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I get the following question about once a month – through social media, at events, or through referrals from other peers, colleagues and friends: “My goal this year is to get Salesforce Admin Certified, but I am not sure the exact path to take. Can you help guide me” First, I would say – your path is going to be different than mine. If I were to poll the recipients of the Salesforce Admin Certification, we would find that they have different paths and each one has value.
So I must say that my path won’t be your path. That being said, there are some things that I feel would bring a solid base on your way to being certified. Congratulations on taking the path and good l uck on your journey!
1) Hands on work If you are currently working as a Salesforce Admin that is great and will give you experience in Salesforce. I spent over 6 months administrating a Salesforce organization before studying for my Admin Cert, and I think that was valuable time spent. If you are not currently an admin it is OK, because we have!
With Trailhead, you can sign up for a developer Salesforce Account and use this as your hands-on playground to understand more about Salesforce and how Salesforce Works. Here is a Trailmix for Admins looking to get certified: 2) Study Groups Through my local Salesforce user group, I found other people in the area who wanted to get certified and we started our own study group. We met weekly for 3 months and studied together, using the materials I will list below to work together on quizzing each other on topics and Salesforce functionality. 3) Certification Site and Exam Guide Use the exam guide found on the certification page as a study template. Make sure you know the information listed in the categories on this guide. 4) Blogs and Admin training sites I reviewed these on the way to my certification:. /.
5) Reach out and Connect with others You already have done this if you reached out to me with your question, so you are already networking with others. Keep doing that. Meet others at local user groups, connect with other community members via or through the. For example, there is a Certification Study Group but there are many other groups you can join and participate in. Asking questions to others is a great way to start a conversation. 6) Set a Date for your Exam I set a specific date for my Exams – try to be realistic, but set the date. For my Admin Cert, I set a date 3 months out and then strive to hit that date.
Having the deadline put pressure on me to continue to study every day knowing that I had to be done. Oh, and then make sure to celebrate for yourself when you are done. It is nice to have the certification and then reward yourself on a job well done. Top 3 things – what I am taking action on. I had a chance to speak with the leaders at and we spoke more about how we can reach high schools and help them increase their STEM education. I received some new ideas and am continuing to work on more opportunities for students. gave an amazing talk in her session about Training End Users.
I have so much to do and will be using her information to enhance how I interact with my users on a daily basis. USE IT OR LOSE IT! (right, Rebe?). I was amazed at the feedback I received from the talk that and I did about. We were a primer for the keynote by later in the day where he used the same picture that we did of Marc Benioff in the Women’s March.
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Also, many of the themes we spoke of were magnified in greater detail at the first ever WITSuccess Conference, which started after MWD ended. There is more work to do here for WIT Allies, and I look forward to those conversations. See some of my photos from MWD17 on my flickr site.
The Dreamforce 17 speaker sessions have been selected and those lucky speakers have been notified. Things are in motion for an awesome event in November. What if you submitted a session and were not selected? On the Admin side, chances are your session was not chosen as there were over but only 70 were chosen (that’s a 90% chance that your session was rejected). It does suck – you worked hard and had a great idea and you got a message from the Dreamforce Team stating Thank you, but your submission(s) were not accepted as part of the Admin/Dev Track 2016 I got rejected last year – big time rejection. I submitted talks for Dreamforce 16 and they were not accepted.
It wasn’t fun. My rejection came right before Midwest Dreamin 16 and I felt some humiliation knowing that I would be seeing my Salesforce peers knowing that they were selected but I was not. It really hit me while driving home from Midwest Dreamin 16 (Chicago to Minneapolis), when I listened to the and I heard my friend speak about his Dreamforce submission. While listening to him speak I realized why I didn’t get selected. He eloquently spoke about how he put together his submission and the pitch that he gave. Just listening to him speak, I realized the time and pride he took into preparing his abstract and I had to pull over to the side of the road to wipe the tears of both joy and sorrow.
I turned my sadness into humor and created this analogy of Ben’s Dreamforce Abstract vs Mine. If I were on the submission selection team, I would have chosen Ben’s session over mine in a heartbeat. Dreamforce got the best of the best in that choice. There is an art and a science to the Dreamforce session submission.
I was able to attend Dreamforce last year and saw many of these AWESOME presentations. I was mesmerized by the talent in the the Admin and Developer community and was proud of the selections that were chosen to present.
Kudos to the Salesforce Admin and Developer Evangelism teams! 2015 Fortunately/Unfortunately, I have experience in being Rejected. In July 2015, I was laid off of a good full time job.
The organization I had been employed at for 5 years decided to let 20% of it’s staff go and my role was on that list. It was one of the biggest Rejections I had received.
My boss told me it was also hard for him, because I was a good employee and had done great work. This was not a performance-based decision, but based purely on financial numbers.
Not only was it confusing for me, but my team was also dismayed by the decision. There were projects in motion that were left on the table with no one to finish them. There were plans and dreams about innovations that were killed. There was no closure to relationships with coworkers and associates.
Everything just ended one day. My reaction was not of anger.
I was upset, and fearful at first, but I had some really good friends who helped me through this rejection. First was my wife, who surrounded me with support and encouragement. Second was my men’s group – a group of guys who I have coffee with on a weekly basis to just talk. They asked me to close my eyes and imagine: “Where do you see yourself in the next 3 – 6 – 9 months?” “What do you hope to do with your life that will be better after this experience?” The experts in loss and grieving will tell you that you should remember the following during a period of Rejection:. – Acknowledge your feelings.
Don’t beat yourself up – Treat yourself with care. Refuse to let Rejection define you – You are not your job – You are not your Dreamforce Submission. Learn from Rejection – How are you going to use this Rejection to be your future self? (I am reminded of the scene from where Kirk explains why our past makes us who we are today.) So what was my reaction to the Rejection of being laid off from a good job? I decided I would use this “opportunity” to ensure I would be better off from this painful experience:. I committed to getting my Salesforce Admin certification. I attended a local Certification User Group (where I met, and others).
I got my Admin Certification, and proceeded to get 4 more certs quickly thereafter. I changed my twitter handle to as a marker of my intention to get my certification and learn more about the Salesforce Platform. I connected with other Community Members – I met with and spoke to local Salesforce MVPs to learn about what they do and how they got there.
I signed up for community events (Tahoe Dreamin and Midwest Dreamin) and volunteered at the local Twin Cities User Group. I spent time with my family and took a road trip with my son. I worked on a “portfolio of work” that features some of my best work over the last 10 years.
That project was fun for me to do and I got kudos from recruiters and employers about how powerful this is to show off my skills. Overall I decided not to let Rejection decide who I would be and how I would live my life. 2017 Now 2 years later, and I recently met with a former coworker. He asked me how things were going since my layoff.
I rattled off a bunch of things that I have accomplished in the last year and indicated that I am continuing to learn and grow. His response was of “awe” in how much I have done. He commented that I had done something amazing with the struggle and loss that I went through. That felt good. It doesn’t wipe away the pain but it does justify my belief that even through Rejection, you can use the pain to make yourself even better. So here is my challenge for you. You have been Rejected.
I empathize with you and agree that it sucks. In a while, please let me know how you will use your Rejection to make your life better. Close your eyes and imagine: “Where do you see yourself in the next 3 – 6 – 9 months?” “What do you hope to do with your life that will be better after this experience?” Next, find a community of friends who you can lean on and talk about this experience. I count on my Salesforce #ohana community to be there when I need to air grievances, and I also get to support others who may be going through similar situations. Want some more ideas: Read some more from the (Thanks Zayne). The following is partly taken from a letter I sent to Mr. Marc Benioff last week.
I have had some Salesforce #Ohana ask me to tell my story around Dreamforce 2016 and what has been happening with my Public School Challenge this year. I hope to inspire others to join me as I continue to help improve the education and lives of youth in my area. Thanks for all your support!
My name is Stuart Edeal. I live and work in St Paul, Minnesota, and I have been working with the Salesforce platform for many years. I attended the Dreamforce 2016 Keynote and listened to will.i.am speak about how Equality begins at school for America’s youth. Later that week, at the Marc Benioff Q&A Session, I was able to thank Marc for his work with adopting San Francisco schools and asked how I can also help the schools in my local community.
Marc’s answer was direct and relevant. He asked me the name of my local school, and the name of the principal of that school.
He challenged me to meet the principal and to ask him/her about the needs of that school. Results after Dreamforce In October, Amy Weaver interviewed me in the Keynote at a special post-Dreamforce Salesforce Event in Minneapolis. During this conversation, I retold the question I posed to Mr Benioff, as well as his response. Not only did that interview result in several subsequent conversations with members of the Salesforce community, but I also met many new people passionate about STEM education. Through local Salesforce Community Connections, I was invited to participate in Junior Achievement’s Career Day event at Humboldt High School. Humboldt is a St.
Paul Public High School, located near my home. At this event, I met with students from grades 9–12 and spoke with them one-on-one about their career questions and concerns. That day, I also met with Humboldt Staff and Teachers about their STEM education plans. STEM Leaders in my community Humboldt High School and the Academy of IT I met the Principal of Humboldt High School, Michael Sodomka, and discussed his vision for the school. Humboldt High School is aggressively trying to build opportunities for the diverse mix of students:. The student enrollment is 1,150.
Male/Female attendance is a 50% split. Total minority enrollment is at 94%. Economically Disadvantaged enrollment is at 93%.
Advanced Placement participation rate is 42% One of the opportunities that Humboldt offers is the Academy of Information Technology (AoIT). The AoIT is a technology learning community inside of Humboldt that offers an opportunity to study technology while preparing for college and careers in the IT industry. The AoIT was initially funded via a Youth Career Connect grant awarded by the U.S.
Department of Labor during the Obama Administration, which will expire in the next year. The AoIT is made up of three practices: – Common courses for a small group of students – College prep curriculum with a career focus, and – Partnerships with employers, communities and institutions of higher learning. AoIT cohorts include the following:. 9th grade – Basics of IT & Computing. 10th grade – Web Design.
11th grade – Computer Hardware. 12th grade – Advanced Networking I also got a chance to meet with the facilitators and teachers in the AoIT, and was amazed at their plans and the skills they were teaching these young students. In March 2017, I was asked to serve on the AoIT Advisory Council, and in April I was appointed to the School District’s Career & Technical Education (CTE) Advisory Board.
Paul Schools are working to increase the opportunities of their students in many career areas, including Technology, Robotics, Medical, Agriculture, Construction and many more areas. One of the major focuses of the St Paul CTE is Apprenticeships. They are equipping young students with not only the education they need to get careers but the opportunities through that they need to put that education into action.
This morning (July 27, 2017) I got to meet with Dr Joe Gothard, who is the new superintendent of the entire St Paul school district. We spoke about community involvement in schools, and I had a chance to tell him about the work going on so far. He was very receptive to more partnerships with the community to create opportunities for the St Paul students. St Paul Connections There are other opportunities for St Paul students, such as the. The mission of Silicon North Stars is to inspire and educate young Minnesotans to become future leaders in technology.
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The Silicon North Stars are preparing for a one-week tech camp held Silicon Valley. During the week, the students meet with leaders from top tech companies, startups, and venture capital funds. Past visits have included Facebook, YouTube, Google, Andreessen Horowitz, Lyft, Indiegogo, Galvanize SF, Intuit, Stanford University, Singularity University, TaskRabbit, and the Target Innovation Center. My hope is that programs like this continue to grow – perhaps a visit to Salesforce would be a future stop for these students? Needs The biggest needs for the Humboldt and the AoIT program are around four different areas:. Funding for Staffing and Equipment (as the funding from the Dept. Of Labor Grant ends, we will be looking for new sources of funding to continue this program).
Programming Opportunities (Internships, Job Shadowing, Tours, etc). Mentoring and Volunteers in the classrooms. Collaboration with other Education Leaders across the country. (The local leaders here are eager to speak with San Francisco school leaders about the work they have already done with their Salesforce partnership.) Next Steps I am committing my time to the St Paul School district this year.
I will be serving on the Career and Technical Education board, and I will be actively volunteering in the AoIT technology classes, and helping the staff with programming and fundraising. Thank you for your time and encouraging me to get involved with my local education system. I have benefited greatly from this challenge, and I hope that the youth of St Paul, MN will also benefit from our partnership. Stuart Edeal.
There is that awkward moment at a local event when you are at a table and don’t know anyone. Recently I was in this situation and found an empty seat next to a table of strangers and I felt awkward about “breaking the ice” but I knew that it needed to happen. From the conversation that was going on, I could tell the people next to me were Web Developers and there was a Project manager – oh, and me, a Salesforce Analyst. Now if this were a Salesforce conference or community event like Tahoe Dreamin or Midwest Dreamin, I would have a common topic to discuss – SALESFORCE.
However at non-Salesforce events, I feel I need to explain, evangelize and teach others about what a Salesforce or CRM Analyst is or does. Sometimes when my explanation falls flat (like today), I usually defer to talking about the mission of the nonprofit media org I work for. On the other side, when I try to ask the web developers what they do, I am disappointed with the answers I get.
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I expect an answer about the type of projects and not the technology stack being used. Knowing that someone focuses on the “Ruby on Python JAMP stack” doesn’t really tell me what is done or why they do what they do. After some attempts at finding a common technology topic to discuss, I sort of gave up.
I decide to just focus on my stuff which means I escape to my iPhone. I open my email and see an advertisement for local restaurant.
I mutter to myself “I wish I had a good idea for dinner tonight”. That random statement sparked something. Next thing I hear is “you too?” from Matthew, the web developer next to me. “I didn’t set anything out to prepare for dinner either!” he exclaimed.
I asked “So what would you have set out?”, somewhat embarrassed that my thoughts turned into audible mumbles. This verbal mistake, however, turned into a real conversation. Turns out Matthew has a killer chicken pot pie recipe for the slow cooker. We spent the next 30 minutes talking about food – recipes, techniques and flavors.
Not only did we share our cooking tips, but we shared our emails, so that we could send each other’s recipes. I made a new acquaintance based on nothing more than Chicken Pot Pie. What did I learn at this event? I learned a lot of good stuff. What will I remember from this event? I will remember Matthew and our discussion.
I am reminded of the Southeast Dreamin conferences from both 2016 and 2017. In 2016, invited us to “have coffee” with people and make personal connections. In 2017, asked us to consider our Work/Life balance so we can be a blessing to others. (See Chris’ Keynote talk ) These talks inspire me to get into a mode of connecting with others and looking for ways to give back. So if you find yourself wondering what you have in common with the person next to you, maybe you don’t have to try too hard. If you are next to me, try something that most people do – which is eat food. Interested in the Chicken Pot Pie recipe?
Let me know, cause I got a good one! This blog has been verified by Rise: Rfe1f8cdb79b786e72e0f31.
I attended and had a delightful time. I have been to Dreamforce 3x and last year attended MidWest Dreamin’. Both of which were wonderful for their own reasons, however there is something magical about TahoeDreamin’ that I LOVE. It is more intimate, more secluded and yet just as educational as other events. I am again amazed at the knowledge and the friendships that I come away with at a short, yet focused event.
Thursday Travel day – I didn’t get to Tahoe in the time I wanted to, but I did make it in time to attend the #WIT (Women In Tech) hosted Happy Hour. It was great – I got a chance to meet up with some of my friends from last year, including, and got to make some new friends, including, and others. Friday Friday was the learning day of TahoeDreamin.
Here is a high level recap of sessions I attended: 8am: How to set User Expectations in Salesforce to increase User Adoption w/ Takeaways: 1) Being a Salesforce Admin is more than just being an “Order Taker.” You are a leader and help improve the business process and business outcome. 2) Soft skills are just as, if not more important than, technical skills. Lyndsay spends 80% of her training time on soft skills – communicating, managing and working with clients. 3) Salesforce Adoption is not a straight line.
It can meander and curve and sometimes adoption goes down – keep working with users to improve and update your org. Adoption is an ever-moving thing. 9:00am: with and guests, including, and Takeaways: 1) Sarah Franklin spoke about her career path and how she made changes in her life. Change can be hard, but we should not let Fear take over your life choices. 2) We can/should/will help others. We can “” that others need. 3) Spring 17 has a LOT of updates, features and functionality that will wow you.
Paths, Streams, Flows, Utility Bars. I like what showed about the changes to Lightning and “bringing the power to the users”. It will make users’ experience more relevant by exposing the right data in the right context. 11am: How with and Takeaways 1) Security and Authentication is difficult. Matching the right person to the right account with the expected outcome takes consideration.
(I like how Doug said there is a reason why we have two buttons on the Trailhead page – LOGIN and SIGN UP) 2) Trailhead team uses Salesforce Authentication Services, Heroku, and other Salesforce tools to deliver Trailhead. 3) Sometimes I attend sessions that are way over my head, just because I am a huge fan of the presenters. 1:30pm: Take with Takeaways: 1) Christian Carter!
Open invitation to Christian Carter to come to Minnesota and speak to our users here. Then help me plan out my Lightning migration?!? 2) Moving to Lightning offers the admin a chance to freshen not only the look and feel of the interface, but a chance to rethink the business processes that users need when working in Salesforce.
More than just putting the right fields in the right order, its “what data” and “where” in the application do they want/need it. 3) I need to spend more time learning Lightning and trying different use cases. There is so much you can already do that it’s going to take a while to play around. 2:40pm: Lightning Myths with Takeaways 1) Don’t be afraid of Lightning. Start to use Lightning in your sandbox to try new things. 2) You can “upgrade” Classic apps to Lightning fairly easily. (a little too easy, huh?) 3) Flows in Lighning Console.
This looks really interesting and I will post more about this after I play with it. 4pm: Online Forms for Websites and Email Messages Using Flow with Takeaways 1) There are many ways of getting information from a web form into Salesforce, from Web-to-case, 3rd party apps, rest services, etc. You can also do this using force.com sites and visual workflow. 2) There is a AppExchange App from Salesforce Labs that is the. It may provide some ideas for new users to flow. 3) It is time for me to start playing with flow some more and see what scenarios I can come up with to help my org.
What I appreciated about these sessions was that the “Q&A” was real Q&A with real-life scenarios. This was something that you don’t always get at Dreamforce, because it is so fast-paced. I was able to ask specific questions about a product or business process directly with the expert and afterwards people came up to me and started talking to me about the question.
Other admins, consultants, software vendors, and MVPs were accessible for lively discussion over a topic that has been been a personal challenge. This was a great time for inspiration and ideas. Some of the other great discussions I had were in the hallways outside the sessions, including individual talks with, and Saturday The.plan. was to get early breakfast and go Snowmobiling.
However due to impending weather conditions, I decided to change my plans. Instead I with. This was an awesome turn of events, because we got to talk about all sorts of things. I am grateful that we got this time just to relax, have breakfast, walk around Tahoe and shop a little. We decided on that afternoon and spending time with some other great Salesforce Admins. We had a great dinner and all discussed life in the Salesforce ecosystem and life as people in this world.
It was amazing. I am once again reminded what a blessing I have right now to be surrounded by not only smart people, but honest, caring and fun people. In Reno:,. Sunday Sunday is travel day – and this was a hard one. My plane sat on the tarmac at both Reno and Phoenix for over an hour total.
I missed my flight home from Phoenix, however while I was there I found the greatest tweets. The was doing an impromptu lunch with, and not only did they invite me to come, I got a call on my cell phone to ask if I wanted a ride. (I didn’t get to go due to logistics, however it cemented in my mind what an AWESOME set of individuals that are part of this #ohana. ) If it weren’t for Twitter, I might have gone a little crazy. I did let American Airlines know (via Twitter and in person) that I was not a happy person. While stuck waiting for my flight, I did get to work on my 2017 Goal List, which now includes a couple new things. Thanks to everyone who joined us for the “” at Dreamforce 2016.
I am still thrilled that I was asked to be included with these other AWESOME presenters. If you have a question that wasn’t answered in the session, please let us know. A couple interactions recently caused me to write down my “go to” list of learning and knowledge about Salesforce. asked me (on the Power of Us Hub) “where do you go for Salesforce resources? “. One of the power-users at my org indicated that she would not be able to go to DreamForce this year, due to timing and cost. She indicated there must be other places for her to learn about Salesforce and connect with other users.
YES there is! My answer was a list of all sorts of stuff:. and (I still don’t get why these are separated.). reviews.
Twitter feeds and my Twitter friends. forums. website (download all the workbooks and guides). past sessions online.
Search for how-to’s and hands-on training. with Jen Lee, David Litton and Rakesh Gupta. with Missy Longshore. User group meetings.
I belong to the. You can join the no matter your location – the Success groups usually have an answer for you. I also am active in the Twin Cities. from Salesforce experts and Mvps. for Salesforce status and upcoming changes. If you have Salesforce premier support, the amount of knowledge and training they have is quite impressive.
Your. BA Blogs, Learning and Training Sites. with Laura Brandenburg. with Angela Wick. with Bob Prentiss. with Jonathan Babcock. with Abidemi Stephanie Famuyide.
with Dave Saboe. Universities do also offer Business Analysis courses. (For an example, see University of California Irvine’s course). (David Hussman).