3204: Empowering Women in Tech: Confidence, Leadership, and Career Growth

[00:00:03] Imposter Syndrome is a term that we hear very often, especially when discussing women in tech and leadership roles. But the big question is, how can you truly overcome it? And more importantly, how do you recognise it in others? And how do you create an environment where confidence can thrive?

[00:00:24] Well, as we celebrate International Women's Day and Women's History Month, this conversation couldn't be more timely. But my guest who I'm going to welcome in a few moments is going to discuss how women leaders can overcome self-doubt, build resilient careers, and create more inclusive, high-performing teams. And her powerful journey has seen her go from working on that IT help desk to leading one of the top ServiceNow consulting firms.

[00:00:51] So I want to look, so today we'll talk about how to shift from self-doubt to leadership with confidence and resilience. And why taking bold career moves in tech can transform not only your career, but also the opportunities that are available to others too. So big question, how can women in tech break through barriers, silent self-doubt, and take their seat at the leadership table? Well, enough from me. It's time for me to introduce you to today's guest.

[00:01:21] So thank you for joining me on the podcast today. And for anyone listening, hearing about you for the first time, could you just tell everyone a little about who you are and what you do? Sure. Hi, my name is Stacey Fournier-Thibodeau. Most people call me SFT. A lot of people are surprised, but they actually do call me SFT. It's really interesting, but my last name is long and hard to pronounce. So it's very French.

[00:01:45] Yeah, but I'm the president of Cask, NXUS. So Cask is a ServiceNow integration partner, and we've been a partner for a long time. We're one of the top tier partners that they have in their partner ecosystem. And their U.S. business is a huge part of our business. So I'm able, I've been in that role for about just over a year now. And so I run all of the U.S. business, sales, delivery, operations. And yeah, my background is in IT and consulting.

[00:02:15] And I was a ServiceNow platform owner for 10 years when I worked in corporate America. So I bring a lot of business transformation knowledge with me. And I've been now in the ServiceNow consulting space for almost nine years. So a pretty extensive career, both in working with ServiceNow, working in consulting, IT consulting, and business transformation consulting. Wow, incredible. I'm really pleased you've joined me on the podcast today. So much I want to talk with you about.

[00:02:44] And you mentioned the world of IT there. And something I'm reading more and more about lately is imposter syndrome is a real common challenge, something very real, especially for women in tech and women in consulting. So, I mean, can you share your personal journey of overcoming self-doubt and maybe how it's influenced your own path to leadership at Cask NX? So I started off in IT and I worked on a help desk and then I just worked my way up.

[00:03:13] But something that was really interesting for me is I just naturally had an inclination for technology. But I really fell in love with the, like, why does IT even exist kind of part? And making sure that I understood how the budget worked, what was expected from the business. And I did a lot of process methodology and things like that. So I started working with the ServiceNow platform. I had a natural inclination for business, I think.

[00:03:36] And when I started to use a platform like ServiceNow, I was able to prove my point, really, for the most part. Like, show through data things that I knew to be true already, but people would maybe not believe me. So I think through being able to kind of flip-flop from like a, hey, I have a gut instinct about something versus like, no, here's a mic drop for you, right?

[00:03:57] Here's the data to prove it and I'm going to show you how it's going to get better and better and better and show and use information to prove my point and drive maturity and success through an organization. I really got pretty fearless about what I could do. So when I left kind of IT proper and corporate America and went into IT consulting, I had not even been really a consumer of consulting. So now you're like, okay, now what are you doing in an executive role at a consulting company?

[00:04:26] And that, yes, that's exactly what I was wondering at the time, right? And quickly, I really fell in love within the business of professional services because I had been used to working in a Fortune 200 company. And now every client was different sizes, different business problems, different challenges, things like that. So that helps with confidence as well, because you're kind of able to like, okay, check the box here, here, here, here, right?

[00:04:51] And all of a sudden you realize you have transferable skills that you can really apply to anything. So I was fortunate to have a lot of support, a lot of cheerleading. I've always had people who just clap for me and just supported me through my career. And I was able to, when people came to me and said, do you want to take on more? The answer was always yes. Even if I didn't really know how to do it, I was like, I was going to figure it out.

[00:05:15] And so, yeah, when I came to CASC and X, I came in actually a people role, which was really interesting. I'd never worked really in like an HR or employee type of capacity. But because our whole business as people, knowing what all these different people do across the organization was really compelling to the leadership team at the time. And they were like, do you want to take this job? And I had to like do a bunch of research because I thought I am not an HR person. But I really ended up being very valuable.

[00:05:44] It's something I learned a lot about as well. Relating to like how we do delivery, what kind of roles we need, how do they work on projects together? What kind of gaps are there in the way that we deliver our sales team, our business operations? And then I took on operations. And then after three and a half, four years, I was promoted to this role, which was actually a newer role. But it was a way that we kind of moved to a corporate structure and then this part of the business was put under my purview.

[00:06:11] So you'd think I would have an incredible amount of imposter syndrome, but I spent the time kind of prepping for it. Like, just give me the reins. I'm ready to go. And the last year, not to brag, we had a really good year financially and also as well as through just maturity, growth, retention of our amazing employees. And yeah, so I think just kind of the resilience to get through a lot and take on things and set them up and knock them down, I guess. Love it.

[00:06:40] And in another lifetime ago, I too started life on one of those IT help desks and had my own issues with imposter syndrome. And I'm curious, why is it you think imposter syndrome is particularly prevalent in the tech industry? And any particular strategies that you found effective in building confidence in these high pressure environments that we find ourselves?

[00:07:02] Yeah, I think now, I think more than ever, because of the speed of technology, I think you can find yourself a little bit flat footed or nose over ski tips. Like, do I really know this stuff? And a lot of times the answer is probably better than a lot of other people, right? Because not everybody is going to know all the ins and outs of AI, for example. They're just not going to know all that. So if you can just even be a couple steps ahead of your business team, you're still better off than you think you are.

[00:07:29] So I think that's what comes like, oh, I don't know the ins and outs of it so much. A lot of people who also work in IT are very black and white. And so if they don't exactly check the box on the thing, they start to really question, like, am I doing a good job? Am I qualified? Am I all of these things?

[00:07:47] But you can persevere through that by making sure that you are looking internally, recognizing the skills that you have and understanding that they're valuable, even if you don't know everything. And you don't have to know everything. That's the other part is that people do expect to, they expect themselves, they hold themselves sometimes even a higher regard than other people do. Some of our values at our company are around authenticity and things like that.

[00:08:14] And even in consulting, I really want people to be more psychologically safe than I think would be at some of the other types of, I would call them more stodgy. Maybe that's not a good word, but like buttoned up consulting companies where they show up and their job is to tell you exactly what to do. They're supposed to be smarter than you. They're supposed to know everything. I don't want our consultants to feel like they have to do that.

[00:08:39] We have lots and lots of different skill sets, different expertise across the whole company. So even like raising your hand early and say, I don't think I have this skill or this element. Can we bring another person in? Yes, absolutely. Right. Or, hey, can I get a couple more hours so that I can go and refresh my understanding? Yeah, absolutely. Right. Those are the things that people have to feel comfortable raising their hand and saying, hey, I maybe don't have it and therefore I need help to be able to go and get it.

[00:09:07] It's important to remind listeners, as you just said there, you don't have to know everything and you don't have to do it all on your own. Like the old saying goes that it takes a village to raise a child and mentorship plays a vital role in career growth, too. So how has mentorship impacted your own career and how do you encourage mentorship within your organization to support future women leaders, too? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:09:33] So my whole career, I have been so blessed to have people that just kind of let me do my thing, but also gave me feedback. I always call it like long leash, right? Like, like just go do it and then kind of pull it in and check on those regular checkups, reviews, things like that. But I just have had the most lovely people. I could just walk.

[00:09:57] I've actually struggled with it a bit because I think about going on a LinkedIn or something and doing like an appreciation post and then it starts to get really long. Right. Right. But I have had people that, you know, really said, hey, I saw you do this. So I think you can do this. And you're like thinking, like, I can do I did this kind of lower level things. You think I could do this, which is like 75 percent more in my mind. Well, they believe in me. So I'll just go in and try that. So I think I do that a lot, too, with people.

[00:10:26] I have 13 direct reports for a reason. I have to, like, get my hands on people. I like to do that because I like to see what makes them tick. And part of my my whole mantra around leadership is like motivate, mobilize, maximize. That is like everything I do. So I can't motivate somebody unless I know them. Right. Because I wouldn't be genuine. So I get to know them. I understand like who they are. And then it doesn't take me that long to be like, OK, I got this person figured out.

[00:10:55] I know how to maximize this person. Right. So it's like I'm going to mobilize them and I'm going to send them a direction. They're the one who is qualified to do it. Not me. Honestly, a lot of people report to me. I couldn't even do their job, but I'm going to send them that direction. I'm going to remove impediments. I'm going to like help them get rid of any self-doubt. I can help them with some like initial kind of things. And then I'm going to send them off. Right. Then they're going to come back and I'm going to maximize them. Right. I'm going to say, hey, you killed it. Now you should go and try this.

[00:11:25] If they come back, they didn't kill it. You start back to square one. Right. Hey, I didn't do a good job. I didn't get it done. I feel like I don't I'm not going to be. Nope. We got to go back to motivating again. So so that part of it, I bring into like everything I do because I I mean, I have to even do it to myself. I'd give myself a pep talk on a regular basis about all kinds of things. Work related, not work related. Parenting. My workouts in the morning. It's like, OK, get it together.

[00:11:52] They're like, go downstairs in your gym and do what you're going to do. Nobody else is going to do it for you. Right. But I do enjoy that part. And I love seeing people thrive in the space that that they're good at. It's like my favorite thing. And I just the same way people clap for me. I certainly feel like I do that for people all the time. So I think the cost of a bad hire is notoriously expensive. And there's a big focus right now on retaining top talent and diverse representation in leadership

[00:12:21] is key to building stronger teams. So how is fostering collaboration and psychological safety? How has that helped contribute to retention and success at your organization? Yeah, I think it's a huge thing because especially in consulting, there is that idea that you're supposed to know everything. Right. And what we would see is that consultants would be hesitant to speak up, which then would cause them to make mistakes, bigger mistakes or wait too long and something we could have recovered from had they spoken up earlier.

[00:12:52] So we've tried a lot to tell people like, hey, I'm put supporter on them. Not just like I am over here alone raising my hand, but hey, regular check-ins. We've put in a lot of training around leadership. To your point, the executive team before I was in my role was all men. Aside to me, and now it's probably half women. There was a lot of women kind of right below the executive team that were just incredible. And I'm like, I want these people directly on my team with still the other people that were there.

[00:13:20] And that's great because I think women maybe are a little more willing to push into some of the EQ kind of stuff and challenge things that just maybe aren't as logical from that perspective. They like scratch some scabs that other people would probably rather leave alone. But some of those things are the things that absolutely have to be talked about, worked through to break through the whole company to where we're trying to go to.

[00:13:48] We're one of the biggest peer-to-peer partners, service-bound partners out there right now. We're revenues, I think, are higher than any other company like ours that we have never taken an investment. We don't have private equity and we are self-made. So it's like we're at a point that we have done something already that other partners haven't done. And we're not going to keep doing that if we keep doing the same thing we've always done. I'm a change agent. So I like it when people around me are also that way.

[00:14:15] They're willing to be flexible, be adaptable, try things even if they don't work, not worry too much about whether they will or won't. But give it a try. I don't like no. I like how. Like, don't tell me no. Tell me how. Maybe the how is dumb and we'll just decide not to do it. But I'd rather hear about what it's going to take to actually do it. But I think that helps from the diversity perspective that you talked about. But I think it is one of the reasons we've had so much growth this year, because we have a lot more alignment. We have a lot more clarity.

[00:14:45] We have more people at the table. The table is more diverse. And the perspectives are there's a lot of different perspectives. And that helps a lot with problem solving, because most problems need two or three different solutions. They don't just need one solution. So I think that that's helped us a lot over the last year. And before you join me today, I was doing a little research on you and I saw that you'd spoken about resilience and how critical it is for career growth.

[00:15:11] So how has resilience shaped your own leadership style and the journey you've been on? And any advice that you'd give to any women listening to this podcast today looking to thrive in the tech industry, looking for a little inspiration? Any advice you'd pass on? Yeah, I was doing another interview recently, and I had done some research. And I, of course, kind of rose-colored glasses. I thought things had gotten better for women in the tech industry. And one of the things I saw is that a lot of women were joining the industry and then

[00:15:40] leaving the industry. And that hurt my heart a little bit, because there is some resilience in getting through things, right? And being able to figure out where you can contribute, what seat you're in, being in the right seat and helping find that place. And my advice for women, it would just kind of to be fearless. And you could say, oh, that's easy for you to say, Stacey, you're in this role. But it's like, I take chances all the time that could be career limiting, right?

[00:16:08] And generally they work out for me because I can back that up with wisdom, experience and other things. But if I didn't run into brick walls a lot, I probably wouldn't have run through a lot of brick walls, right? I got used to doing that, right? And getting knocked down. And I would say I'm more interesting for the things I did wrong than the things I did right. I had a guy who reported to me some years ago, and he had a big team that reported to him. And he would always say, go ask Stacey.

[00:16:36] If she hasn't been through it, she knows somebody who's been through it, and she will help you navigate it. There can barely be anything she hasn't been through before. And I think that just is, it's a part of even being happy, right? It's the ability to, or confident, or just secure is like your ability to know that if you don't ever go through anything, you'll never get through anything. And the more you get through, the more it's like, oh, okay, like somebody could fire me out, go get another job, right?

[00:17:04] And I don't want to say it so flippantly, but there is a part of me that's like, hey, I have qualifications. I am skilled. If I'm not, I'm not for everybody, but you know, I am for a lot of people. So if it's, if it's not a good fit or it's not, you don't like what I'm saying, or you were not, we can't get on the same page with that. There is some, there's some confidence that comes from that, right? From having been through a lot and being able to, to persevere through those things.

[00:17:31] And again, looking back at your career, moving from being a high performing individual contributor to leading teams, that too can be somewhat of a challenging transition. And many people have struggled with that. So what lessons did you learn during that shift? And how do you support your teams in maybe making similar transitions? It's super interesting to me how much EQ leadership takes, but I have a cup behind me that says

[00:18:01] world's best coach on it. And when I talk about it, some people will be like, oh, you dumbed down what you do. And it's like, not really though. Cause like, you ever watch like NBA basketball and like some of the best coaches are former players, right? So it's like, I'm also bringing a lot of wisdom into it, right? They don't have to be able to dunk to explain to somebody how to dunk. Like they, they're all getting a little bit older in their career. So they're not like, hey, let me show you this. And then you can do it. They're like, hey, you have to use your quads, right?

[00:18:31] Like you have to like be able to do these things to be able to, to dunk. So when I think about some of the lumps that I've taken in leadership, it would be some of the times where I, I didn't lead with EQ as much, or I didn't support people as much. I worked at a job where I had a super high performing team. They were amazing. And they just worked hard, played hard, this whole thing. And as I started to move up in the company, I had a lot of things I needed to work on that weren't related to that team.

[00:18:59] I mean, directly, like individually, right? It was more like strategic and things like that. And I found myself in a place where I couldn't do one-on-ones on a regular basis as long. I moved everybody's one-on-one to a half an hour at a big team. And so I had like seven, that was like 17 hours a week of like one-on-ones, right? So I'm like, I got to reduce some of this and that. And then probably about a month went by and I started hearing about how the team was like

[00:19:25] talking about me and they were really struggling with some things I was doing. And I'm like, I haven't really changed anything. Like, what am I, what am I doing? Right? I called the whole team together because we were really an open team. And I said, Hey, what feedback do you have for me? Like, let's go around the table. Like, tell me what it is. Like, I'm, I'm here to listen. And I only got through like two people before I realized they felt like they were disconnected from me. And that happened because I didn't have as much time for them. And it wasn't even about their work.

[00:19:54] It was like personal stuff they were going through or different things like that. And I said, Hey, I recognize that this is the problem. They didn't, they weren't getting their kind of like kind of mixed therapy somewhere else, right? And that was hindering them from doing their best work at, on their job. So I said, Hey, I can either meet with you a shorter time more frequently or a longer time less frequently.

[00:20:19] And they actually picked the longer time less frequently because being IT people, excuse me, they, they weren't leading with those kinds of personal things necessarily. So it's like, here's my checklist of things that I want to talk about. And then you, you have enough time to get to the, okay, what else is going on? Right. It could be developmental. It could be work related, or it could be like, Hey, the last time we talked, you said you were having problems with someone you're that you're dealing with in your, in your private life.

[00:20:48] You're had mentioned that your, your mom wasn't doing that well, or you, and then you get that whole part of it. Right. And that's really not. Everybody is really good at that. I do care a lot about that when it comes to people, just making sure that they feel seen, heard, understood in any way that makes sense for them to do that. And when I went back to that, that type of more hands-on approach with them and took that longer time, all of that, those issues that started to fester went away.

[00:21:14] So it's like, even with my team now, I try to get at least 30 minutes every single week with all those people. I always have a lot of work related stuff, but I always want to make sure that I'm checking on the things that they've communicated to me otherwise as well. They just think it's really important for them to be able to continue on and be their best in their actual job. And of course, taking bold career leaps often defines leadership journeys.

[00:21:41] And I'd love to inspire women around the world listening today. Are you able to bring to life what we're talking about, but maybe sharing a story where you personally stepped outside of your own comfort zone, led a pivotal moment in your career and how you inspire others today by following in those footsteps as well? Yeah. So I think a bold move that I really took in my career is probably when I first, it sounds

[00:22:06] very technical, but when I went to my leadership team and said, I wanted to buy the ServiceNow platform. And again, ServiceNow has gone, they've had a very long business career now. So I'm at the beginning of this. I'm talking about, they have like 200 employees at the time, but I knew that this platform would be life-changing for me and my team because we could go a lot faster with the things that we were trying to accomplish. At the time, we didn't have any SaaS applications. We didn't have any software as a service, anything.

[00:22:36] And it was a big deal to try to get approval for security-wise and other things to go into a hosted environment. And I knew that we were onto something that could possibly get cut out, right? And it was like the last minute and the CIO called me in his office and he said, convince me that we can't build this in-house. And I thought, oh my God, this is not the conversation I wanted to have after months of doing the RFP

[00:23:06] process, literally doing sandbox environments and any of this stuff. And I said, we can't do it in-house. We don't have the expertise. There's so many things already built in it. We're going to be able to do what we want to do in it and take advantage of all of the releases and things that are coming. And he signed the paper. And it was like such a big moment for me because going forward as that company started to think

[00:23:32] about moving to more SaaS environments, getting more of that type of software, I feel like we were able to really lead the positive aspects of doing that. And then to that point, this was my opportunity to use that platform to prove that I was right in so many ways about the way that we were servicing the business, whether or not the business was getting what they needed from us, justification of so many different things

[00:24:00] in a time that IT was growing exponentially and the budget was just getting bigger and bigger and bigger. I mean, I think at that time, our budget went from like $10 million to over $100 million, which today's standard is not absolutely that much. But at the time, it was just going, going, going. And I was the one place, I think, that I was able to show vision, governance, roadmap, return on investment, and all those different things.

[00:24:28] And I really learned how to do that and be able to sit there and go to those meetings and show what I was able to accomplish. So it's like, I think one of the things that I try to talk to people all the time about is just even formality in the way that you approach a major business problem or a major problem to say, you understand it. You are able to show that you're the direction you're going with it. You're able to ask for the support. You're able to have candor when it comes to getting feedback.

[00:24:57] A lot of IT people are not going to give me feedback either. Like you and I are sitting here looking at each other, but I could tell you and you can nod at me a bunch of times and then we could leave the room and I could assume that you agree with me. And then you can go and tell everyone how, what a terrible idea I have. So being able to sit here and say to you, what do you think? And giving room for you to give that back to me and be open-minded and really open those doors up as well. It's something I still don't really think IT people are really that great at.

[00:25:26] But I did a lot of that early in my career. I encourage people to do it now. I encourage the executives and other folks that we work with in our clients to do that because we work with IT people all the time. We have a Digital Transformation Leadership Council and it's a lot of VPs, CIOs, other C-suite folks that use the ServiceNow platform and even a lot of them struggle with that, right? And they're asking for money. They're asking for people. They're asking for support.

[00:25:53] They need to have a perspective that's really solid. They need to be open and getting feedback. They need to be having governance. They need to provide data. And those are things that I would just still tell any woman to do. It's not that hard to get started. There's lots of ways to do it. Just to even write some stuff down on a piece of paper and call people in a room and facilitate that conversation is a great way to start. And then to formalize your process through or approach through adding different methodologies

[00:26:22] or anything else that you might have learned. That would be my encouraging, hopefully encouraging thing to people. And you don't even have to be in IT to do it. It could be really about anything that you're trying to accomplish. Fantastic advice. And one of the things I'm passionate about on this podcast is giving listeners valuable takeaways. And today, of course, we're celebrating International Women's Day. So any other practical advice that you'd offer to women that are navigating careers in tech

[00:26:49] and consulting today, especially those aspiring to leadership roles? Anything else that you would pass on to them? I don't know why this word became cliche, but growth mindset, it shouldn't be a word that we avoid. The whole concept of it is to be continuously learning and applying. And that, when I talked about being a change agent, I can be that because I am constantly learning. If you're not in a job where you're having continual aha moments and then applying the

[00:27:18] learning that you're getting to the next thing you're doing, there's not always that ability to really incite change that quickly and to try to see it through. So I think that would be my main piece of advice is that growth mindset. Is a place you need to stay in. And I wouldn't just advise even professionally, but personally as well. Being a lifelong learner, being open to talking with people. One of our values is continually curious.

[00:27:45] And I think curiosity is so, so, so important. Some of my favorite consultants don't know everything. They just know how to get the information out of you in a way that you don't even realize that they're doing it. And then you're like, you leave that and you're like, wow, that was amazing. Like, I just want to talk to this person all the time. And then they go and do all the cool things they do in the background. But again, they're not coming from a place of, hey, I know everything you're trying to do.

[00:28:13] So therefore, let me rain down direction at you. It's like, I do know a lot about what you do. So let me try to ask you a lot of questions about it and pull out of you because of the wisdom I have, the things that I need to know to be able to help bring you to another place. So I think growth mindset, staying curious, lifelong learning would be the advice that I would have. Absolutely loving it. And we started the podcast today talking about your origin story.

[00:28:41] And as we come full circle, I'm almost reminded of the Steve Jobs quote, where you can't join up the dots looking forward. It's only when you look backwards. And the reason I mentioned that is none of us are able to achieve any degree of success without a little help along the way. So is there a particular person that you're grateful towards who maybe helped you get you where you are or offered you invaluable advice that maybe we can give a little thank you and shout out to today? Sure.

[00:29:07] I'm thinking, again, this is hard for me because I have so many people that I would credit for a lot of things. But when I was on a help desk and I was kicking butt, I know that I was because I know I was doing a good job because I really understood what I was doing. I just felt like I just love my job. And I started moving into like, hey, here's process changes. Here's some other things. The company said, hey, the help desk is getting bigger.

[00:29:36] We need a manager. They hired a person. And I was like, oh, that person doesn't know everything that I know. Why did they hire this person? I was trying to figure out. And she was in her role for a while and things were still going OK. And then all of a sudden somebody came and said, she doesn't work here anymore. We had a layoff and she was part of like a small layoff. And I was like, oh. And she reported to this person and his name is Chuck Bees. And he's still around.

[00:30:03] And Chuck called me into his office and he said, Stacy, everybody knows you run this place. You're the manager. And I was like, what? And it was like that was my first formal leadership job in IT. And it was interesting because this person is a master networker, right? And over the years as he changed jobs, he would take me out to lunch like all the time, especially when I got into ServiceNow because he started working in ServiceNow Consulting and he would come and pick my ring because I was a platform owner, right?

[00:30:32] Well, when you think about the time I spent in corporate America, if I turn around and tell you about how I went and joined a ServiceNow Consultancy, I will tell you the person that hired me there was Chuck Bees. And that was after, oh my God, that was 10 years later. And it was funny because he wanted to talk to me about something with ServiceNow. And I said, I have to tell you something. I'm considering leaving where I was a platform owner.

[00:30:59] And he said, Stacy, you don't just leave and go and pick any job. You need to tell people you're looking and let them kind of talk to you and convince you to come there. And he's like, let us have an opportunity to get you to come here. And I had like 10 interviews. I was just doing what I would always do is like, hey, go on LinkedIn or Monster or something like that and apply for some jobs. He's like, no, you're not at that point in your career anymore. You need to let people tell you why that they're the best choice for you.

[00:31:28] And it was within a day he had an interview there. I came on as a VP at that company. That's where I didn't know anything about consulting and learned all of that. And here I am nine years later. So he helped me early and often in my career. And he is just such a lovely person. He's one of those people that like is philanthropic. He's always helping people in need. And I'm sure that's why he's super blessed in his own life. So yeah, I almost get a little bit choked up thinking about it because

[00:31:57] just knowing that you got people out there that look out for you like that is just such a cool thing. It really is incredibly cool. And so important that we give a quick shout out to Chuck today. He sounds like the incredible kind of guy that is selflessly just helping others, but probably blissfully unaware and far too modest to realize that the impact he's had on your career and so many other people's careers. So Chuck, big shout out for you.

[00:32:22] And for anyone listening wanting to find out more about you, about the company and everything that we've talked about today, where would you like to point everyone listening so we can continue paying this forward? Yeah, absolutely. Follow me on LinkedIn. T, it will come up that way. Or Stacey Forney Thibodeau. Also follow Cask NX on LinkedIn. We are always posting all kinds of stuff. And you will often see my face on video in the feed. But we have lots of things that we talk about in there.

[00:32:50] And we have a quarterly magazine that we put out about all kinds of things related to IT. We'll be at the knowledge, ServiceNow Knowledge Conference coming up here in May. It's a huge conference. So if anybody's interested in that technology and they're going to be out there, come and check out our booth. Otherwise, happy to talk to anybody about anything even not related to consulting and ServiceNow. I love talking to women, men. People ping me all the time about their career. It does not have to be even in IT because obviously now I'm more of like a business person.

[00:33:20] So happy to do that. Just send me a message. Awesome. I'll have links to everything to make it nice and easy for everyone. And we covered so much there on while we celebrate Women's Tech Day that overcoming imposter syndrome in tech can be made easier. The importance of resilience and career growth and how women can thrive in the tech industry. But I don't want to be talking about this stuff just one day a year. So it'd be great to get you on late in the year. See how things are evolving and keep this conversation going in front of mind.

[00:33:49] But thank you for sitting down with me today. Yeah, it was wonderful. Thank you for having me. I think Stacey's journey is a testament to what's possible when mentorship, confidence and a growth mindset all come together. And overcoming imposter syndrome isn't about eliminating doubt altogether. It's more about learning to trust your experience, seeking the right support and then taking bold steps forward.

[00:34:17] And confidence isn't something that we're all born with. It is something you have to build and work at. And I think Stacey's sharing how shifting her mindset and relying on data-driven insights helped her grow into a leadership role. And whether you're seeking guidance or offering it to others, mentorship plays a huge role in helping women advance in tech.

[00:34:45] As is building an environment where diverse voices are heard, not just the loudest voice in a meeting room. That's what leads to stronger teams and better business outcomes. So if you are that person listening that dominates those meeting rooms, that always talks longest and loudest, maybe try and rein yourself in a little bit. And as we celebrate International Women's Day and Women's History Month, ask yourself,

[00:35:11] what role can we all play in helping the next generation of women in tech thrive? It's a responsibility we've all got. So let's keep this conversation going. Please email me, techblogwriteroutlook.com, LinkedIn, X, at Neil C. LinkedIn, X, Instagram, just at Neil C. Hughes. Please send me a message. Let me know your thoughts. And if you'd like to come on here and talk about anything, let me know. But that's it for today. So thank you for listening as always.

[00:35:39] And I will speak with you all bright and early tomorrow. Don't be late. I'll speak with you then. Bye for now.