Josh Birk Remember the first time you received an email? The magic of instant communication transforming your work life? That’s the journey we take you on as we explore the dynamic relationship between work and technology. From email evolution to instant communication tools like Slack, we’ll also tackle the unexpected mental emergency that a phone call can induce. 

Come along for a fascinating snapshot into the ever-evolving world of work.

Show Highlights:

  • The transformation of work due to technological advancements.
  • The mental shift that occurs when an unexpected work phone call comes in and how it impacts our modern work routines.
  • The impact of remote work and video conferencing on work culture, especially in the wake of the pandemic.

Links:

Episode Transcripts

Mike Gerholdt:
To wrap up Business Analyst August, we’re chatting about the ever-changing nature of work, so how things have changed in our work lives, maybe notable changes in technology that have changed the way we work, and maybe even discuss some crazy processes that we’ve had to unwind as admins, or being in the tech world. I don’t know. We’ll see where this conversation goes.

Josh Birk:
That is, once again, my friend and colleague, Mike Gerholdt. Today, we’re going to take a little time with The Admin Podcast once again, have a little coffee with Mike, and our good friend and colleague, Gillian Bruce. We’re going to talk about business processes, and tools, and the ways things have changed in our world. Now, back to the podcast.

Mike Gerholdt:
But I also have Gillian on to give us a preview of The Skills for Success September, which is next month’s theme, because we’re also launching that as a YouTube series. To help me do all of these fun conversational things, joining me is fellow podcast host, Gillian Bruce, and host of the Dev Podcast and evangelist, Josh Birk. Hi, everybody.

Josh Birk:
Hey, everybody.

Gillian Bruce:
Hello?

Mike Gerholdt:
Let’s start with the ever-changing nature of work which is what business analysts deal with all the time. I’ll just throw out there, I was thinking this is probably the lowest of low-hanging fruit, but how email has changed. Because I remember a time, I don’t know, many, many years ago, when I used to go to the public library to check out a computer to check my email, and I didn’t do that every day. Now, it’s what? I mean, how many times you’ve checked your email this hour?

Josh Birk:
I feel like it checks me at, this point, like it’s just watching me. I think it’s a bidirectional route now.

Gillian Bruce:
Well, I think it’s been quite an evolution, right? Because you went from like, “Oh, there’s this new thing called email that you check when you can,” to being like, “This is the thing that runs your work life.” I literally would spend all day just in email answering things to, now, I check it once, twice a day maybe, because everything I do now is Slack.

Mike Gerholdt:
That’s right. Yeah. From sending an email, we’ve definitely drifted away there. I remember my first days in the Cubicle, company had a proprietary, it was a proto Email kind of thing.

Josh Birk:
Oh, they’ve built their own thing, huh?

Mike Gerholdt:
They built their own thing, and then they got Outlook. But the proto email thing had the ability to cancel an email. If your recipient hadn’t opened the email, you could cancel it, and they’d never see it. They never knew you wrote it. The entire company went up in arms, because they suddenly lost the ability to send their bosses angry email at midnight, and delete it at 6:00 AM.

Gillian Bruce:
Wow. I mean, because with the unsend now, it’s like you have to do it within the first five seconds after you hit the send button or something. Interesting.

Josh Birk:
Ridiculous. I remember pre-Cubicle land, when I was in retail, and part of like your morning startup besides counting your drawer, was checking the company email, and you had to sign in. And then, I mean, you never responded, because it was basically just one way like here’s a thing from corporate, or here’s the stuff that’s on sale, right?

Gillian Bruce:
Well, and I also remember, I mean, you used to have to physically be at a computer to read your email. I remember my first few office jobs, I had to wait until I got into the… Commute into the office, fire up the computer, and then log into the email. Whereas, I mean, gosh, now it’s like I just turn over, roll over, and look at my phone, and can see the email to the point where I now have to have a really good boundary about, “No, we’re not checking work email until it’s a very normal hour to do so, because then I’ll just start doing things.”

Josh Birk:
Yeah. Right.

Gillian Bruce:
It’s also interesting how that has changed, right?

Josh Birk:
Yeah. Yeah. I’ll always recommend people to have two phones, which is not a phrase I thought I would say five years ago. But it’s like have a work phone, have a life phone, and that way if you want to go walk the dog, just leave the work phone at home. Just turn it off for a good couple of hours.

Gillian Bruce:
Yeah, I’ve had-

Mike Gerholdt:
I’ve always been a two work phone kind of guy, always two. That way, you go on vacation, the other phone can just do whatever.

Gillian Bruce:
Yeah. I used to be very good about turning off the apps or even uninstalling the work apps, because I’ve been a one phone person for the last 14 years. I’m starting to realize, okay, maybe it’s getting too complicated to untangle the unification of both personal and work on one device, and maybe I do need to go to two devices at this point.

Josh Birk:
Speaking of that, I used to, because I was just realizing my work phone is not really a phone. If you look at the call history, it’s all spam, and lies and misinformation. Nobody from work calls me on that phone, which is fine, because almost nobody from work ever actually calls me anymore. Yeah. I remember once again, going back to my Cubicle days, I remember being told the strategy of when to call somebody when you had to talk to them, right? You don’t call at 9:00, because everybody just got in the office. They haven’t had their coffee yet. You don’t call around noon, because they’re probably out to lunch. You need to strategize how you’re going to have a phone conversation with people. Now, it’s just like, I don’t talk to people. I think there might be a mental emergency if somebody calls you phone, and then I don’t answer.

Gillian Bruce:
Well, now, your phone doesn’t even work if you try to call, right? Half the time I try to make an outgoing call, and it fails.

Josh Birk:
Oh. I mean, I just don’t even answer. I got a call the other day, I was like, “Oh, neat. They can leave me a voicemail.”

Gillian Bruce:
Yeah. Thank goodness for transcription of voicemails, right? You don’t even have to listen to it. You can just see what’s written in that. Yeah. Gosh, Josh, you’re bringing back so many vivid memories of like, remember all of the learning, how to use the complex, like the phones in the office, the intercom.

Mike Gerholdt:
Oh, yeah. Conference calling.

Gillian Bruce:
Yeah. All the headsets everybody would wear, and everything was like a a go-to meeting, or Cisco. It was a whole other culture, and things that we did. I still have a technical landline at Salesforce that I don’t know how you would even access. Occasionally, I get an email with a voicemail from that line that I never check, but that I remember. If that was a cool thing, how do you record the right greeting, and how do you know how to dial the extensions? I mean, that’s a whole another thing that, I mean, people these days probably have no idea what that even means, right? If you’re starting in your professional, first ever office job at this point, the concept of a physical intercom, one of those big phones with all the buttons on it would just be like, “What is this?”

Josh Birk:
I mean, you remember those UFO looking phones that they had in conference tables with speakers and all the… I remember, every Monday, we would have a sales call and people from the field, that’s what we called it, called in, and we’re all sitting around a table and it’s like, bing, John Smith has joined the call. And then it’s like either they’re in their house, or they’re driving, and that was cell phones mid-’90s, which is like a wind turbine.

Mike Gerholdt:
Right.

Josh Birk:
“Can you hear me? Can you hear me?” “Yeah, go on mute, John.” I will confess, one thing I miss about those days is, when I was working at a consulting firm, we would’ve conference calls and if the client was, shall we say, particularly rowdy, sometimes somebody would just put a plastic cup over the speakerphone, and all of a sudden, they sounded like they’re just like [inaudible 00:08:11], and we’d just all laugh at them, without them hearing.

Mike Gerholdt:
Hard to do that with Zoom.

Josh Birk:
Don’t do that now. Everybody’s on camera. It’s all Zoom, and Google Meets and it’s super easy to join. You actually have to say why you’re not on camera.

Gillian Bruce:
That’s the thing, right? How quickly has that culture shifted? I remember, this was probably three years ago. This was before the pandemic, which I think also drastically changed a lot of culture around this. But I was with a couple of friends. We were together, but we were still working our respective jobs for a few hours, until we were doing whatever we were doing. I don’t know if it was weird. It was like we’re doing a wine country thing or something. But we’re all in our respective corners doing work, and I’m on video calls, and one of the people was just on an actual phone call most of the time, and all of us look at like “What are you doing? The expectation is not to have your camera on?” They’re like, “No, nobody does that.” We’re like, “Wow, that’s different.”

Josh Birk:
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I’ve been remote since well before the pandemic, and it was like, it used to be you were expected not to be, like you were distracting people if you were on camera. And then the pandemic hits, and it’s like, “How dare you not show your face? You’re not being social.”

Mike Gerholdt:
Right. Yeah. That changed. It was also weird too, because when you were… I was remote from, I’ve been remote, let’s say, 10 years now. There was a period of time too where you had to have your camera on, because it’s like, “Are you really at your desk slaving away over a hot keyboard, or are you…” Because the perception of work was, well, you work from home, you’re just out lollygagging, and walking around, and enjoying the weather, while the rest of us are stuck in cubicles, slaving away over hot keyboards.

Gillian Bruce:
Well, I’ll say that-

Mike Gerholdt:
Answering emails.

Gillian Bruce:
Yeah. Before those of us who were office-based were all forced during the pandemic to be home-based, that was absolutely the perception from those of us who had to go to the office every day like, “Oh, cool. You just woke up, and turned your computer on. Congratulations. Yeah, that’s working.” Now, I’m like, “Actually, I prefer to go to the office, because I don’t have to work as hard in the office.” I chat with people, and I’m late to meetings, and I have an excuse not to go to a meeting. It’s so fascinating how that has shifted for me.

Mike Gerholdt:
“Sorry, the elevator. I’m stuck, can’t make it.”

Gillian Bruce:
Meanwhile, those of you who are back-to-back meetings at home are like, “Come on, people. You office slackers.”

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah. Click, Click. “Why are you so late? Why are you 10 seconds late?”

Gillian Bruce:
“I was getting coffee, and having a chat in the hallway with so-and-so.” Yeah.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah. “I had to change rooms. It feels so weird.”

Gillian Bruce:
“I couldn’t find a room.”

Mike Gerholdt:
When you work from home and people are like, “Oh, I had to change rooms,” you’re like, “Oh, yeah. That’s so weird, I know. Went to the living room? I don’t understand you.”

Josh Birk:
I know.

Mike Gerholdt:
“Why? Why did you have to change rooms? I never get kicked out of my house.” Okay. Yeah. Well, August was great. Gillian, you said you listened to Amber’s podcast, it rounded out the whole business analyst stuff. Go ahead.

Gillian Bruce:
It did. Yeah. Because we all connected like, “Hey.” I mean, connected to what we just talked about, Mike’s very thematic. There’s different moments in time where work cultures shift, and how you interact and get work done in shifts. Being a good business analyst is all about identifying those opportunities, and figuring out how you can make that happen, well, in the Salesforce world with Salesforce technology, right? But I think what I really liked about Amber’s podcast is it kind of tied it together. It’s like, “Oh, it’s not specifically tied to, maybe it’s one specific platform, but the advent of something like Slack really gives you an opportunity to reexamine how your team works together. What is productive, what are the outcomes? How do you maybe take a step back, and look at this strategically, find ways to make people more productive and happier?” I thought it was good. Good job, Mike. I enjoyed Business Analyst Month.

Mike Gerholdt:
Well, good, because next month is actually a pairing, or a cousin to what you are launching on the YouTube channel, so let’s talk about the Skills for Success series.

Gillian Bruce:
Yes. Well, Mike, you are also a part of this. You have it-

Mike Gerholdt:
Very small, real small.

Gillian Bruce:
You know what? Small-

Mike Gerholdt:
Like 30 seconds.

Gillian Bruce:
It was a great 30 seconds, I’ll tell you. We are launching a five-part video series on YouTube all about skills for success. We go through all of the 14 skills that are in the Salesforce admin skills kit, and it’s not just me talking about them, it’s actually experts and industry leaders within the field. We have real life awesome admins, some of whom Mike, I know you’re going to have on the podcast, and we have industry leaders. Mike, I’m sorry, I’m calling you an industry leader, because that’s what happens when you do this stuff for a long time.

Mike Gerholdt:
Because I answer a lot of emails.

Gillian Bruce:
Yeah. Well, no. Yeah. Probably more Slack messages now. We have some industry leaders. We also have some people who have expertise in hiring Salesforce administrators, to get that employer perspective on why these skills are important, how you develop them, how you represent them to potential employers, what employers are looking for? It’s a fun series. We had some fun, as we do with our YouTube series, injecting some fun in it. But it’s a really great way to hear from different faces, and different people and perspectives, and hopefully, really help you get a more in-depth view into how these specific skills can help you be a successful Salesforce administrator.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah, it’s really cool. As of this recording, I already spoke with one of the guests which was, Emma Keeling, to talk about project management. I’m trying to delve into some of the people that you had on that video series. What was the things that you wanted to talk about, but maybe ran out of time, or what was other things that maybe are left on the cutting room floor, but are still really good? Emma and I had that chat, and I’ve got a few other guests coming up that will be part of the series. Of course, we can’t feature all of them. You have so many people on the videos. Thankfully, there’s not that many Thursdays in September.

Gillian Bruce:
We got lots of awesome admins out there, and lots of experts in these arenas, so it was really fun to work with all of them. I’m going to put this together, and I’m happy that you’re going to have some of them on the pod, to dig a little deeper and get that full picture, that longer soundbite from the 45 seconds, or whatever they are. Yeah. I mean, Mike, you talked about change management, I believe.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yes, we talked about a lot of things.

Gillian Bruce:
Josh, I also know that you were part of the series. I think you had a product management section, you talked about.

Josh Birk:
Something along those lines. I think I pretended to be a product management expert, which-

Gillian Bruce:
Oh, Josh.

Josh Birk:
I just talked about a feature for 15 minutes straight, I think was the right thing to do, right?

Mike Gerholdt:
Wow. 15 minutes.

Gillian Bruce:
Well, you’ll have to tune in to find out how it all turns out.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah. I’ll link to those in September too, so that the podcast can share the love with the YouTube series, and back and forth.

Gillian Bruce:
It’s like they’re connected or something.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah, I mean, we also… Look, let’s be honest. As you’re listening to this, we’re like what, 10 or 12 days out from Dreamforce too?

Josh Birk:
Don’t say that.

Mike Gerholdt:
Because that’s going to happen in September, but that doesn’t happen to everybody. Now, you have this whole series of videos, and podcasts to listen to in September, as the leaves fall. I don’t know, September is that weird fall month where it’s like doesn’t really, is it summer, is it fall?

Gillian Bruce:
Fall. [inaudible 00:16:33]

Mike Gerholdt:
Well, life is already at the coffee shops.

Josh Birk:
Yeah. Are you getting any of those heat advisory stuff over in Iowa?

Mike Gerholdt:
Oh, yes. It’s going be melt your face hot today. Yeah.

Josh Birk:
Yeah.

Mike Gerholdt:
Mm-hmm. Not going outside. Yeah. But who knows what winter will be, maybe. I don’t know.

Gillian Bruce:
I mean, I’m looking forward. San Francisco summer is literally beginning right now.

Mike Gerholdt:
Wow.

Gillian Bruce:
It goes from-

Mike Gerholdt:
Is it normal?

Gillian Bruce:
… late August till mid-November, and this is the second day in a row where it’s gotten above 70 degrees, and it’s glorious.

Mike Gerholdt:
Wow.

Gillian Bruce:
I mean, it’s been foggy, basically from May until a week ago consistently. It’s really nice to see the sun, and get some warmth, and I’m soaking it all up.

Josh Birk:
Well, as I look over at my dashboard, it’s going to hit 102 here tomorrow.

Gillian Bruce:
Oh.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah. We’re in the same boat, Josh, because it’s not… It’s just really in the heat advisory, because our dew point, I don’t know what your dew point is, but they always say in the Midwest, it’s not the heat, it’s the humidity.

Josh Birk:
Right.

Mike Gerholdt:
Oh, it’s both right now.

Josh Birk:
Oh, it’s both. Yeah, it’s both. I think the weather report today is something like 85, but feels like death.

Gillian Bruce:
Wow. Well, you’ll be here in San Francisco with me soon, and you’ll enjoy this beautiful 71 degree weather with a, let’s see, I’m looking it up, it’s 72% humidity, or the dew point is 61.

Mike Gerholdt:
Oh. Well, that’s not too bad.

Gillian Bruce:
No, I mean, it’s humid for us. It’s abnormally humid, but it’s beautiful.

Mike Gerholdt:
But Gillian, I bet Josh’s dew point’s probably the same as mine. We’re in the eighties, 80 degrees.

Josh Birk:
Yeah.

Mike Gerholdt:
When I woke up this morning, literally all the windows in my house were wet, because the dew point and the temperature were like one or two degrees apart.

Josh Birk:
Yeah. Yeah. This is the time of year we’re reminded that Chicago was built on a swamp, for sure.

Mike Gerholdt:
Full of concrete.

Josh Birk:
Yep.

Gillian Bruce:
Come on out to the dunes of San Francisco. It’s glorious.

Mike Gerholdt:
And then when you’re not in Chicago, and this is a real thing, you can look it up, I don’t know if I’m going to say it right, but it’s not evaporation, but it’s evaporative restoration or something.

Josh Birk:
Correct.

Mike Gerholdt:
It’s literally the fact that Iowa and some neighboring states, but really Iowa has so much corn with so much moisture that it raises the humidity level, because as it heats up, the corn evaporate. It’s all over the weather channel.

Josh Birk:
Okay.

Mike Gerholdt:
You can smell it too. When you walk outside, it smells like corn

Gillian Bruce:
In a good way or?

Mike Gerholdt:
Oh, very good way.

Josh Birk:
Oh, okay.

Gillian Bruce:
Okay.

Mike Gerholdt:
Very good. Yes.

Josh Birk:
Yeah. I can see that one falling either way. Yeah.

Mike Gerholdt:
Right. Right. No, this is a very good corn on the cob, on the grill. You’re like, “Ooh, let’s go get some corn from the farmer’s market.”

Gillian Bruce:
Oh. Speaking tangent, because we are talking about food. I made the most epic elote salad a week ago. Elote is that Mexican street-corn. Basically, they grill it, and they put a bunch of aioli on it, and deliciousness-

Mike Gerholdt:
Oh. I wanted to do that.

Gillian Bruce:
… Cotija cheese. I need a grilled corn elote salad that I still think about. I think I might have to make it again tonight. It’s basically, you grill the corn, you put a bunch of tomatoes, and avocado, and cheese, and deliciousness. You mix it together. Holy moly, I mean, Damon and I ate the entire bowl-

Mike Gerholdt:
The whole thing?

Gillian Bruce:
… in one sitting. Yeah.

Josh Birk:
Nice. Nice.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah. You lived like a mid-westerner, because I will confess that it is sweet corn season right now. It’s almost a tail end. I really need to go to the farmer’s market, but we’ve had sweet corn for dinner.

Gillian Bruce:
Yeah.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah. Same as the elote salad, just on the cob with butter on your cheeks, so look at that. Well, there we go. That’s how we’re going to end it. Butter on our cheeks, or mine at least, anyway.

Gillian Bruce:
Butter makes everything better, right?

Mike Gerholdt:
Yep.

Josh Birk:
Real good ingredient.

Mike Gerholdt:
Yeah, real good butter. If by chance, you enjoyed this episode, maybe pick a different one, and then share that with one person, because that would be awesome. Here’s how you do it. If you’re listening on iTunes, all you got to do is just tap the dots. There’s three little dots, you choose share episode, and then you can post it to social. You can text it to a friend. Maybe you text an elote corn salad recipe. We’d love that. That’s our show. Now, if you want to learn more about The Admin Podcast, and all things admin, head on over to admin.salesforce.com. For more about this show, head on over to developer.salesforce.com/podcast. You can hear old episodes, see the show notes, and have links to your favorite podcast service. Thanks again everybody, and we’ll talk to you next week.

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