*this post is in progress
If you're reading this, chances are you're at least somewhat interested in learning about the ServiceNow industry and how you can start a career in it.
Congrats. You've taken the first step to joining an incredibly fast-growing industry with a robust ecosystem developing around it!
This post is meant to be a guide for anyone that's heard of ServiceNow and wants to learn more.
It's also meant to be a guide for current industry folks to share with their friends. From our experience, it's pretty common for ServiceNow developers to try and get their friends into the industry. If that's you, we hope this guide can be a great resource for your friends to get started.
In this post we'll cover the following:
Let's get started!
ServiceNow is a cloud-based platform that helps organizations automate processes and streamline work tasks. In simple terms, it's what businesses use to get work done. For example, if you need to submit a request for a new laptop and have that request be approved by your manager, you can do so using ServiceNow.
For visual learners, check out Stanford University's Service Portal, which is a great implementation of ServiceNow. As you can see in the link, Stanford uses the platform to provide users (students, faculty, etc) with a portal that answers common questions, allows users to submit IT requests, and report problems.
If you're coming from a non-IT industry, it'll be helpful to learn about the basics of IT before you can really grasp the power of ServiceNow.
Since ServiceNow is a platform that is used to perform IT functions, it's a lot more difficult to understand ServiceNow if you don't know what IT actually is. A good place to start would be learning about ITSM and ITIL in this blog post here.
If you're coming from an IT/Developer background, this YouTube video should help you get a good understanding of ServiceNow.
There are several ways you can learn ServiceNow. However, taking a structured approach and utilizing the best resources can speed up your learning curve.
We'll run through some of our favorite resources that have helped us and our colleagues learn the platform and get certified quickly.
First things first, sign up for a ServiceNow Developer account here: https://developer.servicenow.com/dev.do. - this will give you access to all of the resources that ServiceNow offers.
Once you create an account and are logged in, you should be on a screen that looks like the image below.
The ServiceNow Developer website has a few key features:
* to access your PDI, click the 'Request Instance' button at the top right of the screen (as shown in the image.
Beyond the key features we mentioned above, there's a ton of resources available on this site. You can find it all through the top navigation bar (Learn, Reference, Guides and Connect).
There's honestly so much information on the Developer site that you can get lost in it. ServiceNow has become a massive platform that can do hundreds of different things. Even if you've been in the industry for years, you'll still come across information and parts of the app that you've never heard of - so don't get discouraged at the volume of courses and docs!
That being said, if you're just starting to learn, it's probably best to start with the 'ServiceNow Fundamentals' Course (link here) which is where most developers begin their training.
It's also important to note that you must complete this course in order to get your CSA (Certified System Administrator) Certification. We'll discuss exactly what that means and why it matters below in the certifications section.