616 ConnectWise RPA: AI Integration Mastery

00:08 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Hello friends, Uncle Marv here with another episode of the IT Business Podcast presented by our good friends over at NetAlly. This is our Wednesday live show. I am back. I took off last week as a hiatus, needed a little bit of rest because the weekend before I had to move one of my clients. The move itself wasn't very far, they only moved about a mile and a half down the road but there's a whole bunch of computers, a whole bunch of stuff I had to do with Windstream, AT&T, comcast and the office location is about an hour and a half from my location. So traveling up there we actually had to spend the night because we went up Friday afternoon to break down everything, set up the internet at the new location, pack everything up, had to rent a U-Haul on Saturday, move the client. Had to go back on Sunday clear out the old space, had to go back on Sunday clear out the old space and, of course, the week of aftercare, as for some reason things didn't leave some of them wandering aimlessly on a Wednesday night with nothing to do. Keith, I don't really believe that, because you probably spent the week with our good friend on the other show, the All Things MSP with Eric. I'm sure he keeps you entertained, but glad that you are back and glad that we are back. 

01:49
I've got some great announcements coming up later, but tonight we're going to get right into the show. I have with me Jeff Bishop, the chief product officer at ConnectWise. They had a couple of big announcements recently and I wanted to have somebody come on and chat about that. So let me bring on Jeff and get right into it. Jeff, how are you, sir? 

02:08 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Doing well. Thanks for having me on the show tonight. 

02:10 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Well, thank you for agreeing to come on. I know that you're busy but thank you for that. So you are the chief product officer there at ConnectWise and it's been busy, a busy time for you guys. 

02:26 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
It has. Yeah, I run the gambit on titles, I think. Currently I think my title actually is GM and now an EDP or something. But wait till tomorrow for there to be something different, so we'll see. 

02:39 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Well, OK, so if you do a Google search on you, you've got executive vice president and general manager of Unified Monitoring and Management and the ASIO platform at ConnectWise. Does that? 

02:53 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
sound even close. It's a mouthful. 

02:56 - Uncle Marv (Host)
It is. It is All right. So I guess it is a good place to start. We should probably start with Automation Nation, because that's the last big event and that's where a lot of the stuff we're going to talk about was announced. So for people that don't know what that is, give us a quick recap of what that is. 

03:19 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Well, automation Nation was one of the events that we had prior to COVID. Automation Nation was one of the events that we had prior to COVID. We had two primary events back then one that was very PSA and business centric and one that was very automation and back, if everybody remembers the name, lab Tech Lab Tech and Automate that's where we'd focus on automation and bring all the people in who had a passion around automation, scripting, robotics, workflows, automation, all that kind of great stuff. So we would have two separate events going into COVID. We sort of we kind of change things up a little bit and we started doing a cybersecurity event and we just couldn't get the hotels and get the locations back going for the Automation Nation until this year. 

04:02
So it was very appropriate timing as we started getting RPA and workflow and a few other automation tools out the door. We're like, look, we need to bring this back and start to cater to the audience a little bit more. And so Automation Nation was reborn in 2024. Well, instead of it being a one-time-a-year event, we're going to try to do it quarterly. So we did the first one here in Tampa, we'll do the second one at our, just prior to our IT nation secure event in June in Orlando, and then we'll get the Q3 and Q4 ones scheduled shortly. 

04:37 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right. So I've been to the IT nation I forget which one it is. 

04:42 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
So connect is it the no secure is no Secure is in November, secure is in November and Secure is in June. 

04:48 - Uncle Marv (Host)
So the Automation Nation now? Is that more geared towards ConnectWise partners, Because IT Nation is open to everybody, but is Automation Nation? Man, that's a mouthful. 

05:00 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
It is. It's a lot to say, I would currently say it definitely focuses or leans a little bit more into our product space or RMM, automate RPAs, workflows, sidekick our AI and hyper automation sort of vision there. But the goal is, as we continue to expand and become a little bit more attuned with the needs of our partners, we'll start to open things up and consider other automation products and services as well and go forward future. 

05:35 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right Now. A lot of these things were kind of hinted at when I was at IT Nation and I apologize, I'm not in the fold so I'm not always in the know but those were kind of hinted at with a lot of the AI. Of course, ai is huge right now in our industry. But let's dig in a little bit into RPA and let's first describe what that is and what that means for ConnectWise. 

06:06 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Yeah, we kind of hung the brand around the RPA, the robotic process automation concept. That seemed to really resonate and it's what our partners were kind of talking about as they thought about automation in general. Our solution that we've taken to market is a little bit more comprehensive in that, yes, we have bots. We have, you know, in the old days, even the old days but in most people's terminology they start thinking about bots. They're thinking PowerShell scripts or Python scripts. They're running with their RMM, they're running against servers or different machines. 

06:51
A lot of the bots for the robotic process automation is that it's things where you don't need a human in the loop. You can set these things up. They will perform repetitive tasks as needed. I love them. I think about them a lot, about the macros I used to build out in Excel when I'd load a file in it and just sort of run and everything would get cleaned up for me and then typically I would always break them somehow and I'd have to go back and refix them. 

07:11
But anyway, that's a lot about the robotics process, part of it. And then what we've also added on top of that is more of the true workflow automation. So those do require sometimes human in the loops where you're executing a workflow based off of a web hook from an application or some sort of an API that's triggering, or maybe a form that somebody fills out to kick off some larger business process automation that actually may include a bot as part of that process. So when we say RPA here at ConnectWise, we're talking about that workflow, we're talking about forms, we're talking about the bots and then how all those can kind of come together to create an overall sort of automation and time savings for our partners. 

07:58 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Right Now, you mentioned Sidekick earlier. So when I see RPA and Sidekick together, part of me thinks, okay, well, they sound awfully similar, but they're two separate products with two separate goals, right? 

08:14 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Yeah, sidekick for us is sort of that, similar to the way, like Microsoft, has taken Copilot to market. It's an overarching machine learning AI strategy, one that will be taken across all of our products and the platform as we progress. It's really got its jumping off point with RMM and Automate early on, where we started doing script editing and creation using AI, and then at IT Nation Connect we showed a lot of examples of how it could tie in into the PSA things like sentiment analysis on tickets or triaging tickets or summaries of notes for the tickets, or even responding to tickets that were coming in. We've then extended that into Microsoft Teams where we're allowing people to interface with that, to ask questions such as tell me about my day or my calendar, or help me get information on a ticket, or talk to me about the most profitable customers I have, or anything that you might want to ask or probe to learn a little bit about what's going on inside your PSA. And then all of the partners, all of the product lines and services, are starting to proliferate that out across their different areas. You're seeing some areas like documentation creation. You're seeing where the RMM is starting to look at device failures. You're looking at implementing it into the CRM and opportunities and leads aspects of the PSA. 

09:49
So every product, every team here is starting to pull AI and that'll come under the overall sidekick umbrella, no different than with RPA. 

09:58
As we start to implement AI machine learning into the RPA and the workflow product lines, we'll start to use it for everything, from creating a workflow Maybe you want to, hey, ai, help me figure out to create a workflow that does X, y and Z and it can start to pull in the pieces or suggest answers, and maybe it gets you 100% of the way, maybe it gets you 50% of the way, but either way, it's progressing along faster than doing everything manually. 

10:31
You can then start to utilize the AI and machine learning to kick things off so as tickets come in the door or new leads or new opportunities, you can imagine where AI can say no-transcript Microsoft and Gartner and others are using the term hyper automation where AI, machine learning, is coming into sort of augment and help out us humans and the companies. Help out us humans and the companies, but then when they need to execute something, they still typically are going to tie into a bot or a workflow or a script or something that is taking the intelligence there and then applying it into some sort of real world action. So they'd certainly go hand in hand, and you're seeing lots of great companies throughout the IT and MSP space start to really tap into this with some pretty creative ideas. 

11:48 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right, so you answered some of my questions already, because I was going to ask kind of the specific tools and tasks that solution providers can use, but you've kind of hit the gamut. It's more than handling tickets and stuff. It's going into opportunities in your CRM, it's helping people map out their day and stuff like that. So that all sounds pretty cool. My question, though, is I know that this has had to have been a long time in the making. So, instead of asking how it's going to benefit us as service providers, how much has service providers helped you with feedback in terms of letting you know hey, this is great, add this feature, remove this feature, that sort of thing. 

12:35 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
It's all day, every day. We've got a weekly webinar that we do, where we engage with partners and we start talking about what we're doing in both sidekick and hyper automation areas. That's progressively gotten more and more people. Since IT Nation I think. The last, I think the one they did last week, had a few hundred people at it. I don’t know exactly if the number was called three or four hundred that showed up and were giving feedback and giving us insights. We, each of the different product teams, have different forms or groups. So in our virtual community and some of the other communities around the MSP landscape where people are giving us feedback, we bring in pilot testers. 

13:17
So it's all day, every day. 

13:19
I mean, any software company will tell you that we all have what we think are great ideas, or company will tell you that we all have what we think are great ideas. 

13:29
But ultimately it comes down to our partners, our customers, telling us how they would implement these and really helping us refine those. Often we'll give them suggestions or kind of say, hey, how about these five things? But then when we start to offer up the first five, we'll get five more, 10 more on top of that that we had never even thought of. So, yeah, it's progressing very quickly and I think it's coming from a couple of things. It's coming from just the imagination of our partners and things that they're seeing, real world problems that we don't see every day because we don't walk into an MSP office or sit down at that desk day in, day out. And then I think again, you touch on some of the great companies around our industry and others that are constantly in the news talking about what they're doing, and I think everybody's taking some liberties to learn and imagine and build off of what they're seeing into their ideas within their own respective products and industries. 

14:26 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right. So for those of us outside of the ConnectWise sphere, in terms of looking at what you're doing, let me first ask the question of is this driving people to pay more attention to ConnectWise, to partner up and start looking at the tools a lot more? 

14:49 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Yeah, I think, it is getting us more attention. I think a lot of MSPs know who ConnectWise is. Some are with us; some are with some of our competitors. I think that the work that we're doing around AI and hyper automation in general is kind of showing that we are trying to be fast, that we are trying to be innovative, that we are trying to progress things along faster than maybe we have in the years past. So it is, I think, at least from that perspective, getting us a little, you know, some good feedback from our partners. 

15:25
Like it is, I think, at least from that perspective, getting us, um, a little you know, some good feedback from our partners. Like, hey, this is what we expect. Uh, we want to see, uh, you as a, as a vendor, as a partner that we work with, that you are innovating, you are moving quick, you are responsive, and that we're seeing not stuff that happens twice a year or quarterly or even monthly, but every couple of weeks, you know, starting to see new and innovative things hit the ground. So, yeah, I think, from that perspective, people are excited that we've got this and we're starting to move along pretty quickly with it All right. 

15:55 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Well, I ask that more personal because I mean, my day job is still to be a solution provider and you know I'm with a competitor and I'm watching across the way to see what you guys are doing and you know I'm on the periphery. You know Sean’s got me tied into the pitch at things, so that's okay, that's where I'm at there. 

16:16 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Oh, yeah, well, Sean’s great. Yeah, look, every, every product, every, every platform, every solution provider out there has something that they do really well and things that they don't, and it's our jobs to try to improve in those areas that we're not performing well and make them better, and hopefully we maintain our partner base, we make them happy and then hopefully we win some net new people over because of some of the cool things we're doing and I think RPA and Sidekick are certainly some of those cool things we're doing, along with ASIO and some of the new innovation we're doing in cybersecurity as well. 

16:53 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right, let me just go back a little bit and talk about you before this, because now you've been at ConnectWise nine years, right? 

17:05 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Yeah, nine years like two days ago actually, I think I saw my anniversary. A bunch of you sent me an anniversary note on LinkedIn, so I'm assuming it was in the last couple of days. 

17:16 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Yeah, yeah, so prior to there you were. Where were you at Screen Connect? 

17:22 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I was, yeah. So I started out with a small company called Elsinore Technologies back in probably 2009. Okay, and they had an MSP. It was part of their business and they started up a software division. They had an ITSM ITIL tool that got adopted by some pretty big companies early on and the team was looking at trying to build out net new products from the ground up. It was a and when I say team it was, we're talking about a pretty small group. It was like a couple of support guys, two engineers and, and I think the whole company was maybe six employees. 

18:05
We, we, we got in and we started analyzing a couple of different product ideas and then we kind of spun off. We built three or four and got a couple of them off the ground in POCs and got feedback. But Screen Connect was one of the very first ones. So kind of myself and one of the engineers sort of split it off initially, started building it up and getting feedback and get it going, and then we at that point started shutting down all the other product lines and brought the rest of the team into Screen Connect, and so the rest was history from there, from 2009 till 2015. And then, as I think about. I think we got to about eight or nine employees 10 employees at that point, and at that we just realized that we probably couldn't scale this completely on our own and ConnectWise came knocking on the door and we joined up forces with ConnectWise and Arnie Bellini back then and Matt Nachtrab who was running Lab Tech, and those whole teams and it's been a great story ever since. 

19:11 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Yeah, that's been good. So in your progression there, did you see yourself at this point now being in charge of all the AI integrations? 

19:23 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Well, it's certainly a split effort. 

19:26 - Uncle Marv (Host)
We're in a general manager model. 

19:28 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Now you make a split effort. We're in a general manager model now. So Amir who runs all the cybersecurity, jake who runs all of the BMS, the PSA and the Bright Gauge and CPQ, and then I look after the RMMs, ScreenConnect, all the ASIO platform and the RPA, and then so AI is certainly kind of spread across all three of us. The initial output was with RMM, the PSA, with Jake, has done a lot there, and now we're all sort of you know, kind of banding together. Actually, jake and I were in here in the office not more than a couple hours ago talking about what's the next steps and what are we going to show at Automation Nation in Orlando in gosh in about two months. So it's a team effort. 

20:16
Everything that we do here is, you know somebody has to be responsible for the day-to-day but you know, at the end of the day, it's all of us that are responsible. Going forward Right. 

20:25 - Uncle Marv (Host)
So I assume that that kind of follows this whole ASIO model. From what I understand ASIO is, at first it got presented as this kind of spoken hub wheel thing where everything ties into each other. So is that kind of how everything works? Because it sounds like RPA and Sidekick would just be a part of everything, because it's going to tie into the PSA, it's going to tie into the RMM, it's going to tie into the CRM. I mean, is that how it's all going to work? 

21:01 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Absolutely, I guess and I'm not the most articulate person there's definitely people who can voice this way better than I can articulate person there's definitely people who can voice this way better than I can. But ultimately, when you think about software companies and where a lot of us have evolved and grown over the years in around 2018, going into early 2019, we sat down and said how do we innovate, how do we grow as a company? And there was three paths. Really, we could just keep doing what we're doing with 20 different products. Everybody has their own dev teams, their own sales teams, their own support teams. They all have their own back ends, their own databases, and we use APIs and we hook everything together and hopefully, when we make a change here, we don't break 10 things over. Here we probably did more than we like. You're constantly syncing data back and forth and what that usually creates when you're syncing data is you're either duplicating things, you're overriding things and it's a lot of repetitive work, building out a lot of the same things 20 times across all these products without getting the real value to our partners, the MSPs, and none of the engineers like doing that. We don't like building the same thing over and over again and maintaining things and stuff. We'd rather innovate and grow. The other way to do it was to say, all right, we'll keep them all interconnected as best we can, and then we'll put a nice wrapper on top of it, a really pretty UI. You'll log into one spot. It'll feel like one product, one area that you're operating in. But on the back end they're all sort of interconnected, which still is a lot of technical debt. It's still a lot of maintenance work. To keep everything connected Still slows down that overall innovation. 

22:46
And then the next phase, which is a lot of the enterprise companies have done and gone to the Amazons and the Microsoft’s and the HubSpot’s and the ServiceNow’s and Salesforce and stuff, is to okay, we're just going to start off with almost a blank slate. Here's your architecture, here's your database and data layer. Here's your workflow and automation layer. Here's all the common services. Every software product has a UI. They all have user management and permissions and they typically have some sort of a ticketing service and a CRM and some sort of folder structures, and then they have their domain logic on top. So what we decided to do was just commonize all those. Instead of having six tickets, we'll have one ticketing service. Instead of having 20 user measurements, we'll have one, and then that allows us to maintain those for all the products to build upon and it allows us to really kind of grow and innovate faster. 

23:41
I provide that background and color. The reason we went in that direction was because we knew it was going to take us some time to get it built up, but as we did. We knew it was going to take us some time to get it built up, but, as we did, we knew it was going to allow us to really move way faster and to go forward. But what it also does for us is it allows us to put AI and hyper automation at a central layer that every product can take advantage of. Every software product has some type of workflow or automation inside of their systems. 

24:09
Almost everyone was Right, and we did, and everybody was toying with AI for years. It was just not always very good. It was the generative AI and the large language and what ChatGPT and everything has kind of helped kick off over the last 18 months or so has allowed all of us to really expand and grow way faster. So everybody was doing AI, but what it really now is we can put that at the heart of that ASIO platform, so that every net new service can tap into. 

24:41
Ai models can tap into the automation layer. They don't have to rebuild it or integrate into it. It's just part of their natural design as they build out the services. So yeah, it gives us a great jumping off point for sure. 

24:54 - Uncle Marv (Host)
So I was going to ask you if there was a period of time that kind of either accelerated or jumpstarted this and you know my two timeframes are COVID and the introduction of ChatGPT to the general public because it seems as though those were the two events that kind of got us to where we are now and some people that jumpstarted, some people that accelerated that you said some of those things were already in the works and kind of going and then boom, here we are. Any sense of how that affected ConnectWise and ASIO? 

25:35 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Yeah, the COVID one was interesting. We had kicked off; we'd gone through the acquisition and merging of Continuum and ConnectWise in late 2019 and had kicked off the ASIO project in early 2020 before COVID hit. So you know, timing wasn't great for us on that one, you know, to send everybody home and try to figure out how to build out a platform from scratch when nobody could visit and see each other. So it slowed us down, for sure. But it certainly opened up a lot of doors and allowed us to learn how to work remotely and find great talent all over the world, which was meaningful for us. I think the decision for us to go down the platform was the biggest one, which was right, before COVID. Covid certainly changed the way we worked, for sure. And then probably the two big moments for me lately has been the release of about a hundred different ASIO services that now all the products are starting to integrate with, to come together as one true platform as we go through 2024 into 2025. And yes, of course, the generative AI, the large language models are just really exciting. And yes, of course, the generative AI, the large language models, just really exciting. 

26:53
Around here. We talk about it all the time. It's going to change the game of how everything is done when we talk about. Here's how you have always developed software. Here's how you've always done UX and design. Here's how you should do. Here's the best practice. I think they're all out the window. In two or three years, the way we've always done these things is going to change, and change dramatically, and we have to quickly be able to evolve and adapt to that. I think it's true for software development and I think it's true for the MSPs as well. Like there's that, yes, it's going to change things, but it's going to open up so many new lines of business and opportunities of how MSPs can help SMBs take on and also adapt to all this new technology. It's exciting. These are the kind of game-changing moments in history that really define a generation. 

27:45 - Uncle Marv (Host)
So I've got a discussion happening with another future guest about the effect of AI on both solution providers and their clients. It easier for our clients to do a lot of their own stuff If they can go and tap into ChatGPT or something and show me how to code this, so I don't need my solution provider one thing. And then, of course, there's people that are saying, well, if we as solution providers get out ahead of this, we can provide those answers and those platforms for them so that they don't have to go looking for it. Are you having any of those types of discussions with your partners? 

28:35 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Almost every day, Almost every day. It reminds me still of going back as some of the major OEMs in the world, as they've evolved their pricing and their and their partner programs and stuff, and how the MSP safes looked at it and said, oh, you know, so many were like, man, this is it, this is, this is going to be the end of my business. And others were going no, this is going to allow me to, you know, to do this and this and this, and I'm going to become a CSP and I'm going to, you know, an MSP Plus. I don't need to keep Exchange servers online and pay for that. I'm going to move everything into the cloud and I'm going to start helping them with Azure and take on Amazon's new services and I'm going to help evolve all that and give them new capabilities. So I think it's stepping back and seeing the opportunities. I think it's stepping back and seeing the opportunities? 

29:29
Yes, are some of the same things that were as a space and a channel doing today going to change and maybe become less valuable in terms of the ROI for the SMBs? Probably. Are they going to get new challenges? Absolutely. I think about. We've got a huge team here of people who help us integrate our CRMs and our back end databases and our marketing tools and our sales tools, and now we're trying to adapt and adopt to different AI tools within our own technology stacks and in our own day to day. We're technologists and it's still challenging. 

30:12
Imagine a retail shop or a hospital or people who don't have like yours and the rest of the MSP spaces. You know technology chops and just the way you think through problems. They can't do what you can do. So it is, I think, an involvement of the lines of business, but I think it's going to happen quickly and I think it's going to be the MSPs who are keeping an eye on that and talking to their partners and working with their vendors of choice. Marv, you're with a competitor, so you should be talking to them about. Hey, I need you to do these things for me, because here's what I'm hearing from my SMBs and the same for us. We have to make sure that we're staying in very tight circles with you and MSPs like yourself, so that we're not missing the boat and we're giving you the tools that you need to make those quick reactions. 

31:00 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Well, that was going to be my next point is that, yes, doing that, because a lot of what you're doing is just simply automating the stuff for us, so helping us streamline our operations, become more efficient, but the next step is going to be educating us, so that we can educate our clients about the benefits of doing it this way. So that's kind of where I see things going, yeah. 

31:28 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I think most of us in the MSP space, from a software perspective, we've all we've operated under like, a lot of us worked in MSPs, a lot of us have been part of MSPs. 

31:40
A lot of us we talk and partner with MSPs on a daily basis. But I think what we also have to do is start to open up and broaden that 360 degree view and start to like what's happening with other software companies outside of our verticals. That's going to influence and impact the SMBs that we all support or that you support, that we help you support. That's going to create challenges or opportunities for them, and so that means really jumping out of just our vertical and thinking more broadly as to what's happening there. And that's areas that I think we can help with partnerships and relationships we have. But a lot of it is stuff that you have with your relationships with each of those technicians, each of those companies, that we need to be working hand in hand on what you're seeing so that we can advance our technology to help you with that, as Keith said in the chat there, I think, as with all tech, it is our job to keep customers focused on I'm assuming their core competency and help them make money. 

32:42 - Uncle Marv (Host)
We can help them use AI enhance their business. 

32:47 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Absolutely. That's the chops there. 

32:49 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Now I'm going to go back to another point that I think everyone says ASIO, ASIO, different. I think I've asked this before of somebody and they didn't know. Is there an official pronunciation there? 

33:06 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
is there, is it's with a Z, so it's ASIO, yeah, but so why not just make it a z instead of an? I don't look, this goes back to uh, the Asio is actually ties in with a genus of owl, so it kind of sticks with the brand and the logo and the company and who we are and um but, um. So but it is pronounced with a Z. So yes, phonetically it would probably have been a much easier path for us if we had done it that way All right Now. 

33:39 - Uncle Marv (Host)
We've talked about all the good, so of course somebody's got to ask the question. You know what are some of the challenges, considerations that we need to pay attention to as we go down this road. 

33:57 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Yeah, there's a lot of papers, there's a lot of studies and, I think, a lot of really smart people looking into this that I think, even 18, 24 months from today, we're going to come back around and we're going to go. Yeah, that was cute, but now here’s some of the real problems that we all have to really focus on. But these are really interesting problems that weren't even in our lexicon. As typically as technologists in this MSP world two years ago, you start talking about bias and hallucinations and making sure that if an MSP or your end clients are interfacing with tools that were alerting them that this was AI driven, so there has to be some sort of alerts or identification so that everybody understands are they dealing with data or information or knowledge that has been stored into a documentation service that is being surfaced? 

34:55
You know, Marv did you write this article and now all of the technicians are reading this. They know Marv wrote it. This is the gospel by Marv, right? Or was this generated based off of 10 different articles? You've written based off of 15 different support tickets that the AI engine has seen solved and it's given you what it thinks is the answer, which you know. That answer is based off of the information and the data that is given. So, like anything else, all of these AI models are as good as the initial data sources that they're feeding off of, and also as consistent as the interactions they're getting with the in our space. You know the developers or the MSPs or the end clients that are interfacing and providing learned behavior as we go. 

35:50
If, if everybody keeps clicking, saying no, this is the wrong answer even if it was the right answer, it's going to think it's the wrong answer. So these things learn and they become patterns over time. So it does come back to the data sets. So there's things like data privacy. Obviously that needs to come in. Everybody wants to take the data that they have and build out models to make sure that you have great jumping off points and the answers that are being provided are as accurate as possible. But the same warnings that we all have with ChatGPT. 

36:18
If you start feeding in like, hey, tell me how to improve this software code. Well, guess what? That code is now a part of some model out there in the world that everybody's going to see. So if you start saying, hey, this is my financial numbers for 2023, please tell me how to improve them Now, potentially the world has access to it. So the data privacy and security there has to be balanced, also allowing everybody to be able to take advantage of the technology. So that's probably point number one. Number two is keeping a close eye on these models as they progress and look for things where they're drifting out from optimal setups. 

36:57
We've all seen some of the things that have just been really bad, where the way an AI model reacted to people was offensive or just plain wrong, which caused major problems. So it is it is about us being software providers that we are keeping a close eye on this and we're putting in the controls to do that. And again, this isn't even in most teams lexicon two years ago, so a lot of us are playing catch up and trying to move really, really fast to get ahead of this. 

37:27
So those are some of the biggest ones that I see today. But again, if we were to go pull up an article right now from Harvard or any of the other Fortune magazines, you're going to see 15 things long with all these data. All these here's all the ethical considerations that every company needs to have, but, I think, making everybody aware where AI is being used, I think making sure that we focus on data privacy and things that aren't getting out, that shouldn't- and then making sure that these models stay in control and that they're providing the right answers or as close as possible, but definitely not giving things that are going to be misleading or cause real downstream problems. 

38:05
You're seeing healthcare implement some of this, and what if they were? Somebody was suggested a resolution to a healthcare problem. That was completely wrong. I mean, that's life or death Right now we're talking about. Maybe we gave them the wrong answer to how to handle a blue screen or a reboot problem, but some of these are going to get much beyond that and in their criticality to a business and or a human, yeah, it will be interesting and I don't envy the task you have ahead of you to guide us in this, but I'm thankful that there are people doing that and looking out for us and all of that. 

38:46 - Uncle Marv (Host)
So now, automation Nation, as we talked about it, am I correct? Is it in June? 

38:52 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
It is. It's right before our IT Nation Secure event in Orlando, so I don't remember the exact date off the top of my head, but it will be right before the IT Nation Secure. 

39:05 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Well, let's see here if I can quickly Google. It looks like I've got to put the glasses on here. 

39:14 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I should have had that readily available so it looks like June 3rd in Orlando, Florida. 

39:20 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Does that sound right? 

39:21 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
It sounds right, okay, yeah, June 3rd through 5th. So yeah, come on in and join us. Then is then the cyber security event is always a fun one, you know. Get about a thousand or so people in the facility, everybody coming in and kind of hanging out and talking about all things cyber and learning, learning from, uh, each other, as well as the vendors that are there. So, yeah, that's, that's the big event all right. 

39:49 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Well, I know that I have plans to be at the IT Nation Secure. I don't know what Lardo has me doing, but I'll be there. Well, if? 

39:59 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
you're hanging out with Sean Lardo. There's probably at least a bourbon and a cigar in place somewhere, and then a whole lot of talking to everybody. 

40:07 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right, so we shall see everybody there. Of course, my goal this year is to make many more conferences, as long as they're in the state of Florida. I will be doing very little travel. I'll actually talk about that in just a little bit, so as we wrap up with Jeff here. Jeff, thank you for coming on and chatting about this, and there was a whole press release of bullet points that I was going to kind of ask about, but you pretty much hit them all. 

40:35 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I think so. Yeah, the RPA is just. It keeps evolving. It's just. It's a really fun project. So if you haven't seen it in the last couple of months, there's just a ton of advancements out there. Come join us. You can hit one of our webinars in the virtual community or reach out to any member of the team that can walk you through it. But we've got custom actions now where you can create integrations into just about any product you want. We've got bots being introduced into the workflows. We've got custom triggers and forms rolling out over the next 30 to 60 days. So it's moving really, really fast. 

41:10 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right. Well, there you go, folks, jeff Bishop, chief product officer, and a very, very long title that we'll put somewhere at ConnectWise. Jeff, thanks for hanging out. 

41:24 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I like my old Screen Connect title. It was janitor, that was probably the most appropriate. 

41:29 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right, and I'm going to give you a minute to make your decision. I don't know if you've made it yet, but we're coming up on Florida man or random question. 

41:40 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Okay. Well, since I am in Florida, I think I have to do the Florida man one. So I'll give you my favorite Florida man story. 

41:46 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Okay, All right, well, before you do that, let me go ahead and give some love to our sponsors. All right, well, before you do that, let me go ahead and give some love to our sponsors. I have to thank NetAlly, the presenting sponsor of the IT Business Podcast, empowering IT professionals with innovative network testing tools trusted by the experts. And just so you know folks, I tell you I have a go bag of just my NetAlly tools the EtherScope, the CyberScope, the AirCheck. I found the power cord to my LinkRunner the other day, so that's there. I still have the LinkSprinter in my bag. It is a must. I use those tools almost every single day. 

42:27
Our live stream is sponsored by Computers Done Right, our good friends over in Venice, Florida. Reliable IT solutions built on expertise and integrity and trusted by businesses to keep their technology running smoothly day in and day out. And you've probably seen me drinking from the cup here. Our drink slash mug sponsor Super Ops, revolutionizing IT operations with intelligent automation to streamline your workflows, optimize your performance and stay ahead of the curve. The future of IT is here and it is now time for our Florida man, or random questions, segment, and that also is sponsored by our friends over at super ops. Jeff, you said, you got yourself a Florida man story. What, what could that be? 

43:29 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
This one hit my radar because of the. You know it's March madness. 

43:35
We're all into basketball. I don't know if you remember the game 21 basketball Lots of different names, Knockout or whatever. It may have been 21. So I hear about an individual being arrested in Florida for playing 21 in Walmart and my initial thought was, oh, they're in the back. They're in the back, you know, playing in one of the aisles, and it's probably some Instagram or TikTok person or something else. And it turned out to be nope. This is a new game of 21, where you try to see who can get in and out of the store with the most stuff without paying for it and get it out to the parking lot and get it into the car the fastest. So a whole new type of 21. 

44:27
And the individual was out in the parking lot explaining the game to the arresting officers for better part of five or six minutes. You can find the video online. It was quite like no, no, this is a fun game, Just laying it all out, talking about how much stuff they stole and put it into some random car. It was a great story. 

44:49 - Uncle Marv (Host)
It is a great story and the rest of that story, because that was one of the ones I was going to select. So the girl's name that got arrested, amber McCann, was the one that got caught doing it and as the police were doing their investigation, because she had already gone in with a cart, run out, got stopped as they were doing the investigation. She went back into the store to get more. 

45:19 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
You can't make this up. 

45:21 - Uncle Marv (Host)
It is Florida. 

45:23
So, I will have a link to that story because that was a good one. That was going to be my story, but this one I actually had to pick. It's going to be my story, but this one I actually had to pick the story actually, so it got dropped today into my feed and I actually need to ask for help from my good friend Josh Liberman in Albuquerque, new Mexico, because Florida man is taking his act on the road. So I wanted to say that police said that they stopped a Florida man from taking a 14-year-old Albuquerque boy to a furry convention in Las Vegas, Nevada, and I think the news people were quite beside themselves when they had to utter the words furry convention. So, according to an arrest warrant, police will charge 33-year-old Conrad Coovert with child abuse when they take him into custody. They don't have him yet, so I don't know how they stopped him without arresting him already, but he has faced allegations of being with an underage boy in the past. The current teenager is back with his mothers and that the arrest warrant was issued after the boy's mother dropped him off at the guitar center on Minal Street Wednesday evening and he planned on walking the short distance home less than two hours later, when the boy didn't come home, his mother tried to find him and ended up calling the police. 

47:07
And then there's a whole bunch of stories there, so I will have a link to that. So there are other Florida man stories in other states. Folks, we are coming. We are coming with the success of the Florida man games, put on the ballot the opportunity for Floridians to vote for the legalization of marijuana in the state of Florida. So that is on the ballot for this November. We need 60 percent of the people in Florida to approve that and I think when that happens, you're going to have some more Florida man stories. 

47:53 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I thought it was already legal. 

47:54 - Uncle Marv (Host)
You know Florida, we, it doesn't matter if it's legal Florida man didn't care about COVID. 

48:03 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I mean, that didn't happen. Nope, Most people think I'm joking when I talk about coming back from North Carolina down here in September and walking into a restaurant bar. And I just came back from North Carolina and I had the mask on and they're like what are you wearing a mask for? I was like okay, fine, no, thank you, I'm fine, it was good. 

48:28 - Uncle Marv (Host)
It is fun. Well, jeff, thank you very much. Thank you, obviously, for also sharing your Florida man story, and I need to give a little shout out to Holly of the Ink House for helping put this together. So I want to give credit where credit is due. I requested some stuff and Holly came through, so thank you very much, holly. Jeff, I'm sure I'm going to see you in Orlando. 

48:54 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
I'll see you in Orlando. It'll be fun. We'll grab a beer and tell some four-man stories. 

48:57 - Uncle Marv (Host)
All right, I do want to also share folks that I told you I'm going to be traveling, so let me just give you a quick little glimpse of what's going to be happening coming up. 

49:11 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
Are you guys excited? Are you ready? 

49:12 - Uncle Marv (Host)
to start Beyond. 

49:14 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
What's up, baby? Who's coming to Beyond 24? 

49:19 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Woo, you want a little more. I think folks are really, really excited about what they can do with their customers and how they can help grow their business. 

49:29 - Jeff Bishop (Host)
It's a massive opportunity for all of you customers and how they can help grow their business. It's a massive opportunity for all of you. 

49:37 - Uncle Marv (Host)
Cheers to the channel community. That is going to be happening once again Rob Ray and Pax8 putting on Pax8 Beyond. I just secured my ticket, my accommodations and I'm just waiting to get my airline booked. So I will be in Denver June 9th through the 11th. So if I attend all these things, it's going to be a busy first two weeks of June with IT Nation happening, automation Nation, pax8 Beyond. Next week I will be in Orlando for Channel Pro Live and I'll have a link to that. 

50:15
So, if you have not paid attention, April 10th and 11th in Orlando, Florida eventschannelpronetwork.com Two days of that event. And of course I've got to pimp my sister podcast and friends at MSP. Unplugged TechCon is back on and that is happening this November as well. They have asked me to come back and help, so I will be there as well. So conference season is upon us, so we will be out there. All right, that's going to do it, folks. 

50:47
Jeff, once again, thank you for coming on the show and thank you for everyone that joined us here live. You can do that most Wednesday nights at 8 pm Eastern. Of course, we have a lot of audio content coming out as well If you are not subscribed on any of the podcast apps, head over to itbusinesspodcast.com, check out the shows there. Pick your app Shop on Amazon, support the show, do all that stuff, and that's going to do it. Next week I will be live. I just don't know from where, because if you heard April 10th, that's a Wednesday. So I shall be live from somewhere between Fort Lauderdale and Orlando. But we'll see you then, and until next time, Holla!