From Receptionist to MVP with Amber Bell

Mark Smith: 0:19
Welcome to the MVP show. My intention is that you listen to the stories of these MVP guests and are inspired to become an MVP and bring value to the world through your skills. If you have not checked it out already, I do a YouTube series called how to Become an MVP. The link is in the show notes. With that, let's get on with the show. Today's guest is from Connecticut in the USA. She's a chief training officer and founder at Training Dynamo. She was first awarded her MVP in 2024. Her long and winding road to becoming a Microsoft MVP started as a receptionist at a GP partner. She is on a mission to give Microsoft Dynamics GP partners and consultants the tools they need to succeed. You can find links to her bio and socials in the show notes for this episode. Welcome to the show, Amber.

Amber Bell: 1:16
Hey, thank you, mark. It's really exciting to get a chance. You know, one of the things I love about community and what we do in our space is just everybody meeting everybody and how supportive everybody has been. It's been exciting to you know to see that grow and grow in my life and how much that means to me and how much it helps me. You know, really helps me when I'm stuck on a problem. I, you know, know people I can reach out to, which is great.

Mark Smith: 1:41
The community is amazing, without a doubt is is it? I feel it's the backbone of the MVP program and the connections and the relationships that you build over time. Um is is incredible. Before we we we dive into your story and your career story in this space, tell me a bit about what you do when you're not doing tech stuff Like. Tell me about food, family and fun. What do they mean to you?

Amber Bell: 2:03
Okay, well, food I've been recently getting into making more salsas from scratch. I grew up in Southern California and so I grew up eating a lot of really good Mexican food, and so I grew up eating a lot of really good Mexican food, and so over time I've picked up some recipes that I really enjoy. But I've been doing a lot of like roasted tomatillo salsa, so like a great salsa. And then I just moved. I live right by the beach, which is really exciting, and I have room for a garden. So I'm a little bit. I'm very Northeast, I'm in California, I'm on the up corner, I grew up in the South corner, southwest as far as you can go, but I'm trying to figure out if I have warm enough weather long enough to try to grow some tomatillos, but at the very least I'll be growing some tomatoes and hot peppers this summer. So that'll be good, yeah.

Amber Bell: 2:57
And then family. So my family that I was born with is all on the West Coast, so I try to go out there at least once a year. But I have some really good you know, chosen family wherever I go, and I have some really good friends that live nearby that are real fun, and one just gave me a karaoke machine so that was a fun thing. So family and fun kind of go together. But it's nice. I like living up here in the East Coast. I'm really close to New York City and I'm not too far from Boston. I have a friend out in Martha's Vineyard so get to take advantage of the summer coming up. It's going to be really nice.

Mark Smith: 3:33
I love it. I love it. It's interesting to talk about Tamatea. I've got a heap of seeds and I've never planted them because it's not a traditional fruit slash vegetable that you would have in New Zealand. But now you've talked about it and it makes me go hey, I should actually give those a crack and get them into my greenhouse and see what I can produce. I tell you what I found AI so helpful at understanding your weather zone. Oh yeah, for plants. Oh, so helpful because you can just say, hey, I'm going to plant these tematillo seeds. What's the best month to do it in? This is my zone, blah, blah, blah, and it'll tell you. You know what options you have. So good.

Amber Bell: 4:12
I'll send you some recipes, if you want me to yes.

Mark Smith: 4:14
Recipes if you want me to yes, yes, yes yes, my wife loves Mexican food and salsa as well, and making it all herself, so I think that that would be fantastic, thank you, Recipe and just kidding. What was that Turns into a cooking show. Yeah, a cooking show. Exactly, exactly, exactly, so true.

Amber Bell: 4:39
So tell me, how did your tech career start? So my tech career started, you mentioned I started as a receptionist, which you know. For a long time I will say that was something I didn't lead with and I think a long time I thought I had some experiences where people look down on it like, oh how, what do you know? You know you just worked at the front desk. But before that I had worked in, worked in different companies. Where I did. I worked as like inventory and warehouse kind of control at a company that did manufacturing. I worked at an employment agency in their corporate office doing payroll, but I purposefully, like, went to work for this company that was a Microsoft Great Plains and later GP partner. That was in San Diego. I knew some of the people that owned it, so I had a foot in the door, but the door opened wide enough for me to get at the front desk.

Amber Bell: 5:28
So, but at first I didn't want to take it, but my best friend, roommate at the time was like they, we know people there, they're going to train you, they're going to get you up and going, which they did. I actually was there this was around the dot-com era and they moved me up and then they flew out a wonderful trainer, leslie Vale that's big name in the GP space. She got me educated enough that I then started passing my certifications and then I really thought I was going to get into programming. That was, honestly, the goal. I was going to school while I was working in accounting, learning databases, and had taken some Microsoft Office classes, which were invaluable. I love Excel and Word and all power, everything. But honestly, once I started training, which I thought was just going to be another sorry, I feel like I was opening my teeth. So if you see on the video it's like this but I really thought that the training, taking the training was going to just be like okay, next step is I'm training. Now I'm going to become a programmer. Now I'm going to do custom things, because that was what the company really focused on was custom built solutions.

Amber Bell: 6:40
But honestly, once I got in front of people, once I started to really get to know users of the software, I did testing. I was on a project for a long time doing quality testing of the customs, but then I got to talk to the people and I was bridging the programmers and the users and then I was documenting how to actually do the custom, use the custom, and I just loved that. I just didn't. I didn't want to get into programming anymore. I wanted to do documentation. I wanted I know the things I love to do. I love I love reading. I do like reading manuals, I read them and I do like to write documentation.

Amber Bell: 7:17
I think there's such a value in giving something tangible to people so that they can come back to it and find answers. So I started to do that and then I worked at that partner and then, in 2005, I moved here to Connecticut. I worked at another partner for about 10 years give or take, and then that makes it sound longer, but whatever time it was, I started my own company nine years ago. So nine years ago I took the jump. I had met some really supportive people in the dynamics community, supportive people in the dynamics community, and just as I started telling them my goals and my story, and then I started, I had been presenting at really big GP events and I was getting like people running out the door, like it was like people sitting on the ground. It was crazy and just.

Amber Bell: 8:11
It made me recognize again the value in what I did, whereas for a long time I kind of looked at it. You know I was. You know everybody has it says imposter syndrome. But I mean I had it, I had a clinical version of it, so it was real bad. But when I started to see that training really could be a foundation instead of an afterthought and that's why I center everything I do on training, it's in the name of my company, it's Training Dynamo. I kept the journal where I had tried all these different company names. My name's Amber Bell. So ABC was an ABC, consulting all these different things. But then all of a sudden I thought about dynamics and then I thought Dynamo is like really being excited about it, and that's where I got to where I'm at. But I love, I love training and I love working with people. So that's how I got.

Mark Smith: 8:59
That's so cool, that's so cool. What's the landscape right now for GP um across the U? S? What's your what you know um? It's been one of those products that Microsoft probably hasn't shown the love in the last 10 years too that it did traditionally. What's, what's your thoughts on that?

Amber Bell: 9:18
well, one thing I'm really glad with the the length of time I've been in this space is I was there when it was like, um, microsoft bought GP, I was there like I'm not there, I didn't sign the paperwork, but you know I was, I was, I was a little a partner in San Diego and what. Nobody knew who I was, but I was there Like I mean not there, I didn't sign the paperwork, but you know I was a partner in San Diego and nobody knew who I was. But I was, you know, aware of all the announcements. But I also went when I went to my first GP like Microsoft Convergence event. At the time I saw the fireworks for GP, I saw the love, I saw the things they were planning. So I know that they put a lot of money into GP. I saw the love, I saw the things they were planning. So I know that they put a lot of money into GP. They really did. They invested a lot to make it the program it is. So I think knowing that makes me really appreciate where we are, because they're doing that right now with BC, they're doing that with their other products. But that doesn't mean that those dollars went away. It doesn't mean the program all of a sudden lost all this, the features and wonderful things it has. That being said, I do see the value for me as a trainer. I'm working to bridge people from GP if and when they're wanting to move off of GP. My thing that I'm wanting to cover with them is what they can do now is process review and cleanup and data cleanup. So that really goes along well with my foundation of training and understanding people.

Amber Bell: 10:41
If you just say, oh, we never got GP, didn't work for us and finally we can switch, but you don't figure out that really what it is is, you didn't have it set up, you don't know that Barbara does this and Janet does that and Bob, you know Kevin does that. If you don't know who does what, how they're doing it, what products you're using, what products aren't set up that you paid for, and then you meet with someone who says, oh, we can get you into BC or Acumatica or whatever it is, and if you don't have that foundation of knowing your people and what they do and if they're not comfortable, you're going to take and you're going to pour all this money into moving them into a new system where they're even more uncomfortable because you're starting them at zero. I'd rather have the time to take you to say, okay, you know you're going to be in BC. Say, okay, you know you're going to be in BC. In BC you have to set an accounting group. For example, in GP it's optional to put things like a customer or vendor or item class. So my goal is to go let's make that a requirement in GP so that we can just transition that field right into the field in BC. Let's look at your customers.

Amber Bell: 11:53
How many have you never worked, not worked, with since 2002? How many? I had a client I was interviewed for. The ERP software blog has a series, that's one fix, one fail. I had a client that had in GP I think they only had like three segments but they had about 70,000 accounts because somebody had done every combination possible. So you multiply a hundred GL accounts times 10 locations, times this thing, and the number was so big and they used a tiny fraction. So I worked with them, created a SQL view. We were able to then automate updating and inactivating and, in a lot of cases, deleting the unneeded accounts, doing that before you're live in BC or before the weekend that you say we're going to go live on Monday. That's really important.

Amber Bell: 12:44
And the other thing I find is I know that a lot of people out there their thought is, oh, you should just fix it, we can do that for you.

Amber Bell: 12:53
But I don't know if you're like me, but it's like one teach Amanda Fish or someone comes and cleans your house every week. You don't learn to put your clothes away If they don't have the understanding of how it got so bad and you just fix it. They don't have ownership of it. And also I feel like it's involving the actual team that's in the accounting department in the cleanup. It's empowering and it's respectful. They're the ones that are going to work in it day to day.

Amber Bell: 13:21
If you just take it away and go, you're going to figure it out in this other software. You're not involving them. You're not figuring out how they're making things work. And so my goal is to go. Let's bridge that, let's start doing that now and let's figure out when is the right time for you to move and if you can stretch it out for a little bit of time and make it a better implementation, that's time well spent rather than a fear-based. I got to switch it and sneak. That's a terrible way to live your life, and it's the stress of that is so much worse than if we cleaned up everything first.

Mark Smith: 13:57
It's interesting at the start that you talked about Microsoft's investment into GP and I I wondered did they make it so good? That is why it has had such a like. People like you know if it's not broke, why fix it right? And there's gp sitting on boxes, uh, as in servers, in the closet and stuff and organizations, uh, all over the place, and it just works. It does its job, and so there's been no kind of burning bridge or burning platform for people to take a decision on and go to something else. Are you seeing more in recent years now a move to look at something like a business central as an alternative? And what's really motivating a customer if it's working? What is motivating them to move?

Amber Bell: 15:11
Well, I think that's why it's a customer by customer basis and it also, you know, you might find out from a customer that in GP, you know, like the example I gave, if you have 70,000 accounts and you find out well, in BC, out of the box it's designed to have dimensions. As opposed to making all these different combinations, that might be a good fix. There's so many add-ons for GP that are moving and being available in BC. So people are going well if my system will have, yeah, bc is different. Going well if my system will have, yeah, bc is different. But my integrations and my customs run through XYZ program and they have it ready for me. The road is paved, it's ready. Then they're taking advantage of that. So I think there are a lot of partners that want to get people into BC and there's multiple reasons for that. One of them is you know, if everybody waits to crunch time to when it's not supported, that's going to be a difficult thing for everybody. There are companies that are going to keep running it. I mean, that's the plain old truth. It happens with the other accounting software products that Microsoft purchased.

Amber Bell: 16:23
My feeling is always you want to keep at least your SQL servers supported. I mean, my goodness, you wouldn't want to run. I have a client that it scares me. It's like how bad theirs is and how old of a server it is, and you know they're just saying it works and I go sign a paper that says you're not going to sue me when it falls apart. But I think you're right in that. When it works, then what's the motivation? And that's where a good consultant, a good company, will look and help you figure out if and when you'll do it.

Amber Bell: 16:57
If the answer is just like no, no, you got to switch, you got to switch today. I want to make sure what you do will work there. So that's why you need to figure out what are your customizations? What reports are you running? What are people doing manually outside? And if you find out they're barely using GP because this, that or the other and they want to move to the cloud and they want to have this, that or the other.

Amber Bell: 17:20
It's automatic in BC. That's a great thing. If there's some really big BC is growing and it's turned. It's really like leaps and bounds every couple months what they're able to do with it. So I would never disparage it.

Amber Bell: 17:33
But I also feel like taking the time to get people comfortable and what they're doing in GP then, and data's clean when they make that move, each person has the headspace to figure out what they need to do. So if I just take you and you're in crisis mode in GP and I say, hope it all works out in BC, Like that's just to me that's just a, that's a scary foundation. But yeah, I think there's so much value that's going into BC. There's so many things that are being added to it. You know, with the built-in co-pilot things. But because GP runs on SQL, because GP integrates with Power BI, because GP works with Power Apps, there are so many things that GP can do. So I totally appreciate, respect and understand people that are like GP till the end of time. But you know, as a person that does training, I have to be ready for anything and it keeps me on my toes. Yeah.

Mark Smith: 18:33
If you look across your career, are there any kind of major inflection points where something happened, you met the right person, whatever it was, that took your career a particular way that you can pinpoint down to what that inflection point was or who that person was? Are there any highlights for you?

Amber Bell: 18:55
Yeah, I think one thing I mean learning GP. That was a huge turning point. And the trainer that I had, leslie Bell she's dynamic in her training, she was very great and so I think my foundation and understanding and excitement started there. I remember going to the Microsoft conference and I still am friends with several people that I met at these events, so that was really helpful. Mark Rockwell from Rockton Solutions Hi, mark, if you're out there, he I remember I didn't know him and for a long time he was like a celebrity because he would always do these parts at the events where he would do a full musical number. So seeing people be excited and going into classes and seeing that excitement.

Amber Bell: 19:41
But for me, when things started to change was as user groups started growing in the dynamic space. User group started growing in the dynamic space. Gpug, or the GP user group, was led by Kim Peterson and she because Kim has magical powers of meeting people she just heard about me enough and started to invite me to do remote webinars for the user groups. And then she wanted me to speak at the events and she's the one that just kept saying let's have you speak at an event and finally I did and I did one and then the next year I was like I'll do 20 million of them. So from that point on things got bigger and better.

Amber Bell: 20:18
And then Kim also planned a Women in Dynamics luncheon at one of the GPOG events and literally the first one it was, I don't know. We were around a lunch table in the middle of the expo lunch area and just we sat and we were talking, people recommended books and people talked about different you know mindsets we get into, why we hold ourselves back. I went back. I'm reading those books and that's when I literally decided I want to either change how I'm working at where I'm at or start my own company and literally like that from that October to that February. Then I started my own company.

Mark Smith: 20:54
That is, that is epic right and that's impactful. So that was at the conference you're at and you yeah.

Amber Bell: 21:01
Yeah, so I you know the. The thing that it was amazing is that, um, she really saw value and showed me the value in that you know that training is more than just getting people excited about it, that there's this you need a special skill set to train Doing a program. There's a million people that you can do it, but you're more like I can't show you what I'm doing, but I can make it work.

Amber Bell: 21:24
I can't explain it, but knowing how to break down how you're doing it. I learned to value that. And another person that really has helped me and to this day literally came to stay at my house a couple weeks ago is Anya Jucherski from the ERP Software blog. We worked together at the partner out in San Diego. Then she moved back home to Connecticut, recommended me to the GP partner she started working with here. Then that I started working here in Connecticut. Then she was real supportive when I started my company. She just interviewed me for her ginormous, huge blog. She's very supportive and also, like always, like come on, you got to explain what you're doing so people can see what you're doing.

Amber Bell: 22:05
So there's been some really wonderful people. Belinda Allen is really wonderful in the space, you know. David Musgrave is amazing. He's kind of your neighbor but a very far away. It's like you're on the other side of us but yeah, yeah, so he really has been somebody, and I mean there's a million people. So when you mentioned people, the Academy Awards will play the music off as you're still talking, but I mean definitely the what Kim Peterson did really was invaluable and the support I've had from the other people I mentioned, I mean I wouldn't have started my own without them helping me.

Mark Smith: 22:42
Amber, it's been so fun talking to you. Thank you for coming on the show.

Amber Bell: 22:46
Yeah, thank you. Thank you for inviting me. It was wonderful for coming on the show. Yeah, thank you. Thank you for inviting me.

Mark Smith: 22:52
It was wonderful. Hey, thanks for listening. I'm your host business application MVP Mark Smith, otherwise known as the NZ365 guy. If you like the show and want to be a supporter, check out buymeacoffeecom forward slash NZ365 guy. Thanks again and see you next time. Thank you.