ServiceNow

[Kevin]

I am about to possibly be assigned to an implementation of ServiceNow in our organization. I would like to get others' thoughts about this product and get some feedback on what skill set is required to be a competent SN admin.

[Caitlin_H]

We use ServiceNow at my company and I do like it. I am not the SN admin so I can't help you there but I can tell you that it is highly customizable and you can adjust the organization of nearly all the pages.

When we first rolled it out we had far to many Business Services and Business Service Groups but after evaluating the way SN was being used for tracking we were able to curtail that and narrow the options. The Categories and Subcategories are a good way to track what is being worked on…if used correctly.

The biggest thing I would say is that it is important for the Users of SN to understand the way the system works and feel like the input they submit is taken into consideration when designing it. All the tracking abilities of SN will be for naught if it is not being used correctly and therefore you can’t view an accurate depiction of your Organization and the work being completed.

Overall I like SN and I feel that we have done a good job of implementing it. The system is very robust and we rolled it out about a year and a half ago and are still rolling out new modules of it.

I hope that information is helpful!

[Kevin]

Is there someone there that would be willing to give me 10 minutes on the phone to ask a couple of questions?

[jhbush]

Kevin, at my previous employer we switched from Remedy to Service Now. I was pleased with the usability and tools provided. Creating a knowledge base and service tickets was much easier. It's also browser agnostic which was nice after using Remedy. I would agree with Caitlin_M that implementation and planning is important otherwise it's just a mess. Try and keep your ITIL folks in check.

[Kevin]

My question is this:
I was a QuarkXpress guy, who became a Macintosh publishing support guy, who became an Adobe Creative Suite support guy, that has transitioned to a Casper admin, and then a CrashPlan admin, and an iOS device admin, etc…

Now I am being propositioned as "the guy" to learn and (re-)implement ServiceNow. I have no database or developer background, other that what I have had to pick up to do the things that I now do within the applications I mentioned. I am of average intelligence and a fast learner, but my organization is looking to SN to "save the day" in IT. Is my background appropriate to undertake the challenge or do we need to bring in outside talent to get this up and running?

The reason I ask is that we spent a gazillion dollars on this product (hundreds of thousands) and "the guy" in our data center who took it on created a mess and it failed miserably. He left. It was turned over to our DBA team and they have created one workflow that is an unusable disaster. Management is looking for someone to take this over and get some quick wins to justify the cost. They are wiling to scrap the minimal workflows currently "in production" and start over with someone else. I have had success with implementations of Casper, CrashPlan and WebHelp Desk. All largely self-taught using web resources (such as JAMF Nation).

SN looks like it is infinitely more complex and with the high visibility of this project, I don't want to be the next "the guy" who fails and is out the door because the project is beyond the abilities with someone with my background and interests.

[damienbarrett]

Kevin, it looks like there's quite a long list of "partners". Surely there's one in your area that might be able to offer some training and expertise. I know your org has spent a lot of money on this project, but perhaps it might be worth spending a little bit more (on training and/or integration) in order to get the kind of value added return that's expected?

http://www.servicenow.com/find-a-partner.do

Also, it looks likes like ServiceNow is launching a brand-new discussions forum on Monday. If you haven't already, I'd be digging through the "Getting Started" and "Troubleshooting" sections.

http://community.servicenow.com

[Kevin]

Thanks Damien. I agree that may be the route we go, but what I simply need to know right now is this: Is the typical Service Now Administrator a DBA, a networking guy, a Desktop guy, a developer, etc…? Or is there a typical SN Admin "type"?

I do not have a developer or DBA background and do not want to set myself up to fail… If I am not a good fit, I want out now, before this even gets off the ground.

[pickerin]

Kevin, I'm about to be a ServiceNow Certified Administrator (wish me luck, taking my exam next week). I've been through the ServiceNow Admin Training (3 days) and the Scripting Training (3 days). I'm also our Casper Admin.

This is a highly customizable, enterprise-class, ITSM, Asset, Configuration, and Project Management solution. There's literally nothing you cannot do with the system. That said, it's also not something you're just going to "pick up".

At a minimum, you need to go to the Admin Training. Once you've completed that, you'll at least have an appreciation for what you can do with the system and have a basic understanding of how to administer it. To get the most out of it, you're going to need to be able to write and code in Javascript, or you're going to need a partner to do it with you.

That said, I'm happy to have a 10 minute call with you to do a high-level pass over. There's really no excuse for a workflow in the system not to operate correctly, other than not knowing how to do it properly.

To answer your question, the best "type of person" to administer it is going to be someone with a strong systems engineering, systems administration (windows, unix, etc) background, with some development expertise. If you're writing your own scripts for Casper Administration (think extension attribute scripts, deployment scripts, LaunchDaemons, LaunchAgents, etc) then someone well-versed with Casper Administration and that background could make a good ServiceNow admin.

[ega]

@pickerin by chance have you setup import from JSS to Service Now. We are just starting to implement SN here and need to get info from hosted JSS in the cloud. Not finding a SN module to do this but might be as simple as writing an import. Any ideas or pointers??

[pickerin]

You can do this via an Import Set and Transform Map.
ServiceNow can import from a JDBC connection (if you have access to the underlying database), or via REST, or Web Services.

http://wiki.servicenow.com/index.php?title=SOAP_Web_Service
http://wiki.servicenow.com/index.php?title=REST_API

I've not done it yet, but hope to soon.

[dstranathan]

We just deployed ServiceNow here in December 2014. We replaced a deprecated BMC Help Desk & Asset product and we love it. SN is Mac friendly and browser-based.

I'm hoping to have Casper Suite purchased and deployed this winter spring (2015).

I'd love to hear success stories or testimonials on how you have integrated JAMF with SN. Please share.

My main goal is the auto-creation of Assets (CIs) in SN when a new Mac is imaged and deployed into production via JAMF. It would greatly help my Desktop Techs and IT in general.

[pickerin]

@dstranathan

Your best bet, most likely, for ServiceNow-based information will be the ServiceNow Community, found at https://community.servicenow.com/. It is an extremely large community dedicated to ServiceNow. Additionally, you may want to look at Share (https://share.servicenow.com/) which is a free-to-use area where folks have posted various code, applications, tweaks, etc. that can be used to improve your overall environment. Finally, the ServiceNow Wiki is the online documentation repository for ServiceNow (https://wiki.servicenow.com).