Live from Las Vegas, Nevada, it's theCUBE. Covering Knowledge 15, brought to you by ServiceNow. Welcome back to Las Vegas, everybody. This is Dave Vellante, we're live here in the Mandalay Bay. This is ServiceNow Knowledge 15. This is theCUBE. theCUBE goes out to the events. We extract the signal from the noise. This is our third ServiceNow Knowledge event. The first one was over at the Aria and then last year in Moscone, we're here in the Mandalay Bay this year. Watching the evolution of ServiceNow and the transformation of organizations, Rob Pickering is here. He's the CIO of AAA, AAA Allied. Rob, thanks very much for coming on theCUBE. Pleasure, happy to be here. So AAA, everybody knows AAA, right? Car breaks down, you call AAA. You can call us to tow your car and you can also call us to make your travel arrangements, do insurance. Yeah, you got all kinds of new services going on. I whip out my AAA card all the time when I'm taking the family on vacation. I get these killer discounts. I went in the office the other day, got some Euro in advance. Got a good rate on them, got to get them in advance, got a good rate on them though. But so talk about your business. A lot of people don't know these other ancillary businesses but what's happening in your business generally and specifically how are you guys expanding your reach? Well, AAA Allied Group is one of the federation of AAA clubs. We're the 12th largest AAA club in the United States. There are about 44 clubs total. We service the state of Kansas, the eastern half of Connecticut, Southwest Ohio, a little bit of Kentucky, a little bit of Indiana, a little bit of West Virginia. So we're pretty spread out. I personally, from an IT staff standpoint, have folks working in four different states. So we rely on a whole bunch of various tools to keep us connected. The AAA brand that everyone knows is evolving over time. We're trying to improve our reach and our knowledge and you mentioned discounts. Discounts is one of the things that, that's the only thing I talk about when I'm talking about AAA because it's something that people really don't know a lot about. Well, I only recently started taking advantage of it and they're substantial. It's not like a couple of points. I mean, it's really significant. And there's several hundred. So the AAA mobile app is the best way of finding those. It'll pinpoint you and tell you who's giving you discounts in the area. So I want to talk about mobile but how long you been the CIO? I've been a AAA Allied Group for 10 years. Okay, so how have things changed in the last 10 years? I mean, a lot's changed, right? A lot has changed. We really didn't have cloud back then. That's true. It wasn't really a factor and there was no such thing as social media, at least to speak of. So our IT organization has gone through a bunch of transitions in the 10 years that I've been there. When I started, folks were answering, everyone in the IT department was answering phone calls. So we were one giant help desk doing anything anybody asked us to do. We built a lot of structure around that and started evolving the processes and the tools. We went through three different ITSM platforms before we landed on service now and we've only been on service now now for about a year. So three different platforms before service now? Before service now. What wasn't working? So the first platform we were on, not to be named, didn't have any kind of email integration, didn't have any kind of a customer portal. So it was really a weak environment to roll out to a disperse organization like ours. Yes, so we hear this a lot, whether it's you didn't have some kind of capability or things weren't integrated or it just didn't do the stuff that you wanted it to do. So, okay, so that was sort of the first one or two or three, what happened next? So we then moved to another platform that kind of served our needs at the time, solved a few of the initial problems that we had, but it was not ITIL compliant. And we wanted to move towards a more ITIL compliant environment. We ended up on another platform. What was the driver for that, Rob? It was a quality initiative? It's really quality process, anything in IT, the only way to scale it is to make it more efficient. So we're never gonna have enough people, we're never gonna have enough resource, we're never gonna have enough money. So we tend to invest in tools and we use those tools to improve our efficiency. And so every iteration of the tool improved our efficiency a little bit and we eventually ended up on one that we think we're gonna stick with for a while. But they became disposable, right? Absolutely, right, so they can be expensive as well if you're not focused on looking at what your goals are and having the platform delivered. So let's go back to the early days of when you brought in service now, the impetus was you wanted to get more out of your ITSM your system, so take us back to what that was like. What did you have to do to bring it in? Was it politically charged? Did your CFO wanna get you in a stranglehold? It's funny, I worked for the CFO. We actually initially implemented service now because we wanted a project management tool. We were in the market for a new project management portfolio management tool. We evaluated a bunch of them and we very quickly figured out that we were gonna have people working in two different systems. There was gonna be one group in the project tool. There was gonna be that same group working in the ITSM platform and we wouldn't have any single record of all of their work, all their efforts, their resources, no common process, logic, et cetera. So we started looking at service now and we actually ended up purchasing a platform specifically to roll out project. Okay, so that's interesting. We were talking earlier, one of our guests about project, that's obviously a place where people start, not necessarily always the starting point, but a reasonable one. Small guys like us, we might use Basecamp, but you're managing a lot more complex projects. Okay, so you brought in project and then what happened next? So after we brought in project, we knew when we made the decision that we were gonna be ousting our prior ITSM platform. That was the whole reason why we did service. So once we rolled out project, we actually had it live in January of 2014 and then we began our ITSM implementation near the end of February, beginning of March and we went live on the ITSM platform 90 days later and rolled out incident problem change, service catalog, CMS. And using a single CMDB. Using a single CMDB for everything, one tool for everyone working on projects, working on the ITSM platform. Okay, so what happened? What was the business result? The business results have been astounding, frankly. Astounding. Astounding. We didn't anticipate what would happen and that was that as we were improving our processes, we all became evangelists inside the organization. So the whole IT team loved the platform, they loved the tool, they loved the visibility, how it worked. It was kind of like finding a nirvana at some level and then they started talking about it to all of their customers, the people that they're talking to on the phone, the tickets they're working, about what it was doing for our group and those same business organizations started saying, well, how could we take advantage of that? Is that something that we can do? Can you put us in that platform? How can we use it? And we immediately said, well, that's exactly what we want to do. So like what kind of groups like HR? HR, accounting, our facilities organization, we call them office services. Our ERS business operations group, they're the actual kind of mini IT organization that supports all the road service operations. Several others, marketing is another one as well. So any sort of request oriented service organization? Any request approver type of, request approver, fulfiller type flow. And in many cases it's replacing things that we had put in place as stop gaps for those organizations like a SharePoint list or a SharePoint workflow, something small that they had to create in the past. Spreadsheets. Spreadsheets that weren't working on. Email. The big ones, email, right? All of the other business organizations, they never got to mature from a process standpoint the way IT did. If you think about IT in the past, we started on the phone, then we moved to some sort of a ticketing system that wasn't connected to anything. Then we moved to a ticketing system connected to email and then eventually we had a customer portal where you could put stuff in and we went through this maturity cycle. The other business lines went straight from walk over to their desk or pick up a phone to email. And once they hit email, they stayed there and all of their request approver, fulfiller stuff was happening in email. And that's essentially how we sell the tool internally. Do you have stuff that you're using email for? If you do, that's a broken process. Let us help you fix it. So how has it affected the flow of emails in your organization? The hope is it's reducing them significantly and we're seeing that over time as people move. It's a cultural shift. Everybody loves email. So as people move from their email process to an automated process or a service now request fulfiller process, suddenly they aren't relying on email. Email's not where their work is. Their work is in the system, the tool. So you must have seen a behavioral shift. I mean, most workers when they come in in the morning, the first thing they do is fire up their email. Yeah. Is that still the case? Or are they firing up service now? If they're in IT, they're firing up service now. Absolutely, that is the, you walk around our office and work with any of our folks, that's the screen they have up. They have their service now screen up and we're slowly seeing that happen in the other business lines as well that we've moved. Now we haven't moved them all and we're continuing to work on moving more and more of them into the tool itself but it's successful. I was struck by Frank's keynote this morning when he wanted an iPhone 6. Did you see that? That's exactly it. And he got, he emailed the CIO, the CIO emailed back a link. The link to the portal. And that's what we do as well. And that's what you would have done. That's exactly what we would have done. This is where you get the service. Leave me alone. I'm busy. This is where you can do it. This is how you interact. And what's more important is if anybody working in a larger organization knows that one of the challenges is figuring out where do I go to request whatever it is? Do I go to our intranet? Do I go to our customer portal? Do I email someone? Do I call someone? How do I find it? And now those answers are always go to the customer portal which is our service now CMI. So the customer's portal is the service now is a front end to virtually all the services within your organization is the vision anyway. So if I want to do something in HR like I know in our situation we have to go to two or three or four different portals to find out or I have to go to my house. Sometimes I have to go directly to my healthcare provider or I don't know. I don't know where to go. And over time we're moving everything into that one customer portal so that you can communicate with your employees and say, hey, this is how you interact with our organization. Whether it's a personal request, I need to change my W2 form or I want to sign up for a health club or I need some sort of an HR form or it's a business request. Hey, I need to update that graphical sign at that office. That's a lot of stuff though. So how do I find it? Is it a search paradigm? It's a dynamic search. So in our portal you plug in a search criteria and you'll get two search results. The left hand side will be all the knowledge base articles that we've created around that topic and on the right hand side it's all the service catalog. How does a service get spun up? Do you worry at all about the analog to VM sprawl, the service sprawl? How do you manage all that? We manage it a couple of ways. We've got a request process that utilizes service now's demand management to evaluate whether or not it's something that should be put out on the portal. Sort of a curation process. We also enable our business lines directly. So we use service now's service creator application to create full blown applications that we then deliver to our business lines and it allows them to manage all of those request forms themselves. They can create them, they can publish them, they can edit them, they can modify them and they don't have to work with IT to do any of that. What are the curation parameters that you use? Some of the curation parameters in demand are the capital cost, the labor cost, the risk, the return on investment, et cetera. So you run a business case. So you're essentially doing many business cases on every request that's coming in but you've streamlined that process through demand management to deliver an artifact at the end, whether it be a project or a new development story or another request form. And service creator is app creator, those are one and the same? I think those are two different products. App creator is for full blown, kind of create now applications and service creator is for onboarding a new service specifically for a business line to manage. Are you at the point where you're considering app creator? Absolutely, and so we're evaluating the different, each tool's got a use case and so as business lines want to onboard, we evaluate their technical expertise, how much they want to invest from a licensing standpoint and then determine what the best use case is for them whether it's service creator or a create now app or even a commercial service now application that we can purchase. I remember when we first heard about app creator, Jeff Frick and I were doing theCUBE and we were saying, that's pass. And at first people say, well, not really, but it is. It really is, right? I mean it's sort of headlong into that platform as a service but it requires different skill sets or it minimizes the skill sets that are required. So how, if at all, are you changing your development skill set profile? So one of the issues that we had with our former ITSN platform was that we created a bottleneck and that bottleneck was in our ability to execute the development process. So as our internal folks needed changes to the applications, that would come into one of two developers and they very quickly got overwhelmed. So when we implemented service now we took a different approach. I had 10 of my 32 IT staff admin trained in the service now platform and then we took those 10 folks and made them responsible for various aspects of the system and from that came six certified administrators that they did on their own that make up a development group and we actually used ServiceNow's SDLC scrum tool to manage our service now development going forward. Interesting, and so how does the ServiceNow app creator sort of roadmap fit into whatever it is, whatever you're developing in Ruby, Java, Python? Yeah, ultimately it simplifies it because the development platform becomes ServiceNow so you're not doing Ruby, you're not doing Python or Perl or PHP or any of that. They need a JavaScript skill set and they can start developing apps in ServiceNow. The app creator minimizes the time really to turn up those applications because you've got templates built for small, medium and large applications that have different feature sets. So again, it's an evaluation for what folks need. Does it take pressure off? I mean, everybody complains about how hard it is to find good developers. Does it change that equation? Yeah, it's made folks in our organization that I would not have initially thought we're going to take to developing and being developers and turn them into ServiceNow developers. So what's the skill set you now look for? So you're obviously looking at somebody's resume, all right, whatever, let's say you're developing in Perl or whatever, Java, okay, that's what I need. What do you look for now? A desire to be able to create is literally the best. If they're passionate about it, they've got a desire to learn it and understand it. We can start them on stuff that doesn't require any coding, kind of our zero coders, no coders that Frank talked about this morning and then move them through that process until they're all the way in the lower left corner as core system developers in JavaScript. Okay, so that is your goal, is to get them to the point where everybody in one team can, okay, so it's really up to them. It's up to them and they can stop along that path wherever they want and there's always something that they're going to be able to do to contribute. When you think about the portfolio of skill sets, do you try to have a mix, a diversified portfolio? Sure. Yeah, absolutely, because everybody's going to have a different interest level as well. How about mobile, Rob? What's the rage? You guys got a mobile app? What are you guys doing in the whole mobile space? So, yeah, we're a little bit young in the mobile space in our implementation. ServiceNow implements automatically on tablets, so everything that we're doing is available on a tablet interface. To move it to a smart phone interface requires a little bit of effort and we're starting to undergo some of that efforts because those same business lines, some of the advantages they see is all their folks have a smart phone and they want to be able to check their incidents, respond to them, deal with approvals, et cetera, on a mobile app. How about gotchas? Things that you would maybe do differently now, knowing what you know, maybe advice that you give to some of your peers in terms of if you're thinking about bringing in ServiceNow, do A, B, and C, and D. This is what I would have done differently if I had to do it all over again. If I was going to do it all over again, I'd like to say I would have done it sooner because I'd love to go back in time. Don't go through for a second or third iterations. Don't go through all the different iterations that we did. Throw out, yeah, okay. But beyond that, I was really happy with the way that we kind of built the development environment. We did not focus on full-time developers. We focused on people with a desire to develop and spread that effort out among a large group of people. That's enabled us to move forward very quickly. Something that I'd probably do different. I would probably bite off less at once. We bit off a bunch of the platform over a six-month timeframe and implemented, which today would be the whole PPM suite, the whole ITSA suite, performance analytics, event management, demand management, just an enormous effort, and that was a lot. So I would tell anybody who's looking at the platform today, if you have an ITSM platform, look at Express. I was real impressed with what they talked about especially the fact that the path from Express to a full-blown service now is clicking a button. So that was impressive. That was not something I knew about. So I would say look at that. And then number two, start small. Find something that is going to solve a problem, one application module, whatever it is, implement it, get it working, and then figure out what your next step is. Did you make a cake? We didn't get a launch cake.  I saw all those cakes on the keynote and the guy sitting next to me, one of my folks, was like, hey, we didn't get a go live cake. So that's all right. We did our own celebration. That's awesome. Rob, thanks very much. We got to leave it there. I really appreciate you coming to theCUBE. It was a pleasure talking to you. Thanks very much. Keep it right there, buddy. We'll be back with our next guest. This is theCUBE, we're live from Service Now Knowledge. Hashtag no14, go to the crowd chat, crowdchat.net slash no14. No, sorry, no15. What am I talking about? It's 2015, folks. All right, everything I said, global replace 15. We'll be right back. This is theCUBE.


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Yeah all right um we're recording okay thank you Joe um so Manil there's your data point that we had trouble going to YouTube so uh cool um so Joe as you joined we are just brainstorming like requirements and uh for in the case scenario where we are online what are requirements that we would need for the platform um and we are also kind of brainstorming other factors variables to keep in mind such as like guide for presenters problems presenters might face um I loved Christian's idea too about the games room stuff like that um so I'm gonna finish writing microphone um other featured requests or means um oh maybe not a featured request or it would be nice if the tool would have a way where people can collectively make notes and allow us to streamline or upstream them to get up or I don't know at least like a google doc that is like central to the next year conferencing so that this there's no problem with Joe that no one has to copy paste things out and um there's a we streamline this process of uh keeping the notes and all the artifacts that have been discussed in the meetings that's a great idea artifacts hi everyone well hi Mateo I made it like I was like one hour late to my to my original expectations but whatever um it's good to see you it's just I'm late I'm late beyond any possible means but my previous meeting ran over by an hour so you are you are forgiven you are here that is what matters um Mateo we are just um having a brainstorm discussion about what required um features we might uh need for the scenario where we are doing this and via a online platform um so folks are coming up with uh different ideas like a um streamlining notes feature or um obviously good queuing features for take so folks can take turns and ask questions that kind of stuff um we're also talking about just general um guides or wish lists type items for presenters um things in attendees um Christian had an idea to do a game room somehow that's a great one so that's where we're at um and then Roy I like this idea do you want to um expand on it about co-chairing yeah it's just that we try we give it a try at the tooling working group with the HackMD and then already I improved so much more than the experience but it's just marked down right uh but in the context of the collapse summit would be nice to have a proper co-chairing platform like going beyond this mark down like really having more code capabilities into this and that's a good one I think that there are paid versions of HackMD that um hi kiddo hi cutie um that you can get to um uh to also to to work with other languages so we should check that out um uh and uh it's a little also disturbed simultaneously by Joe's sorry all right um okay uh uh right any other ideas or thoughts or or wish list items for for the platform I think what I will need to know is how many simultaneous sessions uh we would want to have and again for one day or two days those are important components I think that's a great um next topic is like like what would we want to adjust in terms of the format um so how many simultaneous sessions um um format what I have actually not gotten just a ton of that was an action item I had um from from the last call was to send that note out to to projects and ask for um ask for input I had uh four or five people reply um mostly to say that they would not be able to make an in-person um uh collab summit this year and to say that if one were available in a remote at first uh context that they would attend and participate in that so that's sort of just read and that was like I said um sent that out to the projects list got five responses back um that's better than none but it kind of reinforces our feeling that in the worst case scenario people will want to do something together online um so a lot of folks also mentioned the time zones as being a thing that they were concerned about because you know they a couple folks were like in Poland for example um wanting to participate um synchronously with everyone else might present um challenges so we would probably we probably do need to really kick the tires on the format and timing now so we can set those expectations um does anybody want to throw like a straw person thoughts out or preferences to let's list the folks we do know who we think want a track in addition to an open j s collab summit so I think I've heard electron perhaps wants a track uh does node need a separate track in addition to open j s who else did you hear back from joy I think the question the key question before that for that times I don't think that is like from my point of view that is the time zone sort of biggest problem before trucks yeah because it's um um yeah you know scheduling session is going to be way harder and uh even though we might want a track we might actually just say that we don't want one because if like this is going about yeah it's uh you know node j s is really spread over all over the globe so it's uh it's some feasible to ask people for example in china to do certain type of hours and so there is like it's going to be harder to some extent so we might need to maybe rethink the the format to to some extent so and maybe plan it more un-conference way or more less than these will happen these two days and more these will happen this this week or something like that compared to compared to everything I'm just flagging it because I just yeah that's that's good maybe we have more small chunks of time like break it out over a few days so if we have if we have all the sessions if we know all the sessions in advance we can ask people to say which sessions they are interested in and which they want to participate and I think Joey you mentioned the tool that we had at the W3C TPAC meetings where you just put all these factors together and it will create a schedule that works for all the attendees that are interested in those meetings and based on that we can find the ideal schedule and you know when one session can be at 3 a.m. in europe if no one in europe is interested in that session it would be fine to have it at 3 a.m. and yeah that I love to reach out to Dominique about modifying that W3C scheduler tool because that would be pretty dope that was pretty actually miraculous how well that worked but to Matteo's point and Robin's earlier question the feedback I'm getting is that it depends is that big it depends because the format and the time zones and sort of like the time requirement is like a variable for projects thinking about putting content together so it feels a bit like we have this cap 22 or chicken and egg sort of problem where it's like well we we want to know who wants to participate so that we can find the time zones and the format that works for them but the those folks want to know like the time zones and the format plan so they can figure out how they want to participate and so you know it's a bit of it's like that sort of neat tug you know tug and pull whatever you know kind of thing so but to Robin's question and electron amp node there are certainly a lot of our at-large projects who had indicated their interest in doing sessions during open JS collab summit but not feeling that they had enough content to run a whole track so that's that's that and I will tell you it's apples and oranges a little bit but the big technology platform that we would use assuming our event goes virtual does have actually a global translation tool to it so that would be pretty cool but again those are sessions that you could watch later so it's not always going to apply for a collab summit and I think maybe that's one of the challenges of this event uniquely compared to a conference where you know if you're if you're not there to watch it live and ask a question you you were probably just watching the session in the first place and so it's okay but in the collab summit where we expect peers to participate and drive the content you know the folks in the room are the programming it's harder to do those things you know I'm happy to take the action item to to follow up with Dom because I'm Dominique is at the W3C about this tool and see if if we can modify it for our uses I think just to give you all a just picture of what this was so the W3C has an on conference day as part of TPAC and what they do is they request folks to submit sessions and they have a set number of rooms that they can hold sessions and a set and a constraint on time and what they did was like have people add those sessions and then people submitted added their names to the sessions that they wanted to attend and then based on that the tool selected the timing the the most optimal timing obviously that had some constraints going for it one way being that it was all in the same time zone and and you know there there was the number of rooms but here we don't have a number of rooms requirement because there could be an infinite number of rooms I suppose I guess none of the tools have a room limit do they Robin that you're running into I'm not quite sure I'll that I'll find out and do we have any feedback from the 24 hour work from W work from home conference on how the viewership was I can I have all the data if you want but you need to Robin I can possibly even let me see if I can present it if you were interested I have a report let me just Oh Mateo are you comfortable with this being on on our YouTube channel before you probably not okay uh so uh because we're we're gonna record this um maybe we can stop recording for now Joe and then resume when Mateo back cool so um you just raised a good good point feature requirement accessibility concerns are and internationalization concerns are certainly super important and probably some things we could do to have guides for presenters as well there um okay so um back to the to the format question um what you know let's let's assume for a minute that everybody is more or less stretched across you know five or six consecutive time zones which is more manageable um would we rather have an event that um kind of kept everybody together solidly um for a couple of days or would we rather uh figure out how to break that up um so we're we're not not necessarily putting people in their their chairs in front of the collapse club summit content for say four hours a day um what do you all imagine being like the the max we can and uh we can ask of people to endure there that's a really good question I think both on like comfort and you know just on people's availability with with work and stuff too yeah what why wouldn't we need to put it into two days why couldn't we just think about a bigger scare like having the collapse summit stretch out on a week to fit all the time zones we crest properly given that we don't have to travel to a certain location and we don't have um yeah that limitation so it can be like collapse summit starts on the 26th and the party doesn't stop until we say it stops yeah just like uh I you know what I kind of I kind of like that it's just a fun way to frame it you know yeah like I mean I guess it cannot stay forever collapse summit but you know you need to frame it to at least a certain time but I don't think we are forced to have it within two days like packed into two days I think something like a week could be also possible too every day is collapse summit day yeah that's my christmas um that's a good I like that idea like instead of it being you know another thing that I kind of like about that is that um it kind of reinforces this idea that collab the the values in the spirit of collapse summit or something we should be continuing beyond like a and that's I love collapse summit so it's it's like oh okay it's collapse and it's over but it lives on you know like like I don't know I like that idea um it also does to your point christian just give us a lot more flexibility for people who want to participate in multiple sessions across multiple time zones we just get more room to work with yeah it could be even focused on specific areas um on specific days let's say uh monday is foundation oriented uh topics then tuesday is no js oriented topics and depending on what kind of session we press for proposals we get we can like have a day focus on specific areas so that the context switching isn't that crucial and problematic so one um slight challenge is that the 26th is um thursday so um you know I don't know if we would want to say that that's a week consecutive inclusive of the weekends or you know if that would be something that we would stop and resume on monday you know um or if we were to say along with the and along with a possible announcement of moving online that we start summit on monday of the following week um thoughts on that the conference is tuesday wednesday so and how do you handle monday thursday friday yeah oh okay yeah yeah yeah yeah so so we instead of starting summit after the conference it could start the monday before the conference and run and that week is that what you're saying raman no it's just a question and a statement more than anything right yeah um yeah it could be an option definitely have monday as a day where people where we try to schedule sessions specifically for people that are new to those foundation um events and we want to invite them and you know this is like a pre conference um event that you might like to attend online um and then you know they get like a feel of how that feels like and then if they if they want to continue participating they can stay being continuing online on thursday and friday and eventually next week that's an interesting so so like the monday day before open j s world is like the new contributor track type content yeah um and then it kind of that's a really good idea it kind of makes it a week of open j s exactly i like it quite a lot to be honest so it's uh it's actually a very good idea because it allows us to provide some more content talk about our projects so ideally we shouldn't be inviting all projects to do take even a 20 minutes talk something like that of what it feels like to contribute to that project what the project is about and and so on so for me yeah absolutely like this seems a fantastic um i like that you like it mateo that makes me happy i had to go and turn on the light because you can she couldn't see me anymore so you see that the sun is going down yes okay um so new like new contributor um track content going in on monday before open j s world a call to the projects all the projects to um put something together for that day so now i'm thinking um that's this this is awesome um it kind of so then the question would be if then on tuesday wednesday and i think the answer is no it's my like personal sense but it's a question for everybody do we continue to run collab summit content on tuesday wednesday um which are the days of the open j s world or do we stop like collab summit track activities during open j s world joseph i would say stop um and have you know focus on the event i just want to add to real quickly that i think the the new contributor idea for monday is great and i think also if they're looking at the schedule of open j s world um if there were any sessions any like speaker sessions where a sort of new contributor or some sort of intro to a discussion could happen on the monday might be good as well like say if james is talking about quick or something then maybe you know they're sort of like an intro to quick collab summit session um on the monday as well but i don't mean to derail the question of whether the collab summit happens during the conference i would say no that's that's my um my opinion as well i wouldn't want to um like take any viewership away from the online event um for for open j s world i think it benefits us to have a strong open j s world experience so that's my two steps yeah i would also say that the tools that we're looking at for a virtual event have a lot of interactive engagement opportunities so i would love to have all of our top contributors maintainers and you know present during open j s world to participate in those online discussions and not sidetracked so to speak yeah um okay so that is that's a super idea so it's yeah it sounds like in terms of um and i'm gonna start kind of winding us to some yeah thanks to uh to some conclusions for um to make progress on it sounds like we are preferring an online experience that would include starting on monday prior to open j s world with new contributors and we would prefer a solution that allowed us to balance interest from registrants with time zone availability of the speakers slash presenters um and that is an ai to me to go talk to dom about how they did that for w3c um from a tooling standpoint um we all have ongoing action items to encourage our working groups and our communities to submit um proposals for collab summit um i realized that everybody's in the same boat here where they're like well we don't really know what's going on so we haven't submitted a proposal but also it's hard to plan this without the proposals so um we need to to to do what we can to encourage um our groups to to submit those and particularly if we're very keen on the new contributor track idea to do that for um that population um which i think is a really solid move um and obviously robin has the um the very important and unenviable ai to continue wearing the heavy crown figuring out what we're doing here with all of the uncertainty in the world thank you robin um what you know what sorry just to jump in what i would suggest is why don't why don't we put together a a draft um you know a time frame agenda to give us something to react to because that can help us also evaluate the technology tool that we select and then maybe you all can react to that this week would that work because maybe we have some early something in the early morning something in the evening but that at least gives us if we start framing it out and then it also shows us where we might have gaps and where projects can say oh wait wait wait no i did want a track now that i see that draft out there draft empty agenda framework um yeah i think that's a good uh a good idea um just something that helps us sort of visualize how this could come together over yeah great um in our last couple of minutes i just wanted to ask for a couple of things one is there's um open pr with some meeting notes if you don't mind popping over plus one or add any changes when you get a minute and the second is that just a question um which i will just continually ask is there anything we need to add uh or update on the read me and thank you to christian for updating the read me last week with the cove it into okay i see any other business today okay last thing is that you are all killing it you're doing a great job i'm very proud of you hang in there you've got this i love you um and have a wonderful rest of your day thank you jerry thank you jerry bye bye bye bye y'all


Hi, good morning everyone. My name is Kyle Tweet. I'm the communications coordinator for the Department of Labor. Appreciate you all joining us this morning, this Monday morning, May 10th for our webinar on the work search requirement for unemployment insurance claimants. So today we'll be going through a very step-by-step approach and process for the information that you all need to know as unemployment insurance claimants on what information and what the steps will be for you when you are actually entering the work that you are searching for in the activity that you are doing this week. So just as a reminder, just kind of as we go through this today, do encourage questions in the chat and look forward to getting those and answering very specific questions on what information is needed as you're entering your work search information. So again today, as with all of our past presentations, today's presentation will be recorded and we'll be adding that as a link to our YouTube channel. I'll be providing the link a little bit later on in today's presentation. Under our work search page, there's actually links to all of our past webinars on work search as well as our few of our future webinars in town halls with representatives from our unemployment insurance divisions with links again to past presentations on our YouTube channel. So again, just kind of how today will flow. We'll have a speaker from our unemployment insurance division who I'll introduce in just one second. But again, just in terms of how today will flow, do encourage questions in the chat. Basically how that works is you all submit questions, I review them and add and publish them. So what's helpful for me as the moderator and for our speaker who will be jumping on in just a second is if you can review those questions that are already in the chat and you can actually have the ability to give those a thumbs up, and which means that we'll be filtering questions by how important they are, if you will, to all of you. So essentially, if you can just like questions, if you want to hear them answered, that would be helpful for us. Well, we'll be giving a background on work search today and just kind of, you know, just kind of an overarching view of what to expect and what information. And as I said earlier, what specific steps you have to take in order to enter your work search for those of you who may have never been on unemployment insurance benefits before. Or for those of you who may just need a refresher. In terms of, you know, COVID-19, there are exemptions to the work search. We'll be going over those exemption questions and, you know, those yes no questions and what to expect for that. You know, and then also, you know, in terms of the information that you specifically need for your job contacts, as well when you're entering your work search. So just as again, please feel free to ask any and all questions during today's presentation. Again, just wanted to say I'll turn this over to Deb Bruce from our unemployment insurance division just one second. But again, Deb, you know, as I'll turn it over to you, but again, I think folks just need to know. Obviously, work search was reinstated on May 9th, which was yesterday, but they don't actually have to do anything other in terms of entering the information in terms of the reporting aspect until next week. So this week is really about that work search activity. So with that, Deb, I will turn it over to you to walk us through the presentation. Great. Hello, everyone. My name is Deb Bruce. I'm with the Department of Labor unemployment insurance and wages division. And as Kyle said at the beginning, I'm going to be the representative to take you through the work search requirements and how to capture and report that information when you file your weekly claim. So to repeat that briefly what Kyle just said, we reinstated the work search requirement on the 9th, which was yesterday. And that means that for your work search activities, you will be conducting these activities this week. You will not report your work search information until you file your claim, and that begins as early as Sunday the 16th. So again, you're capturing your work search information during the claim week and you report it when it's time to file that week's claim the following week. And this information must be entered online through the claimant portal. And you can get. Thank you, Kyle. So the very first step is logging into the claimant portal. The quickest way to get there is from the Department of Labor's main website. And on that page, you'll find the quick links section. And right near the top is the link to file your weekly unemployment claim. And so again, that's where you want to begin this process. Information that you'll want to be capturing or taking down for your work search information. I'll go over those specific areas. You'll want to log the date of your contact. So again, dates are important. The work search contacts that you make this week would be dated from the 9th through the 15th. And this information you will enter when you go to file this week's claim beginning with next Sunday. If you want the date of your contact, the type of work you're seeking, that could be just a brief one or two word description. The name of the employer, the employer's address, the person that you contacted. And if there is no specific contact name, you can put something like human resources or personnel. You are responding to an online job search engine such as Indeed or Monster. Oftentimes there will be a job ID or something in the application field to identify the job that you're applying for. If you're lacking any of those types of specific things that you can jot down, just put the name of the engine. So if it was through Indeed.com, you can put Indeed as the contact person. So there's a little bit of flexibility when you're using some of these online job search engines. We would like a phone number as well. There's a method of contact and you will indicate whether that was in person through a resume, a telephone call or email. And then lastly is the result of your job contact and that may be interview or you're still waiting to hear back. That's a very common result. Once you've made the contact, you won't really have a result for some time later. So it's okay to put waiting or pending in that field. Okay, and the work search questions, these are all yes and no questions. There are eight basic questions plus our exemption questions, which we're going to go over right now. And so the specific COVID exemption questions are as follows. Have you been instructed by a health care provider to quarantine due to COVID-19? Have you been instructed by a health care provider to not return to work because you have a serious health condition and returning to work at this time poses a significant risk due to COVID-19? Are you the primary caregiver for a child whose childcare is unavailable as a direct result of COVID-19? Are you the primary caregiver for a child who is attending virtual or remote school as a direct result of COVID-19? Are you caring for a family member who has been instructed by a health care provider to quarantine due to COVID-19? And it's very important to bear in mind that more than one of these may apply. So it's okay to answer yes to one or all of these questions. And again, be thinking very carefully about how the question is worded. And if it does in fact apply to you, if you answer yes to any of these questions, you are exempted from having to enter specific work search information. And you will be bypassed for the page with the work search information. And as things develop, we'll provide more information and any clarifiers on these questions. So any information as it comes in, we'll be making sure to update claimants and providing information on our website. Okay, so again, the minimum requirement for contacts is three each week. You can certainly do more than that on your own, but for unemployment under both federal and state unemployment insurance law, the minimum here is three each week. And as I mentioned before, I'm going to go down the list really quick here. You want to make sure you're recording the date of the contact and the type of work. Employer information such as the name and address. Contact details would be the name of the person you spoke with, phone number and email. And again, if some of this information is not present because you're applying through something like Indeed or Monster. If there is not a job ID number, just put the name of the search engine that you use. And then lastly, method of contact and the result of that contact. And what Kyle is showing you now is what the screen actually looks like. I want to point out the little question marks that you see next to each box. If you're not sure how to enter information or if you need a hint about what to put in that field. You can click or hover on the question mark and that will provide you instruction for that text box. Now this is a screenshot. We're not using a dynamic page so we can't show you what that looks like. But each of these boxes where you see the red asterisk, that means that that's a required field. So you must put information in those boxes. And if you get stuck again right next to those red dots is a little question mark and that's there to help you and assist you with the data entry into those text box. Or text boxes I should say. Okay, and another reminder that these questions are going to be asked of you each week. And you will complete them each week and answer every single one of those questions as they apply to you for that week that you were filing for. And this is also tied to able and available. What we need for information is whether individuals are both able and available to seek work. And again there, this is also where those exemption questions can come into play where folks may be able to work but are unavailable due to a potential COVID qualifying scenario or scenarios. If you do not have a COVID exemption in your situation, then the expectation is that you are able and available for the week you're filing for to be seeking and accepting work. And you must certify that each each and every week that you file. When you finish answering your questions you will be asked to confirm the information that you have provided before you will click on to the next screen in the claimant portal. Okay, and by not completing your work search information that can have an impact on your eligibility for benefits. Be able and available is a week to week eligibility. And by not performing a work search if you are required to perform one that may cause an issue on your unemployment claim and potentially the possibility to repay benefits or receive penalty weeks. On your unemployment insurance claim. So it's very important that you are completing this each week that you file for benefits. For unemployment. Awesome. Thank you so much, Deb. Thank you. I appreciate you walking us through that. I just want to recap the information that Deb just walked us through. So again in terms of the online claimant portal again this presentation was specific to regular unemployment insurance claimants or those on extended benefits through parts of the federal cares act. I did see some questions in the chat about Pua. We will be having some specific set we will have a specific session on Pua for later this week. So I would encourage anybody asking questions about self employer freelancers or general contractors anybody on Pua to attend that later on but just to recap again for those of you who will be filing and reporting your work search next week. You know just as you do on a normal week when you're filing online I know a lot of you have been filing over the phone will get to those questions in just a minute. But you will be file submitting this online. So logging into the claimant portal through the website. You'll first be asking your circumstances so a lot of those yes no questions again I have seen some specific circumstances in the chat. I think what we've talked about before really is for you to self assess and self attest as to whether or not your specific circumstances are specific to COVID. And if your circumstances have your circumstances have been impacted as a result of the pandemic and COVID as a whole. So just answering those yes or no questions not asking you to provide any detail really at this time as a part of the answering of the questions process. So just answering those five questions for those COVID exceptions as Deb said you can answer yes or no to any or all of those. And then once you've worked through those five questions depending on your answers. If you're exempt you won't have to provide information on your job contacts you'll move on to the eligibility questions as you normally would. If you were not exempt from work search you'll be asked to provide the information on each of your three job contacts. So again after you've submitted your job contacts moving through to answer your eligibility questions and confirming your weekly filing. So Deb just wanted to give you an opportunity to add anything to that just providing an overview and a recap of that process for folks that that may hit. So if you have anything to add definitely would encourage you if I missed anything. Sure, sure. One other thing I did not speak to earlier is that to better prepare yourself for filing each week. It's a good idea to make sure that you've gathered all of this information together before you actually start the process of filing the actual weekly claim. There is a timeout for each page. It's it's quite lengthy. It's 30 minutes for each page. So that is quite a long time. But it is possible if you start the process of entering information and then step away to go find information or a phone number. It's possible to time out when you're filing and then you would basically have to start all over the system will not save your information midstream. So it's a good idea to be jotting down this place this information in one place and keeping it for later reference. Another criteria for work search and work search information is work search validation, which the department does do randomly as a requirement under both federal and state unemployment insurance law. At this time we will not be doing that immediately, but that will change in the future. So it's very important to be keeping your weekly work search information somewhere where you can obtain it rather easily in the event you are later asked to validate your work search information to the department. On our website under the claimant forms section. There is a work search form that you can easily download and print if you have that capability. If not anything a notebook a notepad just something to be capturing and keeping this information handy if you needed to provide it in the future. And this may come up in chat questions or may have already been posed but for individuals without a computer. Keep in mind that most libraries and your communities are open for some limited hours at least and most of them have a computer. So that is a good resource. If you are now going to be required to file a work search and you're struggling with a computer. You could also potentially reach out to your local town clerk and they may have more information about resources in your community or things like computer access and Internet. So just a couple of things I wanted to throw out there. That's great. Thank you so much. So I don't want to pivot over to questions before we do that. I just want to remind folks that today's presentation has been reported. I know we've gone through a lot of information in only about 20 minutes. So appreciate you all bearing with us and we'll do our best to answer as many questions today as we can. For those of you who want to go back and review, feel free to search the Vermont Department of Labor on YouTube or go to our website at labor dot Vermont dot gov. You can subscribe to our channel on YouTube. You can go to our website and also just click on the specific links. We should have this reporting up before the before the end of the day today. Just as a reminder, this this process is not anything that you have to worry about for this week, which is because we talked today specifically about the reporting of work search. This week is really about the actual work search activity. So Deb, I just going to go down through the questions again just for those of you who are going through and typing your questions into the chat. I'm trying to add them in as we go through. But if you see a question in the chat, I would encourage you to go back through and like the questions because that's how the most liked questions is kind of the process for how we'll go through the questions for Deb today. So Deb, the first question is from Sarah and I think you actually talked to this, but I think it's a good point to reinforce when applying for position online, whether it be through indeed Glassdoor. I know Vermont job link as well as the requirement for unemployment insurance claimants. Who do you enter as a contact person when entering work search activity? Most online applications don't provide a contact name. So I know you actually talked about this, but I think it's, as I said, a good point to reinforce. Yes, yes. Thank you very much for the question, Sarah. When using one of the example websites that you provided in your question, if there is not a specific recruitment number or alphanumeric identifier for that particular posting that you can reference. The best thing to do is just reference the name of the site or that particular job search engine that you are using. So if it was through indeed.com, you can just put indeed.com in that field as the contact person. Great. Let's see here. Noah asks, I've been hired for position, but it does not start until September. Do I still need to show weekly job search progress? Deb, I know Cameron has talked to this in some of our previous sessions in terms of the return to work date.  As I mentioned, it can have spoken to in previous sessions. I believe it was 10 weeks from your initial, initial claim.  I don't know, Deb, if you have anything to add in terms of Noah's question, or we can certainly refer him back to some of our previous sessions as well. I think this question, and thank you for that question, Noah, may require a little bit more clarification internally. That is correct that the 10, the 10 week waiver begins from the date of the initial claim filing. But with the across the board exemption of work search having been in place for such a long time, what we need to verify is is there going to be a starting date from which we will start to pick up the 10 week going forward. And that is something that I'm not sure of at this time, so we would need to get some more information on that. But that being the case, with the question still a little bit up in the air, Noah, the answer would be yes. You would still need to be conducting a work search if you wish to continue to file up until the start date of your new position. And if that ends up to not be the case, your claim information would be updated and you would then be exempted going forward. So if you are able to send us a little bit more information, we can do some research and provide some better clarity on your question. Yeah, I do just want to add that we are just right up here. We are having a couple more sessions like our previous work search town halls starting tomorrow for work search exemptions, part-time employees and suitable work. So that's tomorrow at 1230. And then we also have a work search town hall specific to PUA claimants on Wednesday for those who may be impacted. Deb, I do want to pivot. I have seen a lot of questions in the chat popping up about claimants who have not been over the last few weeks, months, what have you, to actually file online for whatever reason. And they've been, whether it's calling our claimant assistant center or filing through the, I believe it's the IVR, but the automatic assistance line. I just didn't know if you could provide. I know we are telling people that and we are letting everyone know that they will be able to file online, you know, because that will be part of the requirement to submit their work search information online. So just didn't know if you could address those questions have not necessarily one of the most liked questions, but have seen that kind of popping up as we've been talking today. So just wanted to address that for folks. Yes, yes. With the work search requirement now back in place as of the ninth information must be entered through the online portal as there, there is not a mechanism through the automated telephone system to provide that information. So that's why many folks will see the requirement for them to switch the method in which they've been filing from calling in each week to actually migrating themselves to the online claimant portal. And again, that's due to functionality. There's no mechanism for the phone to intake any sort of work search information. Great. I do want to just let folks know too that we are focusing today on more of the step by step process for entering a work search. So those of you asking questions about, you know, do I have to take a specific job or, you know, relating on salary or, you know, the type of work that's available, I would encourage you to check out our past sessions. The recordings are on our website as well as tomorrow's session will where we'll be getting a little bit more into that, you know, whether it's return to work dates or whatnot. So just kind of looking through again, you know, Deb, I think there's still a lot of questions that I've seen about Matt asks when I've applied or sent in a resume online many times a contact phone number isn't listed. So what should we do in respect to unemployment filing. So again, going back to those just going to scroll back up to the information that we're asking for. Yeah, I know you mentioned if a contact person's name isn't available, but what would be your suggestion whether if it's an email address or a phone number. What's your best suggestion for individuals who may not just have a complete. What's your best list of all the information that's available if they if they if they're applying online. Okay, let's see. So, not having a phone number listed is not all that unusual. We do tend to see that sometimes for the indeed.com type of work search engines that are out there. So once of any phone number, what individuals can do is put all nines in the phone number field. And that would be, for example, 999 dash 999 dash 999 999. So that's a workaround if there isn't isn't any telephone number listed. And because that is a required field, that's that's a workaround that you can use to have information in that field so you can proceed to the next page. Great. Just kind of looking through some of the other questions I think they're more about what can count as a valid work search and I know Cam Cameron has talked this in the past. I was asking can today's town hall or can other webinars that the department puts on even specific on workforce development or virtual job fairs count as a work search contact. I know that Cameron has talked to this in the past that they that none of those things can actually count as a work search contact as it actually needs to be the application of a specific specific job. Yeah, but I don't know if you have anything to add other analysis. I'll just finish by saying that a lot of those specific questions are on our website and there's circumstances that you can look to on our website about what actually classifies as a valid work search job contact. So I'm not sure if you have anything to add to that or if you want to just kind of move through to some of the next questions. I can just speak to that really quickly. What I did this morning was to print off the work search information from our webpage. And I'll just quickly hit specifically the information that's listed under the section of what is an acceptable job contact. And this says that you can satisfy the work search requirement by providing information in the work search section of the online weekly claim that includes any of the following. So this would be submitting an application for a job or jobs that you are reasonably qualified for. Contacting your former employer to inquire if they can bring you back to work at this point or contacting an employer by telephone in person or email with a formal request for hire. And so I'm no worries on trying to remember all that. As I said, I've actually taken this specific information right from the Department of Labor's website on the specifically our work search information page. Great. Thank you for doing that. That's very helpful. Just continuing to go through some of the questions. Let's see here. I'm just kind of going through a couple questions. One from Deb and one from another viewer for today about work search that they may have completed, you know, what about, you know, whether it's applying for a job in previous weeks. So before May 9th. So for the first work search may I use applications completed from the past three weeks. Deb poses a scenario where she applied for a job last week and waits and is waiting to hear back from the organization. You know, I know that you just went through what counts Deb actually goes into having an interview and whether it's this week or next week. You know, in terms of you just went through what actually counts as a job job contact. But I know that the job contacts actually have to take place. I believe during like this specific week. Correct. So, you know, you're voting next week for, you know, think the activities that you did this week. So I'll let you go ahead and explain that. Right. Yes, that's absolutely correct. Kyle. And that is a great question, Deb. But the work search must be conducted in the active claim week that you later file for. So as Kyle just said that would mean that you would be conducting work search activities for the week we are currently in the 9th through the 15th and then you would report three of those contacts when you go to file your weekly claim. So yes, unfortunately, we can't go backwards on those. Thank you. Let's see here. I lost my spot. Just in terms of entering jobs. Is there any information that folks would need to know if they're applying for a job? Let's say they live for jobs in another state. So, you know, if there's any specific information, if they're applying, if they live in Vermont, but close to one of our bordering states, if they're applying for a job in Massachusetts or New Hampshire or New York. You know, this individual is asking, can we do that? But, you know, is there any information that they would need to provide if they're doing that? Anything specific? That's a wonderful question. And no, there is not anything more specific that we would need and to expand on that a little bit. It is in fact okay to look for work out of the state of Vermont. It's not uncommon for individuals to find a position and completely relocate clear across the country. So if you are in that particular situation where you are looking to actually relocate out of the state as part of your work search activities, that's absolutely fine. There's no restriction on residency as it pertains to your work search activities. Great. And then the question, same kind of thing about federal jobs. So it looks like the question is what about federal jobs? There's not usually an email or phone number to contact because they're already on USAJobs. Is it pretty much the same process if an email or phone number wasn't provided? Yeah. A job on indeed. Okay. Yeah, that's correct. Let's see. Just again, as you're looking through the chat, please feel free to look through questions that have already been asked. We're going to try to get through as many as we can. For those questions that we don't get through, I would encourage you to check out our past sessions. I've seen a lot of questions on part-time jobs and how that works. Deb, I'm not sure if you have anything to add on part-time jobs and how to enter that as a whole. I know that can count as one of your weekly contacts. Those that are on part-time work, I believe still do have to submit for three contacts each week, but your part-time job can count for one of your three. Am I correct in any of that? Or did you want to add to anything on part-time for those that are working part-time? That's absolutely correct, yes. So the requirement is still three total work search contacts, but the part-time employer is counted as one. That information would be entered and then just the two additional contacts for the week. Deb, just for those that are wondering, I have a question about what is actually considered to be part-time? Just in terms of the number of hours in a given week. I'll let you address that just again. What is actually considered to be part-time work from our perspective when you're actually entering it in terms of unemployment? Traditionally, we tend to think of part-time as around 20 to 25 hours, but essentially, if an individual is working less than 35 hours in any given week, then under unemployment insurance program rules that individual would be considered underemployed and would be still potentially eligible for benefits. So there isn't really a specific legal definition necessarily. Just that if you are working less than 35 hours, you can still potentially receive a partial benefit for the claim week that you're filing for. Yes, thank you. Sorry, I'm coughing and didn't want to put that on the audio. And so there was a question about part-time work and how many hours in order to still receive the federal $300 benefit. That $300 benefit in debt, please feel free to correct me. I believe is if you receive $1 of unemployment insurance benefits from the state, you do still get that extra $300 as a part of the benefits coming from the federal government through the federal pandemic unemployment compensation of PUC. So again, if you're receiving any benefits from the state, you would still be, in theory, obviously all other eligibility questions, concern, if they answer all your other eligibility questions, you would still be able to receive that extra $300. That's right. Correct. Great. Let's see. And Deb, I think we have about 15, 21 minutes here. So just wanted to try to get to a few more questions before we wrap for today. Just kind of looking through. Let's see here. Just some continued questions about the online portal being fixed so we can file. I've had trouble for my past few weeks of not accepting my PIN, and that had to call. Again, just, you know, I think you've talked about that already, but I know our teams are working on getting some of that fixed. And I know also that it is very much dependent on individual claimants and their circumstances as well. Correct. Correct. Any problems experienced with the online filing itself, you know, if you are attempting to enter information and it's just not working, individuals can still, of course, speak to an agent by phone to try and troubleshoot what might be going on. One tool that the department has on its side is a test filing portal. And we use that in concert when speaking with folks by phone to try and help walk them through what's happening. And oftentimes it could be a formatting issue with a text field or some other thing that is actually tends to be minor. But we have the ability to publish you certain filing problems. And if we do, however, encounter a situation where the portal does not seem to be working, then we can still take claim information and you will still be required to provide your work search information to the department. But we, you know, certainly will approach things on a case by case basis if there are actual filing problems. Great. Thank you. I do just want to encourage folks again just reminding you that today's presentation has been recorded. We have the link up for YouTube channel. It will be up directly on YouTube as well as on our website. I do just want to encourage people as well to check out our website again for continued information that will be updating. I know as well we're going to be sending emails directly to claimants as well. Again, today's presentation really is about the specifics that information you'll need to know when you are submitting for a work search. Again, happy to to look into, you know, some of the other things as we go into some of the other sessions. Deb do have a question here. We've actually talked a lot about indeed and Vermont job link and the other sites that are more of those third party sites. Again, just want to remind folks that Vermont job link is a requirement for unemployment insurance claimants. You do need to have an account in order to be eligible to receive benefits. There's links on how to create an account on our website. So please feel free to check that out. We've also actually uploaded a video to our YouTube channel as well on how to create an account for a job seeker. But Deb actually had a question. What if you apply directly on a company's website, so applying directly through the company, you know, presumably a lot of the information would be directly on the website. But if you can't find a contact person would presume you would presume that you would kind of do something similar to what you do with indeed where you enter the scroll back up to the questions. But just if you want to talk through if you're applying directly to a company through their website. Yes, absolutely. So in the scenario where you're applying to a company's online application portal directly and there isn't a specific name or anything like that provided. You can repeat. You could repeat the name of the company. So, for example, person contacted. You could put IBM and then under address, you know, you could put the address information there. In some situations you may actually have to Google some of the information or search for a few bits of the contact information through the internet. But any anything that is simply not provided. It's always good to point back to the source, the source name of the company or the job search engine that you use to apply for the position. And again the one specific workaround for the phone number information if that's not available is to use all nines for that field. And the email address that is the one field that is not a mandatory field. So if you don't have an email address for the company or a specific person. That's OK. We always like to see that information when it is available. But the email address is not a required field, but everything else is awesome. I have a question here referencing return to work dates and actually where to enter that on the claimant portal. I know it's we don't have a screenshot for that today. But I guess, Deb, if you do have a return to work date that your employer has told you that you'd be able to return to work, whether it's on a part-time or full-time basis. I know you enter that through the claimant portal, but are you able to talk through kind of just where and how to do that? The return to work date information is actually provided and or updated by the employer. And so if a return to work date is now available or has changed, whether it's been pushed out or pushed back to an earlier date, the employer can actually go on the department's website. There is a specific section for the employer community to enter that information themselves through a self-service function. And then that information is then attached to the claim. So it's really the responsibility of the employer to get us that information and not the burden of the claimant. Excellent. Yeah, and so I think it's really just reaching back out to your employer to let the department know that they have had your return to work date has been adjusted, I would assume. Let's see. Certainly, let's just see here. Just trying to go through some of the questions. Do you have a question? Did you say you have to use Vermont Job Link as their sole search engine? As we talked about today, Vermont Job Link is a requirement for unemployment insurance claimants, but you do not need to use solely Vermont Job Link to do your work search. You can apply through Indeed or Monster or any of the other questions as well. Deb, I am just going to scroll back up because I'm kind of getting into some of the questions about specific circumstances, just as a reminder for folks in our last five or 10 minutes here before we wrap up about the COVID exemption questions. I don't know if we just kind of want to walk back through these in our last five or 10 minutes. Again, we are asking these five questions will be asked starting next week as you are reporting your work search. So again, maybe we can just take these last five or so minutes to just kind of go over, just remind folks of what these questions are. I'll give them kind of quickly at the beginning. So just maybe we can just kind of read back through these for those who may have joined late or may have missed one of the questions. So we'll just have you kind of read through the questions and we can talk about a little bit more of kind of what they'll have to do as they're entering their weekly filings. Okay, that sounds great. So the exemption questions are as follows. And again, these questions are yes, no questions and one or possibly all of them could apply to individuals who are filing. So the first question is, have you been instructed by a health care provider to quarantine due to COVID-19? Another question is, have you been instructed by a health care provider to not return to work because you have a serious health condition and returning to work at this time poses a significant health risk due to COVID-19? The next question is, are you the primary caregiver for a child whose child care is unavailable as a direct result of COVID-19? The next question is, are you the primary caregiver for a child who is attending virtual or remote school as a direct result of COVID-19? And then the last question under the exemption questions is, are you caring for a family member who has been instructed by a health care provider to quarantine due to COVID-19? So any one of those or some possibly all of those could be at play in your situation. Now at this time, as we are just starting to roll out both the work search and working through the exemptions, we are not asking for proof of these situations at this time, but that would likely change at some point in the future. So just be keeping that in mind that you may be asked to provide some type of information that verifies one or more of these exemption scenarios. Great. Thank you, Deb. I did see one question that I wanted to address really quick because it was on the type of work field. Actually in here in the the weekly filing and the information they'd have to provide a question was simply can you explain the type of work field would presume individuals just looking for what type of information they would need to put in that field. Oh, absolutely. So for instance, if your job contact was for office work, administrative work, you could put administrative if you are in the construction field or a carpenter or do painting or those sorts of things. But you could simply put painting, carpentry, labor basically just one or two, maybe three descriptors to just give an idea of the type of work that was applied for. Great. So just want to, as we kind of wind down here in the last few minutes, just want to remind folks that today's presentation was recorded. You'll be able to access that through the department's YouTube channel, as well as on our website. We'll also be coming out with more information as the claimant portal is updated with whether it's questions or fine tuning in coming week so we may even have a step by step just how to enter for with each screen. You know, coming soon, but want to at least provide you with the information that you would need to have when entering your work search starting next week as well as what information to keep track of as you are conducting your work search activities really starting yesterday today and until until Friday. So again, a lot more information to come on this specifically and as a work search as a whole again would encourage you to check out our website at labor.vermont.gov. You can click on any of the work search links that are on our website, including tomorrow's virtual town hall session. Work search exemptions, part time employees and suitable work. I had seen a couple questions about explaining, you know, what it is specifically that, you know, suitable work is today and I think we'll really be getting into that, you know, you know, what it is that you're qualified for and salary and all of those types of things. And how even our workforce development division can assist with that as you are kind of going through your work search, your job search and even the re employment process as a whole. So just again as a reminder tomorrow at 1230 tomorrow is Tuesday, May 11 at 1230. We'll be going through that with Cameron Wood, our director of unemployment insurance. And then on Wednesday, like I said earlier, I did see a lot of questions about freelance work and those claimants who are on DUA.  Yeah, I know that information is ever changing. So I appreciate you all for attending today's session. As I said, more information can be found on our website. Please would encourage you to attend future sessions. And Deb, thank you so much for walking us through. Definitely very helpful to kind of go through the information, especially for those who may not have done it before or certainly it's been a while since they've done it. So Deb, thank you so much for taking the time this morning. Thank you. It was a pleasure. I'm very happy for the participation from everyone today. Great. Well, again, thank you everybody so much. Please feel free to reach out or check our website for continued updates on work search. And with that, I hope you have a great rest of your day and a great rest of your week.


Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, no one cares. No one cares. I hope they lose the first round He's such a child Hey, we're back to the direction. I work with a child Well, and you can follow me on Instagram twitter for more juicy content So please remember to subscribe to give me a like button hit it.  That's incorrect. Yes, you do No, I do not it's hysterical how much you guys wish you were us. We've won the World Series more recently than you have suck it And so today we got you finish your recent recently Yeah, let's talk about the most recent thing you're at home Oh, really when was when was from the regular season and where are the Yankees? When was your last World Series? Recently when was your last World Series exactly you're talking about what when was your last World Series what counts more Recently we got a new suck and we're great. Nope. We got a new trailer. It's a Hindi film with Katrina Kaif. Yay And Zaddy shawty time gotta love me some Zaddy shroffed Phone boot so phone ghost I guess your ghost. Yeah ghost phone ghost phone. There's a ghost on the phone ghost phone I think it's a One of like the Like kind of like Stree in terms of like it's a comedy horror family film kind of thing, right?  I get Hormedy. Hey Who doesn't very few except me Here we go I was making me. It's a sign. Oh, I'm not over ninja busters I'll talk about a name I say or a fan's home. I would go to the beach out there Emcee ship I'm a business idea. Okay, sir business idea Welcome to phone booth Go Spudger's reference. They just patrol. We'll have to do something about this costume. Sell it on Goal X? No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! I know I get it you guys don't we guys don't celebrate but really you should you like yeah It's a great holiday, and you have an American Americans watch at least in our eyes right watch Stuff in and if they're in America, they know it's Halloween time. Yeah, why not really just a week earlier every week early I don't understand that like it's a perfect feel for how it really is it could be a lot of fun or just terrible There's no middle ground. No. No, it looks like it could just be none of these jokes are gonna land, right? Or this is gonna be a lot of fun and like kind of like Stree. Yeah, even more quirky than Stree though Quirkier. This is like I think this is Dumb and Dumber meets Ghostbusters, right? Yeah.  I do appreciate The fact that they are doing Films like this in India. Yeah, I feel like they're just there It's I've talked about it a lot on Twitter and stuff like it's just not a genre that India has Really tried to do well, and this is this specific this kind of style is comedy There's a little bit of horror, but there's mostly there's a lot of family comedy in there as well Right as opposed to going strict slash or horror or stuff like that and I think we'll get there I think we'll get to the place where there's more They're gonna they're gonna keep doing this obviously, but I think we'll get to a place where there's more legit horror made Because it's having a pet don't bad. You got yes bull bull Yes, which are probably two of the better ones and when you have the popularity So much happening that can now be streamed. Yeah, and people are watching like The Dahmer show is getting a lot of popularity Flanagan's new show midnight club is getting a lot of popularity as did Hill House and Bly Manor and then you've got like when smile comes streaming everybody's gonna watch smile So because of its popularity and it won't surprise me if they test the grounds streaming first They'll do some stuff on streaming. Well, that was I think Bull bull was was it just a Netflix release. Yeah, yeah, so it's it's a huge genre here Because it's so inexpensive to make and because especially around Halloween Halloween is The second biggest holiday here aside from Christmas and Christmas is a freaking juggernaut. Yeah, but Halloween is like Adored by everybody here.  Oh, yeah It's cuz it's like and it was talked about like Harry Potter Harry Potter. They did it with the never Narnia Da Vinci code even though Narnia had witches. Yeah, no no Narnia was celebrated You know why cuz I was a Christian author even though Lord of the Rings was also a Christian author, but That's you know why you know why it's dumb cuz it's dumb There's no logic at all. Absolutely. You know what it made me want to do turn on hocus-pocus to loud like on multiple televisions Oh, we watched it. It was good. Isn't it? It was fun. Yeah That's what Lexa said. She said it's a lot of fun if don't expect the first one's a child's film, right? So expect the child's film right it's it was enjoyable Yeah, and I've read the reviews that it's like if you liked hocus-pocus, you'll like it's fun Yeah, but yeah, I do like that. They're doing so though the songs look like they'd be really cool Yeah, is it T-Series though and who was that it wasn't Shafali Shah, but we know her Do it yeah playing what I'm guessing is a witch or a monster or a ghost or something they broke her feet backwards They did. Oh, man That was a good sound. Oh great sound effect on the ankle breaking But we know that actress for sure is it sorry Yep Yeah, oh, yeah, we know her from a lot of things sheba Say that up sheba Chaddha Yeah, and we've seen her in a bunch of things as has obviously yeah MC share MC share Which a thing to be a lot of fun. I thought Katrina Kaif looked really cool. Yeah, she looked really good I'm hoping that it's gonna be a fun film like similar to Street, right? Look at the runtime.  I thought it said it was going to theaters theaters November 4th. Excel. Yeah, it looks like it Yeah, I hope it does well.  Anyways, let us know what you thought about it and what should be the next Kind of spooky kind of movie we should watch want to get to some before October is done Let us know because I know there's one that I think that's why the all the things are called like boot Yeah, there's a film called boot, which I believe it was early 2000s with the Jade the Devgun and it's about the ghost is just speaking of that. Hey, babe What is ghost in Bengali? It's the same as any boot. Okay. Have you seen boot a Jade Devgun back in the day? I think it's like an early 2000s film. Yeah Anyways, let us know what you thought about this one down below


And I see now we're trying to figure out how to give Mexico some food, and I saw in one of the briefing papers that she wanted water, and we might not be able to give her water, but we could give her food. I don't know if I want to be given away, but I damn sure have some things on my Santa Claus list and coordinate them. And then when I did some, I might make them got to have a quick broquel. That's what we did. I think you turned a flap flop in Mexico. I think you've got them to where instead of confiscating everything now, they're trying to promote private enterprise, aren't they? That's our hope, and they're drifting in that direction. We don't have a lot of problems. We have to stay with this thing day by day, but I'm not pessimistic about Mexico. We've got a good situation coming in. What other places in the atmosphere have you got problem? Argentina, Brazil? There's atmospheres in worse shape than I've seen in 20 years. We've got problems in Bolivia right now. The cabinet posth is the only man there that can hold things together, and his whole cabinet is splintering in all directions because they want to be present four years from now. Can we get in there and do something to happen before it goes to hell? We're working on that this morning, and we're coming up with some ideas on that. We've got a possible revolt in the military against the military fellow in Honduras. We've got Peru and Argentina about to expropriate all properties. Brazil is sick. New Light is irresponsible. Everywhere we look we have problems, but I'm sort of optimistic. I think what we did in Panama and Guantanamo is going to help us a lot in the atmosphere. We need time. Why don't you try to settle these New York Times on the problem that you need help and that this thing you pick up pretty sick, and that you can't do it by just being a floor mop, and you've got to have loose tea on your spine. If you don't, they'll shove you to death. They'll be like a country dog. And see if you can't get to Washington Post, New York Times, quick to taking the line they are. I'm going to try it, but those fellows are basically hostile to everything you believe in, Mr. President. Okay. The guys that write the stories are, you know, I had lunch over with the whole staff at Washington Post and made, in essence, the same pitch. And I was told later that Mrs. Graham, after the line, said that they ought to give us time to see what we could do. But what you have is a half a dozen, very far left-wing guys like Kirsten.  They don't know anything about Latin America. They don't speak the language. They've never been there, but they're full of berries. And these guys are crusaders. And how you deal with a crusader is having the toughest problems of all. But I didn't want to have to work on Mrs. Graham. Mrs. Graham, I don't have any authority. She won't exercise it. She claims she's the best friend I've got, and they murder me every day. That's friendly, runs that paper. Let me talk to Manny and see if we can't block them. I'll get together and see who the most effective that we can. I think you ought to lay the ground over it and say that now we need some help on American policy.  But we should try to help us a little. All right. Okay.


Going on everyone Sam here with late in sports cars from a 23 Panini flawless collegiate football hobby two box case number four random team Stop Look again at your random results. I can always find these on the website under the results tab as well as the link in chat Nicole L with the Titans Eric P with the Eagles up top scroll down to Victor J with the Cardinals and Wayne P with the Packers So good luck here everybody Let's do it. So any um Any rookie or vet will go with their current team anybody retired will go to longest tenure and Any guys still in college Will go as a random to all at the end. I believe Williams viewers and arch manning are all in this Yeah, why are these all like this odd These last two cases have been just like this All right empty go in it to the jacks take big feet That's Jacksonville nine of 25 two-color patch Followed by 20 to 25 for the Ravens is a flowers three color and one color actually two colors a little bit of uh Gold down there as well 15 of 25 going to Seattle's x Charbonne Congrats on that one there Seahawks Congrats, yeah, so we'll be going to the bangles nine of 20 chase brown That's on that cincy 14 of 15 kendre miller Congrats on that three-card patch ought to go on the saints That's saints That's pretty cool. That's really cool Going to the patriots by way of longest tenure 12 of 20 Rob Gronkowski on the campus legends I'm sure he was a campus legend. Oh there's a knucklehead Yeah, and four of 15 going to the lions is going to be a hendon hooker Rocky top. Congrats on that one There you go lions very nice Detroit about three autos in the outer we'll take it one of five or no three of five Bijon Robinson Going to the falcons that they must have messed up on this one Bijon Robinson going to Atlanta Congrats on that we've got Seven of 15 Jordan Addison going to the Minnesota Vikings That's a good one too. Very good one Bijon the net let's go and take a look at the last one really it's gonna be a random two all at the end Two five two of five Caleb Williams On the jersey auto congrats on that one. That's pretty fire too. That's awesome good stuff there. Good luck to everybody on that as well Looks like a little bit of a chip on that I'm gonna send an empty box and wrapper to whoever wins this one Because I don't think that's supposed to be there those two white marks because they're not uniform actually maybe I don't know if they are I can't tell in the lone star because it doesn't it doesn't look like It's not symmetrical. That's what I'm saying I'm gonna send it just to be safe. I don't know if that's supposed to be an outline or it's just like part of the inside of the star That'll go with the um Bijon, you know what I'm saying. Yeah, that's just that it's off Off-center. So again, that is empty Everything out of this empty empty And empty Yeah, I evidently chimney interns last day back in the briefcase for sure. I was packing something else Oh, yeah, you know what I'm saying. Oh, yeah, I do To nerd fest up there.   It's tough to watch, dude 10 of 10, Nolan Smith going to the foul not the foul is the Eagles I think christian might be the biggest nerd of them all Probably I think he's into all that Well, he's got a crazy pc. That's what I heard. Yeah, he bolted an insane pc. Really? He showed me a picture of it Really nuts 21 to 25 that is going to be a koshan booty for the patriots. What is that? That's cool. No, it is actually it's like Legit it's like very legit. Yeah Um, is he I think he's yeah, talk the buck. I want to say this guy is Terrible Yeah, oh, yeah One of five Sean Tucker going to the buccaneers talk the buck Very nice very nice Your solid one here going to the Panthers. That's five of five Jonathan Mingo On the two-colored rpa that's on that one there Panthers got 13 of 20 Lawrence Taylor going to the Giants nice LT What an awful signature booty should not be paid. Yeah, man. I feel I'm with you spent on that. Yeah, it's wrong Lawrence Taylor And then going to the Lions four of 15 Jameer Gibbs Congrats on that Detroit Empty empty I'm glad they don't do this pose anymore That is like who that dude another Three we got six autos in the outer That is pretty awesome. Actually. Wow Uh 10 of 25 is Jameer Gibbs Congrats on that one there again Lions Jameer Gibbs Got hendon hooker two of five on the emerald. I'll get the uh authenticity guarantee Congrats on that one there again Detroit And then a Jordan Addison 13 or three of 15 going to the Vikings. Congrats, Minnesota Very nice very nice Chase with the double thumbs up All right. Got a quick uh random we got to do For that Caleb Williams Empty empty empty Just do it in there. I'm gonna throw all that out. Oh, that's okay. Yeah Excellent. Just write the name on that for me. Yeah, I'm gonna do names instead of teams so we know right off the bat who gets it Williams All right, gonna roll the dice whatever names on top after 10 times. We'll get the Caleb Williams. Good luck everybody one two three four five six seven eight nine and 10 going to James O James O getting the Caleb Williams to five Very nice. That'll do it for the break everybody. Thanks again for the fill coming up next is NT