How brave do you have to be to change everything? 20 Great Answers with Paula Parkes, Vice President of Marketing, Asia Pacific for ServiceNow

Paula Parkes (00:01):

I moved countries and I moved companies, and I did that all with a five-month-old and a two-year-old. And so, for me, being brave ultimately changed the way in which I work and how I live.

I mean it came with its downsides for sure. I think having a London-based boss and doing post-midnight calls when you’ve got a screaming baby waking you up after you’ve actually tried to go and get some sleep. But what it really proved is that you can do a truly global role from this corner of the world. And it led to me as well also being able to work on optimizing for time zones. I’ve leaned into understanding a bit more about circadian rhythm, so for enhanced productivity and creativity and when you best engage and how you best operate as an individual.

Barrie Seppings (00:54):

And welcome back to Plugged In, Switched On where we pull you into the conversations that matter in B2B technology marketing. I am your host, Barrie Seppings. And the quote you just heard at the top of the show was from Paula Parkes. She’s the Vice President of Marketing across Asia Pacific for ServiceNow. Absolutely illuminating conversation with Paula. More of that in just a moment.

If you are new to our pod, welcome. Hi. Come on in. Let me show you around. We do three things here at Plugged In, Switched On. First, we get some of the most interesting people in the B2B tech marketing space, including people like Paula to come in and tell us how and why they do what they do.

Secondly, we look at some of the core skills that marketers are developing or using or retraining on within B2B tech marketing. We do a special episode, deep dive into those skills, find out what new techniques and technologies and some of the enduring philosophies of those approaches are. Really great episodes if you are looking at developing your career further in any aspect of B2B tech marketing.

And finally, we also pull back the curtain on how these teams and leaders operate on the daily. How are they pulling together remote teams? How are they coaching for high performance? How are they encouraging better collaboration? Kind of the real people power aspect of tech marketing, if you will.

We do not try and do all those three things at once. That’d be madness. It’d be hard for us and difficult for you to listen to. So we focus, and today’s focus is one of those interviews with a B2B tech leader. And the way we do is we ask every one of our guests 20 questions. They get the same 20 questions. We get 20 really different answers. Today is no exception. Let’s have a listen.

Barrie Seppings (02:39):

My very first question to you, and it’s the same question everybody gets, is what on earth does your company sell and why would anybody pay good money for it?

Paula Parkes (02:46):

Well, Barrie, it’s at the core of ServiceNow, we help the world work. ServiceNow is the AI platform for business transformation, and we bring AI to every corner of your business. We supercharge IT and developers. We empower customer service, and we reinvent how people work. The ServiceNow platform itself embeds intelligence into every single business workflow for end-to-end transformation. We connect people, process data and devices in one platform with one architecture and one data model.

Barrie Seppings (03:21):

It’s kind of crazy how quickly it spread everywhere. I mean, we explain a work B2B in technology and it kind of caught us by surprise. Was that something that you saw about the brand from looking from the outside?

Paula Parkes (03:32):

You know, I think so. Just from the concept of its origin. When I look back to the vision of Fred Luddy who was our founder and that original piece of code, he built it with so many more purposes in mind, but I don’t think the market was ready for the power to unleash that at that particular point in time. And so we got really well known for IT ticketing. But that is so yesterday. The original piece of code was built as a platform of mind. It’s a very interesting story, and it comes back even to the DNA and the culture within ServiceNow as an organization. Even as today is exploded to 24,000 people globally, that very DNA that Fred had from the start is still here today.

Barrie Seppings (04:21):

Question two, superhero origin story. Paula, did you grow up dreaming of becoming a Vice President of Marketing? What did Paula at high school think she was going to do? Or what were you being advised that you should go and do?

Paula Parkes (04:36):

When I was at high school, I was selling Avon cosmetics. In fact, I would’ve been in the top 15% for New Zealand selling the old Avon catalog. And I must say I toyed with so many ideas coming out of school. I toyed with law. I was always a really, really curious learner. And I think it wasn’t until I actually got to university that my love for marketing and information systems really collided. And that coupled with a love of psychology as well seemed like a great career to step into marketing.

And of course the early days in doing field research and data entry for any marketer are not all that exciting. But for me it led to a role working for the CMO of the London Institute while I was over in London, and then subsequently led on to spruiking healthcare risk management technology. So it was a really interesting beginning. And from there the thread was all the way through around technology marketing.

Barrie Seppings (05:42):

So you stayed with tech and with tech brands that whole time?

Paula Parkes (05:46):

Yes, absolutely. So if I look back on that thread, it started really in content, went to analytics, data. All of those things combined have kind of led me on the path where I am today.

Barrie Seppings (06:00):

If you had a do-over and you could do your dream job and you weren’t allowed to do marketing, technology, B2B, any of that sort of stuff, what would you go do today?

Paula Parkes (06:09):

I actually think I’d be a teacher and I probably wouldn’t get well paid for it, but there’s just such a tremendous satisfaction in igniting sparks in humans and watching them glow. It doesn’t matter where you are in your stages in life, but I think seeing people learn and grow and develop is something the world needs more of and they certainly need more great teachers, particularly when it comes to the future generations.

Barrie Seppings (06:39):

Question three, I do this for free. What part of your job do you just naturally enjoy? You’ve mentioned you’ve done the analytics, you’ve done the marketing, the psychology. There’s lots of parts to marketing. Which bit of it do you find yourself just gravitating to and spending more time maybe than you should just out of the sheer joy of it?

Paula Parkes (06:58):

I think it’s really hard to just pick one. And I mean, I wake up every single day loving everything that I get to do. But if I was to sum it up into two things, it really comes back to people and purpose. So for me, I just, I love connecting the dots. I love cultivating relationships and then across teams. It’s funny because over time people have often likened my calling cards as being grease and glue. So that really harks back to the people and certainly the connecting of dots.

And the other thing for me is my entrepreneurial spirit just loves to explore and unleash creativity. So whether that’s an experience or it’s an emotion, and those things are both at the heart of marketing, they always have been and they are always going to be, that is something else that I really, really enjoy. And I have to admit. I am a self-professed data nerd. I love to data dive for insights that matter.

Barrie Seppings (08:00):

Who do you think’s got the worst job in the B2B marketing ecosystem? What’s the job you probably couldn’t do day to day all day?

Paula Parkes (08:08):

I would say that the director of legal probably has the worst job when it comes to B2B marketing. I mean, have you seen the number of contracts they have to sign every day? I think with the perils of trademarks, privacy, ever evolving legislation, it would definitely douse my flame for people and purpose.

Barrie Seppings (08:29):

Question four, control, alt, delete. What’s the one career move or moment you wish you could go back and undo? When you think back is there a moment you realize maybe even in the moment, “Oh wow, I’ve just learned a lesson here”?

Paula Parkes (08:44):

I live my life with no regrets. Even if I could undo something, I would never ever want to reverse out the growth or learning from any decision I’ve made. I truly believe that we are the sum of all of our choices. And so for me, I say own it and keep going forward. And if you don’t like it, you just make another decision.

I’ve definitely learned lots of valuable lessons. And one of those I’d say for me that’s really super important is to pick your leaders and your brands wisely. So test the values that are aligned to your own mission and stress test them again and again and again. I think it’s really important.

As you sort of move on in life, like being values aligned really does start to matter at certain points in time. And people sometimes wonder. They wake up and they feel a little disenchanted in the world they’re currently in with the role they’re currently at. Sometimes I think a lot of those things come back to then going back to your own values and seeing, whoa, hey, are my values still aligned? Are they aligned with this leader? Are they aligned with the brand that I’m working for? And I think it’s a really good point of self-reflection.

Barrie Seppings (09:57):

Question five, shout out. Who have you learned the most from in your career, perhaps even if it was what not to do?

Paula Parkes (10:05):

Yeah, I’d love to say it was a leader that I’ve worked for. I mean I’ve worked with some amazing leaders, but I think what I’ve learned the most has probably come from even someone closer to home in my own childhood. And that really coming off the cusp of Father’s Day recently was probably my dad with one of the early life lessons was knowing when to back yourself, knowing how to fight your own battles and being proud of what you’ve achieved.

But he always used to say to me, and it’s always, always been in the back of my head, “Paula, you need to push your own barrow because no one else is going to do it for you.” And I think I’ve always been conscious of that. So it stood me in good stead to be honest. And it hasn’t actually come from anyone in the business world. He was a father.

Barrie Seppings (11:02):

Question six. The only constant is marketing cliches. The rate of change in our world in general, but let’s talk about B2B and technology. Sure, it’s fast, sure it’s accelerating, we hear it from every keynote. But I get the sense it’s kind of celebrated as a good thing regardless. But humans really, and you know this from psychology, don’t really like change or they kind of resist it. So how do you find yourself getting up every day and going, “Oh my God, it’s changed again. I’ve got to go learn this other new thing.” How do you not get worn down by the constant pace of change in our industry, in our roles?

Paula Parkes (11:39):

Yeah, I think I mean I lean into change by staying curious. I think honestly learning is the fuel for growth. And so even while I was ramping into the rocket ship that is ServiceNow, I took on a company directors course, great sense of growth for me and understanding the world of governance and where that is all going. And another lens to it truly is around culture driving performance.

So if you are leading teams in the tech industry, you have to deal with constant innovation and transformation. It comes from the tech, it comes from companies, and it comes certainly from the market in terms of the competitors. And so you have to be able to cope with the sort of expect and anticipate change and create teams that can navigate change is just super critical for performance.

And even in the past months, my team motto has been a change of day. I’m trying to desensitize the team from change. And even in Sydney last week I was spending time with the team and it made my heart sing. To hear them call out growth in their own resilience is something that they’re actually proud of on the journey that we’ve been on as a marketing organization.

Barrie Seppings (13:00):

Do you moral that for your team? Is there something about visibly about the change that you or that curiosity that you’re sort of showing them and leaving? How do you show them that it’s not just necessary, but kind of okay and a positive thing to keep up with this change?

Paula Parkes (13:14):

I think it is because it comes back to the curiosity component and that you are going to grow through a change. And it’s the way you spin it. It can be tiring, it can be jading, but I think you have to look at, and I’m always ever the optimist, the glass is half full. It’s just a sense of giving them that perspective in terms of leaning into it and growing through it.

Barrie Seppings (14:00):

Question seven, here’s to your health. What do you do to stay healthy both mentally and physically because we’ve got desk jobs and really sort of thinking jobs. And I imagine someone in your role, quite stressful, everyone’s after you, everyone needs a little piece of Paula all day every day. What do you do for you?

Paula Parkes (14:21):

I start five days of my week in the gym, and in the summer it’s in the gym and the ocean, but I’m not brave enough to do the ocean through the winter yet. Never say never. But to me energy is absolutely everything. And both energy and your time is finite and you can only give energy to people if you’ve got it. And so if you don’t have it, you’re obviously going to consume it from somewhere. So for me it’s really, really important to make sure that I’m balancing that. And do I feel good? Am I taking care of the business, my personal self and my professional self? And that’s really, really important. So energy for me is something I think about a lot, and I take a good level of trying to make sure that I balance that element across my weeks and my days.

And then the other thing I think that’s really important is from a mental perspective is the power and peer mentoring is exponential. So recently joined ServiceNow has what we call powers of 10, where there are 10 similar level cross-functional vice presidents in and across the globe. And you can sort of build the network, share the insights and the learning. And I think that peer mentoring and that global network and even just building sustainable networks really can help from the mental side.

Barrie Seppings (15:57):

Is the discussion strictly about work or you start to talk broader, more leadership and life lessons stuff?

Paula Parkes (16:03):

Broader actually, yeah, broader when it comes to leadership in general. In fact, I’m actually hosting a session upcoming on that, on making stress your friend, and so it really straddles the balance between the profession.

Barrie Seppings (16:20):

Did you say make stress your friend?

Paula Parkes (16:20):

Yes.

Barrie Seppings (16:27):

It sounds frightening, but I love the power of a catchy title, so I get it, I get it, I get it. All right, sign me up because it’s not my friend, it’s not doing good things for me. That’s wild.

So if you’ve got to host that, it’s a virtual thing you you’re running kind of like a little talk workshop thing for your peers. Yeah. Okay.

Paula Parkes (16:45):

Yeah, a workshop where actually there’ll be 10 VPs all North America-based aside from me and think tanking what that means for us as individuals, as leaders.

Barrie Seppings (16:59):

Was that kind of a self-start initiative amongst that crew or is that something even further up that ServiceNow said, “Look, I think you as leaders need to get together and do this sort of thing”?

Paula Parkes (17:09):

Yeah, I think it’s ServiceNow coached, to be honest. It was tested and really worked well and so it’s taken off and I can really see the value in having them.

Barrie Seppings (17:20):

Question eight, unique snowflakes. Now you’ve worked in a lot of different roles and different companies all within tech, and so you would’ve seen every kind of segmentation and role and market and territory and culture. And we do tend to roll our eyes. Everybody thinks they’re unique. Everybody thinks they’re different. But have you come across a little niche or a group or a little subcult in amongst the audiences or the tribes of tech or marketing that you think, “Yeah, these people are kind of different. We need to market to them differently or treat them differently”?

Paula Parkes (17:49):

I think one thing is constant that every territory fundamentally makes decisions within or in consideration of their personal relationships and their relationships with brands. And the currency of business is ultimately relationships. People buy from people. And so this is where for us particularly in a geography like Asia Pacific, this is where cultural nuances come to be.

So personally, for me, both Japan and I would also say incredible India present really unique opportunities to embrace within their own ecosystem. So let’s just give you an example from an India perspective. If you look at the 131 billion total transaction volume of digital payments in India, which will be 439 billion by 2029, you think about the opportunities there within that country.

And then the other one that jumps out to me, and I did mention Japan, if you look at channelments and engagement, social and professional hierarchies and gender, you kind of get these three faces. The face you show the world, the face you show your closest friends and family, and then the third which you actually don’t show anyone. And that almost in some respects you see that too when it comes to Korea.

And so I think with Asia itself being such a super strong relationship-based economy and it makes it one of the most fascinating to operate in. So I do think there’s some differences there that are there to be celebrated and embraced.

Barrie Seppings (19:28):

And do you get a bit of time to be out in those cultures and meeting your teams there and meeting customers out in those teams?

Paula Parkes (19:35):

I absolutely do and I love it the most. There was a point in time where I spend more time out of my home-based country and more time in others that there is a lot to be said for feet on the street, time on the ground, and actually forging really strong understanding of those cultural connections.

Barrie Seppings (19:56):

Question nine, green with envy. What’s the campaign or event idea, and it doesn’t have to be in B2B tech, it can be almost anything or a launch or some sort of creative marketing thing that you’ve seen that you’re like, “Oh wow, I wish I’d done that. That is good”?

Paula Parkes (20:12):

Oh, well this is really close to home. I was absolutely green with envy after I was talking to our chief brand officer, Jim Lesser, after he had spent a week in London, had just come back from shooting our new ServiceNow brand ambassador Idris Elba, a man who absolutely needs no introduction and from the laughs that he had on set, really seeing what was the man behind the man. He’s been such a great face for us in terms of how we put AI to work for people. But he is just a Swiss army knife of amazing, he’s a DJ, he has three businesses, he’s a world-class kick boxer, and I was just like, I was livid that I couldn’t get a front row seat to that action.

Barrie Seppings (21:01):

Is that set up or intended to be quite a long-term sort of working partnership with Idris or is it just put his face on the billboard, what’s going on?

Paula Parkes (21:08):

No, absolutely. I think we’re definitely working with him. There’s a lot of similarities between his values and his mission in the world and ours and it’s just a beautiful synergy. So I expect to see more work with Idris as time goes on.

Barrie Seppings (21:25):

Question 10, that really gets my goat. What’s the one thing in this industry and we talk marketing here that you think’s going on for too long and needs fixing?

Paula Parkes (21:36):

The lack of investment and the quality of our data. It’s that old adage, rubbish in, rubbish out, and the processes that really enhance it. I think we continually keep putting all the shiny bells and whistles on top of an under-invested foundation layer that ultimately powers our businesses and our competitive advantage. With two decades of seeing so many businesses and organizations go through this and struggle with this challenge and we’ve been through multiple iterations of it, I think it’s just so pertinent to still getting right. And I think this is part of the challenge I have seen it done really well to the point where the CFO can go to the CMO for forecasting the revenue opportunity. And that is immensely powerful, but that requires a level of investment.

Barrie Seppings (22:32):

Question 11, truth serum. And to be honest, I don’t know what I was doing when I wrote this question, but I’m going to have to ask it. What’s the one question you’d ask an agency if you knew you’d get the truth?

Paula Parkes (22:44):

Here’s my ask, after we’ve shared the historical on our performance and our commercial objectives, what do you believe your strategy campaign or concept will drive? What’s our return? In other words, show me that money.

Barrie Seppings (23:01):

Do you think agencies shy away too much from answering that sort of hard question like climbing into the accountability boat with clients?

Paula Parkes (23:10):

Yeah. And actually I would just love, we could get to more transparency around it. I think it would actually be really healthy.

Barrie Seppings (23:19):

All right, question 12, better together. As a leader, how do you make that call between collaborating with someone or collaborating with the team or reaching the point where it’s like, “Please, everybody step back, I’m going to do this myself ’cause that’s kind of my go-to,” or also you stepping back and saying, “Look, I’m going to have to let them figure this out and fail or win on their own account.” Where do you make that call? Where’s that moment for you?

Paula Parkes (23:44):

Ultimately, yeah, problem shared is a problem halved and collaboration in itself always breeds innovation. So the more, the better. And I think the question really is, is there ever enough collaboration? And the answer all too often is no. The only place I would caveat that is saying that there are times to create space. I don’t think it’s necessarily just a boundary, and provided that you’ve got 100% alignment on the mission and if that’s there, then I think the magic can continue to happen. But I just from a collaboration perspective, do we ever have enough?

Barrie Seppings (24:24):

Question 13, change your mind. What’s a long held belief or piece of conventional wisdom about marketing that you no longer hold and what caused you to change your mind?

Paula Parkes (24:35):

From the lens of the business historically in marketing it’s been a bit of more is more. And over the time I think the sophistication and performance marketing and our approaches in terms of our audiences is pointing much, much more to bigger, fewer, better. I think the tough part on that is actually taking the broader business on that journey to challenge that status quo of more is more.

Barrie Seppings (25:01):

Is it a bit of a worry like if we’re not doing as many pieces of thing right, the evidence of industry and then the rest of business are like, “Well, what are you doing with your time? What are you doing with your money? I’m not seeing stuff.”

Paula Parkes (25:11):

Yeah, I think there is a bit of that, but the data shows and the data points every time I’ve stress tested it to see that when you do refine the focus and make sure that it’s very clear, you actually get better, you get better results, you get a bigger impact. And I don’t think necessarily a lot of people get involved in busy work and I don’t think marketing needs to be about the busy work. I think it needs to be about the right work and the moments that matter.

Barrie Seppings (25:48):

Question 14, put your money where your mouth is. In terms of effectiveness and ROIs, not to get too specific, but broadly, what sort of tactics or approaches are you pulling back on ’cause they’re just not working as well anymore? And where are the bright sparks? Where are the stuff that you’re seeing that’s working that you want to back?

Paula Parkes (26:05):

Yeah, I think this will be a consistent theme. If I look back and I even look forward, but pulling back on third party events and taking a long hard look at vendor rationalization and that supply long tail is really important in terms of our thinking. And doubling down really on account-based marketing and executive access is where I see more investment going.

Barrie Seppings (27:13):

I just see sometimes the parallels between Adobe where you spent a ton of time and had a lot of success, really complex professional tools, but then all the sort of express or light versions of them as good perhaps in their own sense, but a good on ramp to bring a new set of users into the ecosystem.

Paula Parkes (27:31):

Into the fold.

Barrie Seppings (27:33):

Yeah. Do you think that same sort of approach could work in a ServiceNow context?

Paula Parkes (27:37):

I think so. And I think the keyword you mentioned there, Barrie is ecosystem. So as we continue to grow our ecosystem exponentially, that will obviously open up more opportunity.

Barrie Seppings (27:50):

Question 15, overhyped and underrated. What buzzword or concept do you think gets too much airplay in our industry right now, and do you foresee or predict anything sort of old-fashioned coming back anytime soon or are you seeing anything retro that’s sort of back in vogue in the marketing world?

Paula Parkes (28:09):

Buzzword for me, KPIs, and I think it’s been there for a long time, but because we can measure it, should we measure it? There’s a really big school of thought by John Doerr who wrote the book, Measure What Matters. Are we really doing that because we’ve become more sophisticated? Are we measuring and are we focusing in the right areas? So a lot of buzzwords still around KPIs.

And in terms of I think old-fashioned and let’s call it underloved is the reverse brief, the power in the reverse brief and even to that extent the power in the brief, like that crispness of understanding.

Barrie Seppings (28:49):

Music to my ears. This is absolutely fantastic ’cause I have in previous life run brief training workshops and brief writing workshops to the point where people are like, “Barrie, please shut up about the briefs.” I’m like, “I will not. I’ll never.” And it’s constant. It’s just constant. I’m trying to get them sharp, trying to get them crisp, trying to get them to say one thing ’cause otherwise me and my team, we’ve got to figure it out through the work. You’ve got to figure out the brief one way or another and the cheapest-

Paula Parkes (29:17):

And it’s costly. It’s costly.

Barrie Seppings (29:20):

Yeah. The cheapest place is in a Word document and a really expensive place is a creative department and a production studio or the edit suite or the re-edit suite or the reprinting after you’ve printed something. And I’ve been to all of those movies. I don’t like how they end.

Question 16, the supermodel question. Linda Evangelista once famously said she wouldn’t get out of for less than $10,000 a day. And everybody I’ve said this quote to is like, “That figure should get updated. How’s this for inflation?” That’s everybody’s first response. Tang around, that’s nothing. I’m like, “Oh god, where are we now?” Paula, what do you get out of bed for every day? In your personal life and your professional life, what’s your motivation?

Paula Parkes (29:59):

Oh, $10,000 seems cheap in relation to my response, but mine’s a decent sunrise. It sounds so simple, but my ethos to life is that every day is a new beginning and no matter where I happen to be in the world, I’m relishing a sunrise. No two days are ever the same. Change is constant back to our conversation before on change and leaning into it. And the promise of new light and gives new experiences to just grab onto and embrace. So for me, I absolutely get out of bed for a decent sunrise and I’m teaching my kids to do that too and to photograph it with Adobe tools while they’re at it.

Barrie Seppings (30:40):

I was about to ask you talking about literal sunrise, like get out, find the horizon, and watch that big ball of flame climb up.

Paula Parkes (30:47):

Absolutely. And feel the heat. It’s a feeling. It’s a being. It’s priceless.

Barrie Seppings (30:56):

Yeah, look, I buy into that 100%. I’m a surfer and probably one of my favorite things is the dawn patrol, getting into the water when it’s still kind of dark and being in the water as that sun comes up. There’s a moment there. No matter how crowded it is or how crappy the waves are, there’s a kind of a moment. It’s like church, the congregation all goes quiet.

Question 17, this ain’t happening. What’s the most unexpected or unusual situation you’ve found yourself in thanks to work? Did everybody just go like, “What am I? How did I get here? This is nuts.”

Paula Parkes (31:28):

I happened to be traveling to India, was my first visit to India. I was with Adobe at the time. I had a new boss who was Japanese. I happened to be standing with him at one of our first big events together and he just turned around and he said to me, “Do you know what Paula? None of us are irreplaceable, none of us.” And I was like … I think it actually was in my first month of being in Adobe. It was a real point for me. And I don’t know whether it was part cultural, but it just stuck with me over time. And I think I’ve actually always remembered it from the fact that none of us are irreplaceable.

Barrie Seppings (32:12):

And did you take it as a motivating thing or a fear thing? Like a month in to be told that, that could be a shot across the bow? I mean, what was your immediate reaction?

Paula Parkes (32:20):

I was shocked. A little bit of shock and then afterwards as it sat with me over time it’s just a clear point of reflection. And it probably comes back to me too in times of change. I think it’s something that’s just stuck there.

Barrie Seppings (32:34):

Question 18, home alone. Thinking back, what was the pandemic or the lockdown experience like for you, and how has that changed the way you work or you approach work? What’s carried on, either the good or the bad?

Paula Parkes (32:50):

Yeah, I think lockdown for me was it was a precious human experiment that changed everything and nothing, but it gave the gift of memories that I know I will cherish forever. And I sort of think to the “fortune favors the bold.” I had long envisaged living my best life doing a global role beside the beach in a nutshell. So for me, I moved countries and I moved companies and I did that all with a five-month-old and a two-year-old. And so for me, being brave ultimately changed the way in which I work and how I live.

I mean it came with its downsides for sure. I think having a London-based boss and doing post-midnight calls when you’ve got a screaming baby waking you up after you’ve actually tried to go and get some sleep. But what it really proved is that you can do a truly global role from this corner of the world, and it led to me as well also being able to work on optimizing the time zones. I’ve leaned into understanding a bit more about circadian rhythm, so for enhanced productivity and creativity. And when you best engage and how you best operate as an individual, that was quite good.

Barrie Seppings (34:10):

And did you, you moved from London to New Zealand during the pandemic or the start of the pandemic? What was the timeline?

Paula Parkes (34:19):

No. So I moved from Sydney. So I actually left Sydney on the 7th of January 2020 and I literally on the back of the bushfires in Australia. So I had driven past all of the bushfires and thought I would pack up my life in Sydney for six months, leave it in a storage container and then go back six months later because on the 7th of January we didn’t really quite know what was happening then. Of course then the pandemic happened. The America’s cup was still happening on the shores of Auckland. So I was quite happy. And when I got to live here I thought, “Oh, why would I live anywhere else in the world?”

It just so happened to be that I was on mat leave at the time and of course when I came back it was midst pandemic and my boss had been redirected to London. So I literally played a chief strategy role across Europe and Asia Pacific and Japan through that time while I was still with Adobe, but then obviously shifted companies. I went to VMware to lead their Asia Pacific and Japan marketing team before I actually came across to ServiceNow.

So it was a really, really interesting time, but I really go back to that fortune favors the bold. In some of those times you can make the boldest decisions and see where it takes you.

Barrie Seppings (35:41):

Plenty of people just went into stasis and it sounds like you did the opposite. You changed almost literally everything you could.

Paula Parkes (35:46):

The only thing I didn’t change was careers in terms of my actual job.

Barrie Seppings (35:53):

Question 19, all of me.

Heaps of businesses, they’ve got it in their motto and their company statement and they print it out on laminated sheets and stick it to the fridge in the break room and they’re like, “Bring your whole self to work.” Is that true? Do you get to do that? And A) do you get to do it, and do you do it? Is Paula at work pretty similar to Paula who’s at home or off the ledge?

Paula Parkes (36:14):

That is 100% true. At ServiceNow, we live by what we call our People Pact, and that is to live your best life from a belonging perspective, to do our best work in terms of feeling valued, and fulfilling our purpose together. It’s embedded in the cultural DNA within ServiceNow, and it’s absolutely preserved by the 24,000 individuals within ServiceNow.

In fact, just this week we still do wellbeing days and we had one this week globally on Tuesday. It is who we are. I think the People Pact is something that is at our core.

And with me as a leader, what you see is what you get. I’m not a whole lot different off leash, Barrie. I work hard, I play hard, and I absolutely delivered on that. In my recent five week vacay with my family in Europe, there was less book reading and lots of adventure in every way, shape, or form.

Barrie Seppings (37:13):

Did hear from your colleagues you were not particularly reachable or contactable as you had promised, that you took the five weeks for yourself and you actually spent it.

Paula Parkes (37:22):

I did. I absolutely did. And I got a few pings on there, on the old WhatsApp, but I just enjoyed sending back the pictures of my amazing cuisine or the latest cocktail or spritz I happened to be enjoying.

Barrie Seppings (37:36):

Was that your response, just a picture of a thing?

Paula Parkes (37:36):

It was.

Barrie Seppings (37:40):

All right, we’re nearly at the end. Awesome.

Question 20, secret weapon. Paula Parkes, do you have a secret weapon and in a career sense? And if you do, will you tell me what it is?

Paula Parkes (37:51):

It’s mindset. Everything comes back to my mindset, how I think, what I do around creating the time to think, creating the time to throw the ball forward, reflection, everything comes back to mindset for me.

Barrie Seppings (38:05):

Do you put specific work or training into that? Is it something you go and read about and is it-

Paula Parkes (38:10):

Yes.

Barrie Seppings (38:11):

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. So what are you finding? Where are you learning stuff from?

Paula Parkes (38:15):

The best read ever, and I have it beside my bed because I never have just read it once, but multiple times is Carol Dweck’s book on mindset. Subsequently, there’s people that follow similar schools of thought, but things like James Clear’s Atomic Habits, building moments into the everyday, rewiring, so many different ways in which you can learn and evolve your thinking and your mindsets constant.

Barrie Seppings (38:46):

Isn’t it, well, ’cause so many people have said, one of them kind of think, well, the brain, I’ve got given the brain of God. But you believe it can be trained, tweaked, optimized?

Paula Parkes (38:56):

Absolutely. Absolutely. I do. It can be rewired. It’s an amazing thing.

Barrie Seppings (39:04):

That was 20 questions, the interview game that we play with all of our B2B tech marketing guests here on the Plugged-In, Switched-On podcast. Those answers came from Paula Parkes who is the Vice President of Marketing, Asia Pacific for ServiceNow. Before I let Paula go, I did have to ask her if she could only watch one more movie in her lifetime, what would she pick?

Paula Parkes (39:29):

I’d probably rewatch Forrest Gump. I don’t know. There’s just the whole notion of the box of chocolates of life. There are just so many nuggets in that movie, and I mean as far as actors go, I just, I love Tom Hanks. But life is what you make it I think and some of the learnings in there, and laughs. Live, laugh, learn.

Barrie Seppings (39:51):

Now, before we unplug from this episode, just a quick recap. Splendid Group is the B2B tech marketing agency. We are global. We’re 100% remote. And we’d like to think we’re pretty good at what we do. And if you think you’re pretty good at what you do, and would like to do it from wherever in the world you are, you should probably get in touch. We have been growing recently. We do have demand for more great people in marketing and comm, so visit our website, splendidgroup.com, have a look around, see who’s here, see the sorts of work that we do for the great brands that we are proud to call clients and get in touch.

I have been Barrie Seppings. I’m the Executive Creative Director at Splendid Group. I was talking to Paula Parkes, the Vice President of Marketing for Asia Pacific at ServiceNow in what a 20 questions episode of has been Plugged In, Switched On, a podcast about conversations that matter in B2B tech marketing.

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Plugged-In, Switched On is generated by Splendid Group. Thanks to our Executive Producer, Ruth Holt, and Anna Isabelle Canta, and our CEO, Tim Sands.