When I read through them, I'm inspired and motivated to work as hard as our customers do to make ServiceNow a product that changes lives. In the immortal words of my hero Chevy Chase: I get the urge to create something massive.
That trove of Knowledge13 goodness tells the story of a community perfectly calibrated. Call it the cesium clock of enterprise software. Not only are you doing things we never dreamed of but you're pushing each other to do more…faster…better.
Case in point: at our mobile social meetup Wednesday at Knowledge13, Jennifer from London threw down with her Chat translation integration for multi-lingual call centers. Jake from western PA countered with his augmented reality location-based extension to Live Feed.
There were more than 3,900 attendees at the event. In my highly unscientific poll based on about 80 documented customer conversations, more than three-fourths were at Knowledge not for an IV drip of content (or for the Elvis impersonators or booze), but to share with — and learn from — everyone else. During the event I was asked to match-make for everyone from customers with at least five million CIs in their CMDB to ones tweeting outage information to ones with custom applications that automate global supply chains. The underlying theme: you believe in the platform, are well-aware of its depth and sophistication, and are eager to learn what's working elsewhere.
I've been developing mobile apps for ITSM and CRM since 1999. I thought I had seen it all - communities on the rise and fall, ones that are innovative and others that are stagnant, some dominated by takers and others by givers. I've never seen anything like what we have here: a collective conscience motivated by genuine interest in building something that transcends IT. I've seen shy, reserved sys admins join this community, drink the elixir of awesomeness we ladle, and become SNUG heads (which, by the way, is a great name for an '80s cover band) and most-valuable posters.
Our Product Advisory Council meeting at Knowledge13 felt like a religious revival. We prepared a lengthy list of action items to keep the discussion going after the event. Mid-way through the wrap-up Diane from American Airlines cut me off at the knees and suggested that instead of our Product Management team doing the organizing, each customer take ownership of a follow-up topic. Wende from the Department of Energy backed her up and the rest of the crew dogpiled. We got kicked out of our own party. And it was one of the proudest moments of my professional career.
Thank you Jennifer and Jake. Thank you Diane and Wende. You inspire us to do more.
We'll look back years from now when this ServiceNow chapter is in the rearview mirror and marvel at having been part of something special. We'll recall what we're living through today as a pivotal, memorable, formative stage in our careers. The elixir's flowing. Stay thirsty, my friends.
