Building Your Salesforce Brand

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we have another live interview from the Sidney World Tour, this time with Lorna O’Callaghan, Salesforce Lead at Suncorp Group. She shares how her experience as a Medieval history masters student has translated into a career in tech. Join us as we talk about the keys to leading a mixed team, how Trailhead has helped her broadened her horizons, and why her team is so focused on community engagement. You should  subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with Lorna O’Callaghan. How a Medieval History degree helps in tech. Growing up, Lorna wanted to be a teacher, which is actually pretty common among people in the Salesforce ecosystem and especially among admins. These days, she’s just started a new role as a leader of a team of developers, admins, and business analysts, “which I’m really excited and terrified about in equal measure,” she says. Lorna originally got her masters in Medieval History before she got involved in tech. “I thought it was an unusual career shift, but the more I talk to other Salesforce admins the more I realize there’s a lot of variety out there,” she says. So how did she wind up in Salesforce? Well, it’s kind of a funny story. “I got a call one day from a guy in Dublin who had seen my details in their Salesforce database,” Lorna says, “and as an exercise to prove to the business that the database worked he called me, interviewed me, and I took the job.” Believe it or not, Lorna’s degree has been super useful in her work as a Salesforce admin and beyond. ”Being taught to come at things from a different angle and having to explain to people what on earth you do in a language that they’re going to understand,” she says, “it has one hundred percent stood to me.” Prepping for a leadership role. Today, Lorna is facing down leading a mixed team and is prepping for the challenges that may come up. Trailhead has been incredibly helpful, and she’s already finished all of the manager modules. She’s also been looking at the development framework material to get familiar with it. “It’s definitely a challenge, it’s a little bit outside the comfort zone,” she says, “I’ve managed project teams before but when you’re directly responsible for a group of people it changes things a little bit. I’m very much looking to where I need to upskill myself to be across all of the areas that they are across because it’s vast.” “But equally,” Lorna says, “I’m really really happy that the team that I have come into are also into the community and really active in the community.” That means that she doesn’t have to go it alone—the team is actively working to organize monthly sharing sessions to help each other with what they’ve been learning outside of work on Trailhead and beyond. That feeling when your team checks Salesforce before their email. Before Lorna moved into leadership, she was an admin. So, what makes a good admin, in her eyes? “You’ve got to be a bit inquisitive, you’ve got to have patience and a bit of perseverance to find what you need,” she says, “and not be afraid to make those mistakes.” Things are a bit easier these days with Trailhead, but experimentation is still key if you want to keep adding new skills. Lorna was really focused on user adoption in her admins days. “We managed to actually get to a point where we had the CEO ringing people up saying, ‘Oh, I just say something in this report or this dashboard,’ and you had people coming in, first thing in the morning, looking at list views for what had come into the system overnight before going into their email.” The community is the key. “Salesforce moves really fast. Every release—to be honest, even in between that—there’s so much new stuff that’s coming up that if we, as a team, want to be innovative and want to keep on top of everything then we have to be involved in...

From Medieval History to Salesforce with Lorna O'Callaghan

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we have another live interview from the Sydney World Tour, this time with New Zealander Anna Loughnan, Customer Success Manager at Todd Digital. Join us as we talk about the importance of female role models, how she found herself in tech, and how she came back and got into Salesforce after twelve years raising her family to be a 4x Ranger. You should  subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with Anna Loughnan. Girls can do anything, but what should I do? We’re proud to have Anna as our first Kiwi on the podcast. Growing up in New Zealand, there were posters everywhere offering encouragement that “girls can do anything.” The problem was that Anna didn’t exactly what she wanted to do. “Although we had this being drummed into us there was no actual followup,” she says, “there weren’t role models back in the day, so it was just what you were supposed to believe but there was no proof of it.” All Anna knew was that she didn’t want to do something that was a traditionally female profession. She spent five years overseas working all sorts of jobs, from working at a McDonald’s to being a bartender. She found herself in Ireland and signed up for a postgrad course in computer science, “purely as an excuse to stay away from New Zealand for another year.” As soon as she sat down in class it was obvious: “the veil had lifted and that was my home, basically. It was frustrating because I had grown up with the message that ‘girls can do anything’ but it was my brother who had been bought a computer,” she says, “this was my first exposure to computers and I just had such an aptitude for it.” How mentors helped Anna discover the Salesforce ecosystem. When Anna came back to New Zealand in her late twenties, she worked for a while but also was focused on making a family. For twelve years, she worked a little but was mainly raising her three children. When an old school friend was working on a digital transformation project and needed an analyst, Anna got the call. “I found out later that she had to do a lot of hard talking and convincing for them to be comfortable taking someone on who had been out of the workforce for so long, but she had my back,” she says. “That’s what it takes sometimes is somebody else to believe in you.” Salesforce was a big part of the digital transformation project, so that’s where Anna first encountered the platform. Nowadays, Anna was brought on to work on a startup with an old friend from that first job. “I knew he was an amazing person—he was such an advocate for Salesforce back in the day and he had seen the potential of the platform,” she says, “so I knew anything that involved him would certainly be worthwhile.” As the Customer Success Manager, Anna has to work across the entire platform and know all the things. “I try and know as much as I can about as many as possible, but it’s also good to know how you can find out about all the things if you don’t know yourself.” The secrets of a four-star ranger. In addition to being the first Kiwi (Kieran Jameson doesn’t count since she’s on the Trailhead editorial team… but we’ve put a link to her episode below), Anna is the first ever quadruple-star Ranger we’ve had on the pod. That means she has over four hundred badges. How does she find the time to do everything? “What really helps sometimes is making a public declaration,” she says, on Twitter or another community where you can get support. She also signed up with the 100 Days of Trailhead program through Ladies Be Architects. “Until I signed up for that I hadn’t done any super badges,” she says, “it empowered me because just working at Trailhead was an achievement, not necessarily getting a badge every time you sat down to do something.” As far as advice Anna has for what makes a great admin, “I like being able to relate to people and talk...

From Programmer to Mom to Admin With Anna Loughnan

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we have the first of several live interviews Gillian recorded at the Salesforce World Tour in Washington DC. In this episode, we talk to Toya Tate, Salesforce Consultant at Slalom Consulting, Salesforce MVP, and leader in the DC Women in Technology User Group. We talk through her amazing career journey and how the community was there for her every step of the way. Join us as we talk about how Toya got into the Salesforce, the amazing role the community played in her career path, and how she made the jump to become a Salesforce consultant. You should  subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with Toya Tate. Getting hooked on Salesforce. At college, Toya majored in mechanical engineering, “but when I got to my Junior year I realized I didn’t really like engineering like I thought I did.” She ended up working for a venture capital firm in Cincinnati, Ohio, where they were using a platform to keep track of their investments, applicants who were looking for funding, and more. “One day, my boss came in and told me, ‘Hey, we’re going to use Salesforce for this process now.’‘OK,’ I said, ‘Sure. That’s great. I don’t know why you’re telling me but great.’ He said, ‘I’m telling you because you’re going to run it.’” As soon as her boss walked away, Toya started frantically googling because she had never heard of Salesforce before. They worked with an implementation partner to get started and she quickly fell in love with the platform. She was able to go to New York for a week for more training, and the rest is history. Going to Salesforce from their previous tracking system was night and day. “Tracking was coming from six million different sources before,” Toya says, “once everything got in Salesforce I could just run a report and everything was right there, I didn’t have to spend hours compiling reports every week.” How Toya discovered the power of the Trailblazer Community. “One day I had a question and my powers of Google failed me,” Toya says. She stumbled across the Success Community (now the Trailblazer Community), “and I found the answer to my question but I also found that there was a Cincinnati User Group and they had a meeting coming up.” The person who answered her question was actually at the meeting. “From then on,” she was, “I was fully one hundred percent committed.” Toya spent most of her free time diving into the platform and learning more. One day, she was browsing the community and realized she could answer some of the questions people had. “People don’t believe me but I am an introvert,” she says, “so it was much easier for me to interact online where I could determine how I wanted to interact and how much.” She moved from only answering the questions she was absolutely certain she knew well to learning more about new areas as she helped people. As Toya got more and more knowledge, she wanted to focus on Salesforce full-time and not worry about any other responsibilities—she was still doing other parts of her old job in addition to managing their org. She got certified and started looking for her next move. She saw a posting for a job in DC on the community. “I just took a leap and sent the person who posted it a note,” she says, and they responded back within the day and said that they had seen her active in the community and were really interested in talking to her. If you’re an admin, you’re already a consultant. When Toya got to DC, she connected with Rebeca Lammers, who she had previously known through the community. Rebecca kept trying to recruit her for a new role, and eventually, Toya said, “I’m really not looking but I will meet with the recruiter just so you can stop harassing me.” She took the meeting and, long story short made the switch from an admin to a consultant. “I realized I really was looking for a challenge after eight...

Taking the Community by Storm With Toya Tate

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we have another episode from the DC World Tour with LeAndria Streeter, Salesforce Consultant at Slalom, to learn about the work she does in the community and how you can apply change management principles to your own life. Join us as we talk about how she got confidence from the amazing DC community, how she made the transition into her first admin job, and LeAndria’s tips for overcoming imposter syndrome. You should  subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with LeAndria Streeter. &nbsp;LeAndria’s accidental admin story. “When I was growing up I wanted to work in tech and be an engineer, but I also wanted to be a hairstylist,” LeAndria says, “I’m obsessed with all things beauty and health-related and so I was going to find a way to do both.” When she was starting out her career, she worked as a conference coordinator and meeting planner for a nonprofit. “As everyone who works at a nonprofit knows, you kind of wear a few hats,” she says, “so in addition to planning events, I also managed all of the platforms from event management to their database.” When LeAndria was put in charge of their Salesforce implementation, she fell in love and never looked back. “When we were looking for a solution to replace our dying database, I was tasked with doing the research,” LeAndria says, “and very quickly, all of my research pointed to Salesforce.” Working with a consultancy, she made sure to ask them to teach her how to admin as they deployed the implementation. That set her on the path towards becoming a fulltime admin. How the community can support you. LeAndria was still at her old nonprofit, filling the role of three people and doing all of the things, but she wanted to focus on Salesforce. To find her first fulltime admin position, she used Power of Us Hub, which is basically the Trailblazer Community for the nonprofit sector. That put her in touch with the local DC Community Group where she could level up her skills, get her certification, and land that first job. Imposter syndrome affects everyone, especially when they change careers. “Growing up in the South as a young black girl, you’re not really encouraged to listen to your heart and pursue your goals,” LeAndria says, “it wasn’t until I got here to DC and started working in this very ambitious work environment that we have that I started to become a person who really believed in myself and my career aspirations.” Connecting with community members helped her gain the confidence she needed to know that she could be a fulltime Salesforce admin and make the transition. Change management for your own life. When it comes to actually making that change in your life, LeAndria says the first thing you need to do is truly believe that a career in tech is possible for you. “You don’t just wake up one day and believe that you can do anything,” she says, “it’s a process and it’s intentional.” At WITness Success 2018, LeAndria gave a talk deconstructing that process of changing her beliefs. One of the first steps LeAndria advises is to take the time to visualize your success: doing the work you want to do, taking the vacations you want to take, living the life you want to live. “Take stock of how you feel when you’re in that state. What does that person look like? What expression do they have on their face?” Once you’ve identified those feelings, LeAndria says you need to realize that you are that person. It’s not instantaneous, but you need to work at truly embodying those beliefs. Take time to unplug and sit with your feelings, which could be anything from meditating to journaling. As admins, we’re in the business of adoption and change management, but sometimes you need to apply that process to yourself. Giving back through WIT. Today, through a connection she made at the 2016 World Tour, LeAndria is a Salesforce Consultant, bringing it...

Trailblazer Community- Believe it, See it and Make it Happen with LeAndria Streeter

This week on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we’ve got Tiffany Spencer, COO of Esor Consulting Group and the founder of HBCUforce. We learn how she helps students gain the experience they need to land their first Salesforce job. Join us as we talk about why process and solving is key to working in tech, how to gets hands-on experience with superbadges and case studies, and some great tips for networking effectively. You should  for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with Tiffany Spencer. Producing an impossible report Tiffany says she does everything, and she’s really not kidding. “I’m a consultant, a CRM manager, a business architect, a solution architect—it kind of depends on who you ask that day,” she says, “a big part of it is working with individuals that I train and helping them understand how to better utilize the Salesforce platform and how to continue on their journey.” Tiffany started as an admin for a small land development company after only a week of training and quickly became all things Salesforce for her organization. “It was a really great position where I was able to play many roles,” she says, “I was the admin, I was the BA, the project manager, the architect, the trainer, and that sink-or-swim moment set the tone for all of my other positions.” She went on to several roles as both an admin and later a business analyst. The craziest part about her whole journey is that that first job never mentioned Salesforce in the job description. Little did she know that her chance encounter with the platform would shape her entire career. Bringing Salesforce to Students Tiffany is the founder of HBCUforce, a nonprofit organization that partners with Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) to create programs that provide early access to cloud computing careers through exposure to Salesforce and their partners. She got the idea about two years ago when she visited her alma mater, Bethune-Cookman University, and decided to pop in a classroom. She started talking with some students about their career plans and explained to them what she does, and when she saw their interest she realized she could work with the school to create a program to show them exposure to everything a career in Salesforce can offer. While many students aspire to land a position at Microsoft or Google, Tiffany’s found that they don’t often know that Salesforce is just as big (and innovative) of a company. Not only that, but 97% of Fortune 100 companies use the platform. In technology, it’s really about processes. Tiffany always tells students, “I’m not a coder, you don’t have to be a coder or a programmer or a developer to be in technology. There are all these other pieces of the puzzle that help developers do their job that you can be involved in.” Getting Your First Salesforce Job When you’re looking to get your first Salesforce job, Tiffany has a few tips that she’s seen work for her mentees. For one thing, you can do case studies and superbadges to get some hands-on experience. The other thing that really helps is getting familiar with Agile, whether that’s using a tool like Jira or Trello or even reading the Agile Manifesto. Tiffany also tries to give her mentees opportunities to tackle real-life problems by bringing them into her pro-bono projects. If you don’t have a Tiffany in your life (yet), there are still ways to seek out something to get you started. “There are plenty of Tiffanys in the Salesforce ecosystem,” she says, “people are more than willing to guide and help so the first thing to do is to get involved with the community.” Start with your local community group, or organizations like PepUp Tech or Salesforce Military. “There’s not a shortage of people doing amazing things,” she says, “so you just got to get out there and start networking and connecting.” Links:    Trailhead:    Social  Salesforce Admins:  Tiffany: ...

From Programmer to Mom to Admin With Anna Loughnan

The Salesforce Admins Podcast