crucial we put it into every single one of our contracts because um we're not going to just walk out the door after we've gone live we want to ensure that that whatever the project is that you we can update it after the fact because again service now is not geared towards uh we Implement and then you leave it that way for 20 years and you're never going to touch it um which there's you know you know there's a lot of systems out there that that's exactly what they were um service now is designed to be an IT iterative process and so through that we go live we look at how it's functioning for the business we identify key gaps we bring that back in through again our demand management uh process whatever that is and then Implement those Solutions in order for us to have an ongoing support of that business Chris so much words of wisdom there uh ad Hawk meeting so much common sense in that because people can be fixated with the ad can ban principles of work but can I have the five minutes of your time or you've got a freed up slot today would you have a moment and you're just getting that insided knowledge you're getting the thoughts and that that could be work 10 previous meetings in terms of what you get from that and then you build on it you've got your insights and you're talking the same language and it just saves so much time and energy and you move away from really rock solid rigid structure that does not allow you to have a good forming relationship so again if anybody is listening to this this is where in the podcast need to re rewind this listen again because there's so many good steps to go through and then as you said the post support you're up you're live ready to go that's where it becomes real people are going okay I now need to you know I'm flying by myself here I need to kind of figure this out and then you're there supporting them kind of coaching them through and uh that's when the real learning starts right this because you've got it's it's in there it's in production this is where things shift and move and you got drift and yeah it's it's it's it's a such an important point to make Chris my final question to you if you were going to start back in this journey again and you were walking in and at the start of the podcast he said it was a bit of a fluke but let's say you're starting on again and you could speak to your older Chris what advice would you be sharing on this journey well you mentioned one of them uh in your previous statement uh relationships remembering I I when I started out I had no idea that that this realistically Consulting is about relationships I was a software engineer when I came on into service now but Consulting and working with other people is all about relationships and that's one of the things why I focus so heavily on customer success now so if I had to go back and say Chris this is what you should be focusing on it would be identifying what people need when you're working on a project it's not just about the technical aspects what do you need and how are we going to solve for that problem um having the ability to drill into a customer and say hey you said you needed this but why do you need that what is going on that that supports that need and going deeper and deeper to understand all right what is the true problem we need to solve for you um I was not not I was great at solving problems but I wasn't great at solving deep problems and so understanding that it's about the relationships and not just about the technical aspects and of course um service now especially now is so broad uh focusing somewhere finding somewhere in the platform I ended up kind of falling into it but I Integrations are kind of my Niche now um I build a lot of them but ensuring that if I was starting out now on the platform I would have to tell myself to to find to focus somewhere that I'm passion passionate about because the platform is so vast that you could be an HR professional I I just had someone who was working with us um he ended up going back to work with the military but he had a passion for HR but was learning service now through the skillbridge program and so uh he focused on hrsd and he actually helped us on a number of implementations for that other people are love cyber security and want to focus on security operations there's so many different aspects of service now at this point that you could be a service now implementer and still technically fall into so many other niches so having some type of a focus that's meaningful to you because I'll end with this oftentimes passion trumps Talent simply put um Talent is great you could be a great engineer but if you have the passion for for the platform passion for the ecosystem then you're going to go far brilliant Chris loads of insights thank you very much for your time today thank thank you so much Mark and take care thanks for listening to this episode of the AL this podcast if you enjoyed today's episode don't forget to subscribe rate and review we are available on Apple podcast Spotify and any Android podcast of choice you can also head over to our website www.al this.com to listen to more podcasts view our open roles and stay up toate with industry news thanks for listen list and stay tuned for more great episodes coming very [Music] soon