EMB 170 Captain reported cockpit windshield cracked during cruise. Flight diverted to nearby airport and landed safely.

Narrative

Leaving FL350 for FL270 for our initial descent to ZZZ at I what I believe was a 1;000 fpm descent in VS. Around FL300 there was a loud 'POP' sound and a couple seconds later the FO starts yelling to descend. I had not yet realized what had happened because I couldn't immediately see that his windshield had shattered with the bright sun and clouds in the background kind of hid the cracks with a glare. I finally realized the cracks and immediately EICAS message windshield heater 2 fail appeared. All of this happened in the span of 3-5 seconds from POP to realization to message. So I called for [assistance] QRC. Ran the QRC as we should have. Started the descent and requested priority handling with ATC. At conclusion of descent QRC it states to go to appropriate QRH. I called for cracked windshield QRH. I guess the correct checklist would have been Winsdhield 2 Heater fail as that was identified and canceled earlier and the root cause; maybe that should have been called for prior to descent QRC but with the severity of the cracking my biggest concern up that high was depressurization. Windshield heater 2 fail QRH was actually never ran. If heater 2 fail was called for and ran it would have lead us to cracked windshield QRH but turning heater 2 off then on again would not have fixed the issue as the QRH reads. Cracked windshield QRH has you turn the windshield heater off first thing so it accomplishes the same tasks but Heater 2 fail should have maybe been called for and ran in hindsight as that was the associated message. So on the descent my FO is reading the cracked windshield QRH we get to the part where you determine which layer is cracked. We could not feel any of the cracks on the inside so we determined that only the outer layer is cracked; which ends the QRH. But we had already advised ATC; told ATC we were going to ZZZ1; and with the severity of the crack I decided the best course of action was to stay committed at that point. This whole time my FO was very frantic; I'm sure he had an adrenaline dump and was reading the QRC/QRH so fast. At one point I stopped him in one of the QRHs and looked at him asked him; 'are you good?' He smiled and said; 'yes.' He was helpful in suggestions but he was everywhere; it was as if he wanted to complete every task all at once and couldn't focus on one thing. He would start a task and then never finish it before going to something else. So at the end of the cracked windshield QRH I decided to transfer controls to him in the lower flight levels on our way down to 10;000 to allow him to focus solely on flying and radios while I coordinated with FAs; Dispatch; announcement to pax's; setup up the Multipurpose Control Display Unit (MCDU); landing data; etc. Once I had completed all the coordination; normal checklists ran; and setup complete I resumed the PF role somewhere between 4-8;000 ft. One thing I would have done differently was I probably would have asked for delay vectors just to confirm and double check everything was completed; we were able to get it all done and both check our work and ask ourselves did we get everything completed. It just felt very rushed and that's not how I like to operate. The approach; landing; and taxi in to the gate were none eventful. No brace command was given; no Airport Rescue and Firefighting (ARFF) was required and I did not see any trucks anywhere on the airport environment. After deplaning and talking to maintenance once they showed up upon further inspection the middle pane of glass was entirely shattered and the outer pane in the lower right side was blown out along with some cracks on the lower outer pane extending from that point.