December 13, 2023 • 48 mins
Ever wondered how to thrive in the Salesforce ecosystem? Wonder no more as we bring you the inspiring journeys of Salesforce admins, Jordyn Jaffer and Jason Ventura. Jordyn , an accidental admin, discovered her passion for Salesforce while working for the Atlanta Braves, and Jason, a retired naval officer, stepped into the Salesforce world with his project management skills. They share their experiences, challenges, and how they overcame them, lighting the way for those aspiring to tread similar paths.
It's not just about their journeys, we dive deeper into the Salesforce ecosystem. We discuss the importance of continuous learning and staying updated with the latest features and technologies. Platforms like Trailhead and user groups emerge as significant tools for knowledge exchange and hands-on experience with real-life business cases. We also touch on the psychological aspect - the trials of imposter syndrome, insecurities, and how to overcome them within the Salesforce community. Jordyn and Jason share their experiences and advice on overcoming these challenges and how they continue to learn and validate information.
Jordyn Jaffer (she/her) is a senior solution engineer at Sercante, specializing in Pardot and Salesforce support. After graduating from Northeastern University with a BS in Mathematics, she began her Salesforce/Pardot career as the accidental admin for the Atlanta Braves and became the expert for all things Salesforce and Pardot for the organization. Upon leaving the Braves at the end of 2019, she moved back up to the northeast and started working in the Student Financial Services department at her alma mater. She helped implement FinancialForce and Northeastern’s first community portal as one of the Salesforce Administrators for the university. Now at Sercante, Jordyn works with clients to implement Pardot and Salesforce and provides additional support and training when needed. Her motivation to continue learning the Salesforce platform and bringing that knowledge to others has helped her thrive in her role thus far. Outside of work, she enjoys drinking beer, hanging with her pets, attempting to read a book, and thoroughly enjoying all sorts of television shows.
Jason Ventura is a Salesforce Functional Analyst at Steampunk. He is an experienced technical project manager with a BS in Nuclear Engineering who decided to pivot into the Salesforce ecosystem after leaving the US Navy after 20 years of service. With his 5 Salesforce Certifications, AWS Cloud Certifications, Cybersecurity certifications, and Project Management Professional Certification, he brings his wealth of knowledge and experience to the ecosystem. When he’s not working, you'll find Jason chasing after his dogs, shuttling around his teenagers, earning a new badge on Trailhead, working with Veteran Transition programs, or spending time with his wife. His primary motivation is the feeling of helping clients really maximize Salesforce to its fullest potential (and build cool stuff too). He's based in the Greater Seattle Area with his wife, 4 teenagers, and 2 dogs.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Good morning and good afternoon.
My name is Jacob Catalano andwelcome to another episode of
Admins of Tomorrow.
This week, we're going to sitdown with two admins who do
similar work in the ecosystembut took two very different
paths to get there.
In this episode, we're thrilledto bring you inspiring journeys
from admins Jordan Jaffer andJason Ventura.
(00:39):
We're going to dive into howthey got started, what drives
them to grow in the ecosystemand how new admins can follow in
their footsteps.
Now.
I've had the pleasure of workingwith Jason and Jordan over the
last couple of years, and theirpassion for learning is only
matched by their drive to teachand help others.
I personally have gotten tolearn so much about flows and
(01:00):
automations from these two thatI honestly didn't realize they
just got started in theecosystem in about 2018 or 2019.
I was absolutely blown away tohear their Salesforce origin
stories and learn that they wentfrom barely knowing anything
about Salesforce to, after a fewyears, becoming solution
(01:21):
engineers and leading projectsand implementations of their own
.
It was an amazing talk and Ican't wait for everyone at home
to listen along.
So get ready to be inspired aswe uncover the stories behind
these trailblazing admins anddiscover the lessons they offer
for aspiring administrators.
So, without further ado, let'smeet Jordan and Jason.
(01:45):
Jordan Jaffer is a seniorsolution engineer at Cercante,
specializing in parandSalesforce support.
After graduating fromNortheastern University with a
BS in mathematics, she began herSalesforce and Parorg career as
an accidental admin for theAtlanta Braves and became the
expert for all things Salesforceand Parorg for the organization
(02:06):
.
Jordan's motivation to continuelearning the Salesforce
platform and bringing thatknowledge to others has helped
her thrive in her role.
Jason Ventura is a Salesforcefunctional analyst at Steampunk
LLC, specializing in declarativeSalesforce development in
support of government servicesat the Department of Homeland
Security.
(02:26):
Jason holds five Salesforcecertifications multiple
cybersecurity and AWS cloudcertifications, along with
project management and scrummaster certifications.
Jason is a retired navalofficer with over 20 years of
technical leadership experienceas a nuclear engineer.
So let's not waste any more time, let's dive on in.
(02:48):
So, without further ado, I'mreally happy to have you, jordan
, and you, jason, on the podcastdiving on in to kind of started
all off again.
We talked about this is for thenext generation of admins, for
(03:11):
the people who are eitherfinding that second career in
life or people just gettingstarted out.
I'd love to dive into y'allstories and letting Jordan kind
of dive in first.
What inspired you to kind ofstart down this path of being in
the Salesforce ecosystem?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah, well, I wouldn't say I was fully
inspired to get into Salesforce,more so how most people get
into it as an accidental admin.
So I actually, going out,coming out of college, my main
goal was to just work for asports team did not care Well, I
(03:52):
did care what I was doing, butI wanted it to be more data
analytics.
So when I got my job at theAtlanta Braves, I was doing
analytics for the business teamwhile also helping them
transition from MicrosoftDynamics to Salesforce, and
during that I got inspired toactually stay with Salesforce
(04:14):
and part of it as well marketingclouding account engagement as
well.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
We're a part of forever group over here, so yeah
, cool, cool part of the entiretime.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
But yeah, that's how I got into the Salesforce
ecosystem.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
See, I love the stories of accidental admins.
I was talking with Haley Tullerabout this on the last episode,
but I do feel like there's kindof this misconception about
what is an accidental admin, ordo accidental admins kind of
deserve to be where they are?
Did they just kind of againaccidentally fall into that to
it, or did they actually putforth the work and effort to
(04:54):
grow and develop as a admin?
So I know we'll dive more intoyour story, because I know
you've absolutely earned it andthen some.
But it's always kind of funhearing from the people who say,
yep, I was just an accidentaladmin.
But I know, jason, you're onthe opposite end of the spectrum
though, so I'm curious yeah,what brought you into the
(05:14):
ecosystem?
Speaker 3 (05:15):
I am a intentional admin, if you will.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
So how it?
Speaker 3 (05:23):
happened to me.
My story is a little bit longer, I guess, but it starts pre
COVID.
I've been in the Navy for 18 orso years and I was thinking,
you know, retirement's coming up.
I still had no idea what Iwanted to do, so I started just
(05:43):
looking at transition programsand I got accepted into this one
transition program called FourBlock, which is sponsored by the
Syracuse University and it's athrough a foundation Started by
an army captain who was injuredin Iraq in the early 2000s, and
(06:08):
this Program was designed toexpose transitioning military
invets to some of the larger,like fortune 500, companies.
So they're sponsored by a bunchof different companies Microsoft
, you know, the Bill and MelindaGates Foundation is really huge
out here in Washington and onthe West Coast.
(06:29):
So basically they do, you know,you do campus visits, and so I
went to the Google campus here.
I've been to Amazon.
I went to go daddy headquartershere we did presentations on
career development and stufflike that.
And so I was like man, how do Ido this?
Because I've been a projectmanager forever, right, like if
(06:51):
you're any kind of leadership inthe military or project manager
.
I mean, it's all.
I mean it could just be, youknow picking up trash, but so
project is it's transferableskills, 100%, 100% yeah, so Did
four block.
It was amazing and a lot ofgreat people made a lot of good
contacts.
Talk to Mike Kelly.
(07:14):
It's not the same Mike Kelly.
The works are surcontae, but heworks for SAP.
He's Yep, he's a CIS SP, youknow internet security guru guy,
and he recommended that I Checkout Salesforce.
(07:35):
He's like it, look it's I don'twant to say it's a low barrier
of entry, but you know, it's askill that's in demand and all
kinds of stuff.
And so I started doingtrailhead and Learning and I was
like, oh man, this stuff'sreally cool.
Then the pandemic hit, you know, and it kind of changed
everything.
My job got insane because I was, you know, the guy I was
(07:57):
working with technically.
He was the, he was the, thelead operations officer, the
operations officer, and I washis deputy.
He ended up leaving, he retired, he's like I'm leaving, I'm
getting out, this is the timefor me to go.
And so I ended up being theoperations officer and the COVID
Officer for my base, which isthis was the third largest Navy
(08:19):
base in the world.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
It's five installations spread out over
like I don't know, it's like 175geographic miles yeah so I mean
, yeah, that's not projectmanagement, I don't know what is
.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
I'm getting you know, I'm getting phone calls at 2 am
and just sailors doing dumb andI get a phone call and I'd have
to call my chiefs and havepeople you know and then I have
to call captain, I mean it wasjust crazy and all the time, you
know the whole, while I'm likein the back of my head I'm like
retirements coming, retirementscoming, and so as I got closer
and my relief showed up, whichwas the new guy and God bless
(08:54):
him, he's.
He's still there, he's still,he's still trucking along.
But you know, then I joinedMaravis, I did some veterati
phone calls, which veterati is agreat resource.
Anybody can.
Anybody can be a mentor inveterati.
You don't have to be retiree orprior military if you just want
to do mentorship, for you knowtransitioning active sir, active
(09:18):
duty, you know veterans andmilitary spouses.
You know it's been invaluableto me.
I mean, I talked with three orfour different mentors before I
decided on the path I was gonnago on.
I still have a group of mentorsthat I bounce ideas off of and
everything else, and the mentorin particular that I talked to,
(09:39):
jerry limb.
We are actually now really goodfriends and and she still, I
still would consider a mentorshe recommended I applied to
Maravis and so I I checked itout and I applied and I got an
email from At the time was AmyHarris, who's the project
manager.
She's moved on, works at cloudcare and she, you know, was like
(10:03):
yeah, you're in.
So then that started my journeyand then I met Haley there
through Maravis and then shereferred me to.
So I'm saying so, for me it wasvery intentional.
I made the decision that thatwas something I wanted to do and
but I also think it's reallyfascinating for that.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
You were Passionate about this enough to move
quickly.
So I mean you said that and Ididn't realize this until you
and I had kind of briefly talkedprior to the recording and
everything.
But you had said you had justgot started and thought about
doing this Right before slashlike mid at COVID.
So I mean you've only been inthe ecosystem as a whole as a
(10:47):
starting admin, learning thesystems to being the subject
matter expert for multipleclients, all within a One and a
half two-year period of time soyeah, I mean yeah, next month
would have been my two-yearanniversary at Sarkante, so I
joined the team and I was Supergreen.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
the only work I had done was in Trailhead and some
other side project stuff like,but that does just go to show
that you can learn a lot inthose systems and finding those
platforms.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
So whether, like you're an accidental admin and
you are with a company andyou're thrown into the fire to
learn it all, or You're justgung-ho Into learning the
systems on your own, whetherit's reading the documentation
or going to Trailhead, I meanthat's really really impressive
to to get where you've gotten.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
The best thing of the best piece of advice I can give
anybody is get into a salesforce, get into it, and I don't
mean Firing up a trailheadplayground and doing trails, I
mean get in, break it and thenfigure out how to fix it.
I mean that is the absolutebest way to do it.
I Honestly, like I hit triplestar ranger or whatever, like I
(12:08):
don't know, six, eight monthsago and I've gotten three badges
since then, because I havespent so much time in the orgs
yeah, in the orgs, like forclient work and and even our own
, you know, circante work, doingwork in there, I'm helping make
things better there.
So, like getting in the organand trying to do complex things,
that's the way to do it I wantto take that actually, because
(12:30):
that's a wonderful point.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
I learned that way as well.
I need to be in the system.
I need to to break the fun toysand learn how to do that.
Jordan, I'm curious if you'resimilar in that regard.
Or how, how do you go aboutlearning more, learning new
things in the ecosystem?
Because there's I know thatafter talking with a few
(12:52):
different people now about thein throughout these interviews
and kind of learning how peopleUnderstand and consume.
We're kind of all over theplace in the ecosystem of
whether you are a Documentationperson, you're a trailhead
person or you just need to be inan org.
So I'm curious your take onthat.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
I'm definitely similar to where being in an org
hands-on experience, movingaround, navigating, learning
everything kind of on your ownin the fun.
That's definitely a way I liketo learn.
But I'm also heavily intotrailhead.
Similar to Jason, I think I'm asix-time Ranger.
(13:35):
I don't know, I forgot where Iwas.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
You're an all-you've got to be like an all-star
Ranger, then I think as five asa list badge, like then you get
the-oh, cool, you get the bigone, then I believe I am an
all-star Ranger.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Um, yay.
The big thing I want tohighlight on Trailhead is if you
aren't currently working forsomeone and you don't have
access to an actual org outsideof, you know you can get a dev
org and whatever play with that,but sometimes it's nice to have
an actual org like real-lifebusiness cases that you have to
(14:09):
go and build stuff out.
I highly recommend Super Badgeson Trailhead.
I really love going intoactually having a full-here's a
business use case.
You need to spend the next fourto six hours figuring it out
all on your own.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
So kind of thinking through that kind of breakdown,
because I know for me I don'tpersonally use Trailhead all
that much, only because I wantto work with all the variety of
data options.
So, plus, my background is moremarketing focused, so the
things I would need to work onand grow within Trailhead
(14:53):
usually revolve around email,HTML design and kind of the
different things you can doinside of an engagement studio
program.
That would require a little bitmore meat than what a dev org
can provide.
But I'm curious though Jason,you got your start and you used
solutions and kind of learningtraining resources like Maravis,
(15:15):
like Vetter is it Vetterati?
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Yeah, Vetterati, I'm saying that correctly.
Vetterati is like a mentorshipplatform, so it's a little bit
exclusive, but they're kind ofexclusive kind of groups to
veterans, yes, but there's theirother non-veteran groups exist
though for those kind ofmentorship programs, kind of
like a more advanced and morecomplex user group, is kind of
(15:38):
how I think of those situations.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So I'm curious whenever whether prior to being
in working with Sir Conte orprior to working with a company
where you can get your handsinside of an org if you learn
there's a new topic out there,if you learn there's a new
product feature, how are yougoing about learning said new
thing?
So for use case though, for newadmins getting started, they're
(16:04):
probably hearing a bunch aroundAI.
They're probably hearing abunch around what you can do
with that for being an admin inthe ecosystem right now.
So if I wanted to try to learnthat new topic or learn more
about, kind of some of the newautomations you can do as an
admin, how would you get startedin that situation so I can
(16:27):
repeat what you're doing?
Speaker 3 (16:28):
So what I would say to do is the blogs on the
community, blogs like the adminblog, the developer blog, the
architects they all have, youknow, content specific to that
group, but they always get, theyalways touch like the new
(16:52):
hotness or whatever it is like.
It's AI this year and last yearit was marketing cloud and data
rama and all that stuff.
Got my CDP shirt on, yeah.
Customer data platform, omnistudio and Omni channel the year
before that they always do alot of like really big blog
posts on it with a video thatshe's really attached.
(17:13):
You know Shailen Brand and herteam and everybody who does all
of that there for the contentfor specifically admins, that
admin blog man, I can't tell youhow many times that thing saved
my ass on, you know, inbuilding and learning and really
truly understanding a keyconcept.
Because you know, back toJordan's point about super
badges, yeah, you're going tolearn how to do it and you're
(17:37):
going to pass that badge, but itmay take you.
Yeah, four to six hours is agenerous, is it?
Or is a that's for somebodywho's like super proficient with
Salesforce.
Some people it takes 20 hoursto finish one of those things,
but you may.
There may be some features orsomething that you don't realize
, because a lot of times inSalesforce there's a couple of
different ways to do something.
(17:58):
You know you don't always haveto be pigeonholed into.
Like, if you're really good atwriting NET notation and you
have background in JavaScript,your solution may be more
inclined to go down the apexroute.
You know Now, as an adminstarting out, you may not have
that.
But you never know, likeanybody.
You know admins come fromanywhere it could be you know
(18:19):
anyone.
You may have a background orsomething that can affect that
or be able to help you solvethose business problems, and you
may not know it until you watchlike or you read a blog or you
know watch a video by somebody,or something like that.
So I would say you got to go tothe mothership at first, right,
because everybody's going to.
Everybody else who writes it isgoing off of what they're
(18:41):
saying.
So go to the source, get the.
You know it's still going to becolored by.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
You know, with Salesforce's, you know
sprinkling of, yes, this is theamazing thing but, you know I
mean to pass any cert, to passany super bench, you have to go
by what?
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Salesforce says the answers yeah, you get to build
it their way, but that's just abad thing.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I do want to call out for the people helping pay our
paychecks.
They it's not a bad thing tofollow the Salesforce way, but
there are always going to bedifferent use cases and
different paths to go down,because no company does things
the best practice kind of way.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
Yeah, and your, you know those blogs and those
resources that are out there arefantastic.
That's a fantastic way toreally kind of just wrap your
brain around any kind of newSalesforce ecosystem technology
concepts.
And then you go from there.
Then you've got you know the,you know Salesforce Ben, then
you've got the spot formarketing and all around other
(19:42):
good stuff.
So I totally recommend you know, start at the mothership, go to
Salesforce, check out the.
You know the different blogs,join user groups and because
you're also, you could get lucky.
And you know your user group isa larger one and somebody from
Salesforce comes in and demossomething to you for you that
nobody's seen yet.
So expose yourself to all ofthat stuff and get yourself out
(20:07):
there.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
I want to kind of transition a little bit, because
we've talked about ways you canlearn new things and some of
the resources to find.
I want to pass to Jordan onthis one.
You were talking earlier.
You got your start.
You wanted to work for a sportsfranchise and you were able to
accomplish that, which in and ofitself is a hard and amazing
(20:29):
thing to do.
You now, after however manyyears displaced from that are
double digits, timed, certifiedyou are an all star ranger
inside a trail ahead.
You do all these amazing things.
Additionally, you are also apart of helping with the
community event north of thecommunity event, northeast
(20:52):
dreaming, and you also have auser group.
You help, do you lead it or colead it?
Speaker 2 (20:59):
To lead.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
So but still you co lead a user group as a whole to
go from kind of accidental admin.
How did you, what was thatjourney like to get from kind of
point a to point b, but alsowhat were some of the things you
and resources you use to get tothat point?
Because I know a lot ofstarting admins out there would
be interested to kind of learnhow do I get involved like that
(21:23):
and how do I learn how to be abetter admin so that I have
enough clout and resume to bethat person.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah, I think for the most part, find your support
system.
And going back to my time withthe Braves, so as we implemented
Salesforce, I was brought on asthe Salesforce admin just
because I had showed interest init and no one else needs
(21:55):
Salesforce at the Braves.
And it was definitely astruggle of my first two years
in the ecosystem because I didnot have any I don't want to say
human resources like supportsystem.
Basically, I don't want tocontinue use support system.
I only had one other teammember, salesforce developer,
(22:20):
who it was a little difficult totalk to and he was a code first
person.
So, as a new admin trying tolearn, like flow and everything,
we have a process requestcoming and like this is perfect
for flow, and then he would belike no, I'll just go.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
Like Python or something.
Yeah, this is, we can code thisout.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah, yeah, it's like no, Jordan, you don't need to
work on your admin skills, I'lljust go code this out.
So it was definitely a struggle.
During that time and shortlybefore I finally left the Braves
, I ended up at a part usergroup meeting and, through my
(23:08):
teammate who we kind of co-partat admin for the Braves, megan
McFerrin, which I believe you'vemet Yep.
Through that experiencelistening to Aaron Duncan run
that meeting and everything soonafter I moved back up to the
Northeast.
In general not even in myprofessional life, I just needed
(23:31):
a better support system.
So in general, moving to theNortheast, back to where I was
from, it helped.
And then, of course, got a jobat my alma mater, northeastern,
and then pandemic yay.
But it was actually kind ofpositive for me in the way that
it helped me get so much moreinvolved with the community.
(23:53):
At that time, right around thattime is when the inaugural
marketing champions programhappened and it was you nominate
yourself and I threw my hat inthe ring, even though at that
time I wasn't even in marketing.
I did nothing marketing relatedfor two years but I was like,
hey, let's do this, why not?
(24:15):
And getting accepted into thatprogram and having the
requirement I don't want to sayrequirement like homework, but
as a marketing champion we'resupposed to help out in the
ecosystem once per quartereither through speaking blogs,
whatever.
So having that opportunity justkind of helped me, give me a
(24:36):
good push to start getting intothe community.
So started with blog writingacross different websites until
Salesforce then found me, stoleme, but now we use this thought
Sorry, salesforce, then I'mjoking.
I'm still doing stuff withSalesforce then too.
(24:57):
But luckily during that time Iwas able to do one in person
Boston Women Tech meetup meetthe leader at the time, right
before shutdown happened, andthen a few months later she had
reached out in the community andsaid that her co-lead had moved
on to the mothership and couldno longer co-lead.
(25:18):
It sounds like she died.
Yeah, I know.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Yeah, so for the new admins if you work for
Salesforce which is an amazingopportunity but just have to
throw it's amazing opportunityto be able to work for
Salesforce, However, you don'thave the ability to lead a
community events when you startbeing employed by said company.
(25:42):
So that is one drawback, butone person's kind of benefit of
being a Salesforce turned intoyour benefit of being able to be
a part of this user group, apart of this community.
So kind of transitioning alittle bit.
What do you believe is the mostbeneficial thing of being one,
(26:03):
being a part of a user group butthen also kind of leading a
user group?
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Yeah, I think in general, just being a part of a
user group, it is very nice toget collectively, get around
with a group of people you allhave like minds, whether or not
it's the women in tech, thedeveloper, architect, whatever
user group you know.
You're meeting up with peoplewho have the same interests and
(26:32):
I do love how a lot of the usergroups have variations of what
they do.
They'll have panelists come inshare their experience.
Maybe we do virtual happy hoursevery now and again.
Let's come, let's chat.
You have problems you have tohelp solution each other.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
That sounded very weird If you have issues within
Salesforce, we will help createsolutions.
But I guess back to youroriginal point, which I really
like, is that you have to findyour people.
You have to find your supportsystem, whether it is a
professional support system or apersonal support system.
(27:11):
This ecosystem and the workthat we do as Salesforce admins,
part admins, architects, admin,admin, ellipers, whatever you
want to call it.
The work we do, while easiercomparatively than some
professions out there in theworld, it's still difficult work
to do because you're not onlyhaving to work within a
(27:32):
technology that is not theeasiest to manage software, but
also you're working alongsideother people.
You're having to do a lot ofpeople managing alongside the
software management.
Having that group, that supportsystem, those people to call
your own, to vent with, to learnfrom, to share those
(27:54):
experiences with, I think is areally, really important thing
to make sure you find early on.
I love that you organicallycalled that out, Jason.
I'm curious.
Same question for you what isthe biggest value you get from
user groups?
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Well, I'm in a different situation here.
The closest user group is theone in Seattle and it was
defunct for a while.
It has started back up justrecently.
However, they do it on theweekends obviously, like
Salesforce Saturdays and stufflike that.
I have kids and they take awayall my time in my life
(28:36):
Salesforce Saturdays is so hardto go to Just in general, I
participate in support andMarivis I have my circumnautate
chat at the top and then Marivisis right below it.
I'm always in there getting oncalls, doing resume reviews with
(28:57):
people who are looking at abreak into the ecosystem, or
giving advice very similaradvice to a lot of the advice
that I give to our coworkers.
I feel like Thanks for watching.
I went from you know and beingpart of an organization like
Circonte.
We're kind of our own usergroup too.
So I find that, yeah, it'sgreat to get somebody's opinion
(29:24):
on something, whether it's acareer transition or it's.
You know where should I?
You know what?
How do I need to change thevalidation rule or formula or
whatever?
I think it's invaluable.
I think having that supportsystem is incredibly helpful,
but I also think it does takesome work to find it right.
(29:44):
Like I mean just listening toJordan's story, you know.
I mean it was just you have toseek it out.
It's not like I mean let's justbe honest.
I mean things just don't fallfrom the sky.
You know most of them.
So I think the one thing thatuser groups give you that you
(30:05):
don't just get if you're toilingaway as a lone admin on your
computer is you get perspective?
You know we just talked about afew minutes ago.
You know that they're, yes,super badges you got to do
things the Salesforce way butthat there are multiple ways of
doing it.
You can get so locked into aproblem that you can't see the
(30:27):
forest for the trees right,because you're just staring at
it and you're like, man, I'mgoing to use the force and will
this thing to work.
There's been multiple times,like whenever I worked on things
and just having a second set ofeyes to say, am I going crazy?
Does this look right?
And then it's like oh, yeah,okay, you know, like, especially
(30:47):
like.
This is one thing that alwaysgets me like.
You work your ass off.
You build this really awesomeformula, you go check syntax and
it gives you the red FU at thebottom, where it's like you have
, but then it says it gives younothing else.
It just says you have an extraparentheses and you're like I
know I've counted them all.
That's happened to me a coupleof times and I'm like, hey, adam
(31:10):
, you know, or at Sir Conte,right, because we're going to
talk about them, I used to workthere.
I'd be like, hey, Adam, thisformula is kicking my ass.
And he looks at it and he'slike, oh, you need to put a
space between the comma and theterm.
And I'm like, then why the hellis it telling me about the
parentheses?
And he's like, because it'sdumb, it's just telling you it
can't compile and run.
So you get that perspective ina user group and it's not in a
(31:35):
professional setting, but it'snot in your work setting.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
No, you know, you get that Plus you don't have to
worry about that fear of failure, which I think for me was a
really important distinction,and I love how you organically
called out the doesn't have tobe a Salesforce branded user
group.
It can just be a.
It can be, it can be like.
(31:58):
So again, we all we all at onepoint or another, have worked
for Sir Conte and that in and ofitself was kind of a user group
.
We could bounce ideas off eachother.
You are able to have Marifus.
There's so many other placeslike that that either are
affiliated to a Salesforcecommunity thing or they're just
their own entity.
(32:19):
But you do have to seek it outand find that to get that extra
set of eyes, to get thatvalidation.
I said it on the last episode,whether it's something that just
with the culture the way it is,we from a young age strive for
validation.
As children, as young adults,as older adults, we want a need
(32:44):
to have that extra person comein and say what you are thinking
is correct or no, tweak things,look at things in a different
perspective, whether that's froma technical standpoint or
that's from a just kind of howyou're operating in the
operating in the ecosystemstandpoint.
Having that validation iscrucial for growth and one of
(33:05):
the biggest benefits you'regoing to get from a support
system you find.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
The bravest thing people can do when they first
try the ecosystem and raisetheir hand is raise their hand
and say I think I know what I'mdoing, but please tell me, help
me out.
That's the bravest thing youcan do and that's the hardest
thing that people can do.
To much to your point, Jacob.
I mean you were in theecosystem for six years before
you really started.
(33:32):
Did anything with anyone, yeahbut then you realize you just
get exposed to this wider groupof people and whether you
interact, with them.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
I made things way harder than I needed to make
them.
Speaker 3 (33:43):
And that's honestly, that's human nature too.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
That's an episode for another time in itself.
We are ending the kind ofinterview itself.
We've had a lot of greatconversations so far.
I do want to kind of wrap thisup though, kind of talking about
one kind of big question.
I'm trying to change it weekover week so that we're not
asking just the same questionover and over, because likely
(34:09):
we'll get a lot of the sameanswers.
So last week I had asked Haileyif you could give one piece of
advice to admins in the futureand how they should grow.
A lot of it was kind of whatwe've talked about Find your
support system, find ways youcan be a mentor, find ways to
(34:29):
teach, even if you're justlearning things.
So on the opposite side, what'sone of the biggest regrets you
have throughout your Salesforcejourney that you wish you could
tell your former self you'restarting out admin self to do
differently.
So I'm going to let Jasonanswer this first.
Speaker 3 (34:50):
So what would I?
So I would even go further backand say get into Salesforce a
lot earlier than you did.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
That's like one of the things I would say.
Speaker 3 (35:02):
To go back two years and to tell myself I would be
like don't be afraid of failure,don't be afraid of imposter
syndrome.
You know you're here, it's timeYou've.
You know you've done your timein the barrel, as we used to say
in the Navy.
You know you didn't.
(35:25):
You got hired because of whoyou are and what you can become,
not because of what you areright at this moment.
That's what I would tell myself.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
So I'm curious.
I love that answer because Imean I think Jordan and I can.
I don't want to speak for you,jordan, but I know I experienced
imposter syndrome and have thefear of failure.
I mean, I talked about thebeginning.
Even just putting this podcastout there, I was constantly in
the mindset of no one's going togive one care in the world,
(35:54):
with this 30 year old white guyis going to say no one is going
to care at all what this personis going to think.
But I'm kind of putting myselfout there being vulnerable and
just having these conversations.
I do think there's value toyour point of you want to tell
your former self don't worryabout the imposter syndrome, own
who you are and just give ityour all.
(36:16):
How did you overcome that whenyou were first getting started?
Where are some of the thingsthat maybe admins can kind of
put into practice to get overtheir own insecurities?
Speaker 3 (36:28):
I think the biggest thing for me was realizing that
everything that I did that Ifound stressful in the beginning
.
I wasn't the first person tostress out about it, you know,
whether it's building formulasor it's doing things, doing
configuration, that I'd neverdone before Asking questions to
(36:49):
me.
You know, if you look back inour internal channels and stuff,
I very rarely, if ever, askedsolution questions when I first
joined the team.
Now, well, up until today, youknow I was very, you know I was
a participant, very activeparticipant, and it's because I
learned as much from talkingabout it, because anytime I
(37:11):
wrote advice for somebody inthere, I would jump in and check
it out and make sure I wasright.
I always, almost always,whenever I was answering a
question from somebody orwhatever somebody was reaching
out to me and having aSalesforce question, I would do
some quick research myself tomake sure that I wasn't crazy.
That has become a part of mydaily life, like when it comes
(37:36):
to working in Salesforce anddoing anything Before I do it,
even something simple well,maybe not something simple as
creating a field, but somethingthat's a little bit more
configuration based.
I want to make sure likeenabling accounts as campaigns,
you know, as campaign members.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
I looked it up, even for field like double check, the
formulas, double checkingrelationship, lookups Like, even
stuff like that you always haveto double, triple check.
Speaker 3 (38:01):
To just get into the rhythm of it, and I think that
is the way that you overcome theimposter syndrome is you set a
routine, okay, like if I'm goingto do a configuration change,
before I do said configurationchange, I'm just going to go
take a look and make surenothing's changed, make sure
that Salesforce didn't push ahot fit or hot fix or something
overnight is going to changewhatever, just so that I can go
(38:23):
into doing that task withconfidence.
Now, if you're brand new, ifyou've never done the task
before, you can find videos onYouTube and Google is your
friend Now, chat, gpt, google,barred, whatever.
Take all that stuff with agrain of salt, because it's a,
it's not an AI, it's a, it's alanguage learning model.
Just be aware, it's a.
(38:43):
It's a algorithm that pulls outkey words and maybe come more
in the future.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
But yeah, you're absolutely right, it is
scrolling the internet andhelping answer your questions.
Yeah better form of Google.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
But the other point of that is, you know, like I
said, you're not the firstperson to try to do this.
There are hundreds, if notthousands, of people out there
who've done this and had issueswith it.
My first task as a professionalSalesforce professional was to
build a formula field thatdisplayed a little JPEG of stars
(39:17):
based on a rating.
You know you do something verysimilar to this in like one of
the basic admin trails.
I freaked out about that shit,like I was like oh my god, what
am I doing wrong?
What is wrong with this?
And I seriously worked myselfup into a tizzy over it and the
reality was is like you know,the way overcame, that was, I
took a huge step back, I walkedaway from my computer and I was
(39:41):
like you know what I can do this, and I finished it and I sent
it off to the consultant andlife was okay.
It's just being is.
You know, taking that first stepis really really hard, it's
really really daunting, so askfor help.
You know, don't be afraid offailure, because you know you
(40:02):
got to learn and that's howyou're gonna learn right.
It's by breaking stuff.
You're gonna fail at it andyou're gonna finally get over
your, your pride and yourself-consciousness to ask for
help, and that you know, ifyou're a solo admin like you're
the single admin in the companythat help may come from that
user group or the communityforums.
(40:24):
Or throwing up a flare onLinkedIn saying, hey, how the
hell do I do this?
You know that that may be whatit comes down to.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
I love that.
Just don't be afraid to putyourself out there and ask the
questions.
I know it's, it's.
There's probably somepsychological answer we could do
, like how to overcome theinability just to even ask the
question in the first place.
But that's a different podcastfor a different time as a whole.
But I am with you, I will say.
Coming from previous companieswhere my whole background was I
(40:57):
was the subject matter expert, Iwas supposed to be the one to
answer the questions when I camein to be a consultant and this
job as Serkante was the firsttime I ever done anything
consulting oriented.
When other people are coming tome for the answer and I'm just
like wait, do I actually know?
Maybe I've just been likefooling people for the last
(41:17):
seven, eight years, maybe Idon't know the answer, and so I
definitely think not having thatsupport system.
But then don't be afraid to tapthat support system for answers
for that, for that information.
I love that.
Jordan, you get the lastquestion to wrap us up
Throughout your journey andyou've had an amazing journey
(41:39):
what work?
What is that kind of one keyregret you may have and what
would you want to tell yourformer self to change that past?
Speaker 2 (41:49):
Similar to Jason whole imposter syndrome,
everything.
But I took it in a differentdirection where I was like,
alright, I need the proof toeverybody that I know everything
, everything there is to knowabout Salesforce and when I say
everything, I mean all the damnproducts.
And it's actually funny becausemy first few badges on
(42:13):
Trailhead, if you look, is forSalesforce Classic.
The Atlanta brand's never usedClassic.
So, starting my journey, Idon't even know what I was
learning.
So figure out what to learnfirst.
Don't confuse yourself, but tryto find your niche or what you
(42:36):
want to be a subject matterexpert.
In Very early on I thought Ineeded to get badges and
everything, have a high levelreview of all the clouds, get
all the certifications, prove Iknow it and, of course, with my
(42:57):
certification amount that I havenow you can see I am not doing
the best at bringing that back,but I've definitely been more
intentional about my learning.
I want to go on an architectpath.
Let me focus on that.
Yes, I want to learn thingslike health cloud, financial
services cloud, so we can bringclients in this country with
(43:18):
those clouds.
But also I need to realize calmdown, focus on your own journey
.
You don't need to know everysingle product.
To be a Salesforce expert I'mpretty good at sales cloud,
nonprofit cloud, partot,whatever I can bring that
expertise.
Yes, I want to learn other ones, but let me focus on honing
(43:42):
those skills, becoming a subjectmatter expert in those fields,
and then I can play around withlike other products later on in
my free time if I want.
But yeah, finding your nicheand if you're new to the
ecosystem, try to look into that.
Try to look and see what toolsare needed.
And a CPQ has been somethingthat forever in OEs.
(44:07):
We need CPQ experts in theecosystem.
I attempted to learn that.
I'm glad I'm not doing thatanymore.
It's a difficult one but that'sa great example as you're
coming into the ecosystem.
See what we need talent for Datacloud is a big thing.
Start learning data cloud,marketing cloud, but also pick a
(44:33):
path that you actually enjoy.
Don't go and learn CPQ, becauseyou'll get a job.
Uh, lawrence, apq if you likeit.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
No, I think I love that.
That is a very good.
I mean I got lucky because I Igot a degree in marketing, I got
an internship in marketing,just thinking I'd become like a
director of marketing somewhere,and it fell into part.
Out fell into marketing,automation and data org.
But for so many admins outthere they hear Salesforce and
(45:08):
then they hear how muchSalesforce admins make and
whatnot and they just gostraight into something and they
try to learn everything aboutit, to just make that paycheck
and it's to remind yourself getgood in a thing, yes, but also
do it because you enjoyed andyou can be really good at it.
I love that kind of advice toget good at one thing.
Speaker 2 (45:32):
So I would like the ad on the notifications.
I know we're at the very, veryend, Uh, but one thing that I've
done don't study a topic andjust go for a certification and
now say you're an expert.
I have the education cloudconsultant.
Sir, I have never stepped footin education cloud, so I feel
(45:54):
like an imposter at this pointwalking around with this cert
when I have no actual experience.
So, granted, I was supposed toget experience.
Northeast room was going tomove to Eda.
I didn't get involved, whoknows whatever.
So there was a reason why I gotthe search.
I didn't just do thatwilly-nilly, I did.
Speaker 3 (46:16):
I did a little bit of bitterness, but that is a good.
Speaker 1 (46:18):
That is a good kind of thing to call out and I've
seen this kind of conversation alot of just because you have
the cert.
That does add some credibilityto you and that's an amazing
thing to have, but a cert doesnot make it SME, so I love that.
Well, thank you both forjumping on today.
(46:39):
We've talked about a lot ofstuff.
I really really appreciate youtaking the time.
Jordan, I'll be seeing youaround.
Jason, I'll be seeing youaround.
I really appreciate you bothand thank you for providing this
insight for the admins oftomorrow.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Yeah, yeah, thank you for having us.
Speaker 1 (46:55):
Bye y'all, Take care.
Speaker 2 (46:57):
Bye, I'll miss you, jason.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
And that wraps up another insightful episode of
admins of tomorrow.
Now, I don't know about you,the listener, but for me, I took
away from this episode thatsuccess isn't merely just
getting the job or completingyour next project.
It's the journey, thechallenges you face, the lessons
you learn, but ultimately, thedrive and motivation that keeps
(47:31):
you moving forward.
So we hope you found thesestories of success as motivating
and enlightening as we did.
A big thank you to ourincredible guests, jason and
Jordan, for sharing theirremarkable stories with us.
I also want to thank you, thelistener.
We said it last week, we'regoing to say it again we're so
incredibly thankful to have thisopportunity to be working with
(47:53):
our amazing guests, but also toshare such inspirational stories
.
Also, if you have any feedback,we'd love to hear your thoughts
.
So please don't hesitate toconnect with us on LinkedIn,
twitter or go to our website,adminsoftomorrowcom, and share
your thoughts with us.
Don't forget to find us onApple podcasts or Spotify.
Subscribe to get updates eachweek when new episodes come out
(48:17):
and share it with your fellowtrailblazers.
Once again, I'm Jacob Catalano,your host, signing off.
We appreciate you for listeningto Admins of Tomorrow,
trailblazing the next generation.
Good morning and good afternoon.
My name is Jacob Catalano andwelcome to another episode of
Admins of Tomorrow.
This week, we're going to sitdown with two admins who do
similar work in the ecosystembut took two very different
paths to get there.
In this episode, we're thrilledto bring you inspiring journeys
from admins Jordan Jaffer andJason Ventura.
(00:39):
We're going to dive into howthey got started, what drives
them to grow in the ecosystemand how new admins can follow in
their footsteps.
Now.
I've had the pleasure of workingwith Jason and Jordan over the
last couple of years, and theirpassion for learning is only
matched by their drive to teachand help others.
I personally have gotten tolearn so much about flows and
(01:00):
automations from these two thatI honestly didn't realize they
just got started in theecosystem in about 2018 or 2019.
I was absolutely blown away tohear their Salesforce origin
stories and learn that they wentfrom barely knowing anything
about Salesforce to, after a fewyears, becoming solution
(01:21):
engineers and leading projectsand implementations of their own
.
It was an amazing talk and Ican't wait for everyone at home
to listen along.
So get ready to be inspired aswe uncover the stories behind
these trailblazing admins anddiscover the lessons they offer
for aspiring administrators.
So, without further ado, let'smeet Jordan and Jason.
(01:45):
Jordan Jaffer is a seniorsolution engineer at Cercante,
specializing in parandSalesforce support.
After graduating fromNortheastern University with a
BS in mathematics, she began herSalesforce and Parorg career as
an accidental admin for theAtlanta Braves and became the
expert for all things Salesforceand Parorg for the organization
(02:06):
.
Jordan's motivation to continuelearning the Salesforce
platform and bringing thatknowledge to others has helped
her thrive in her role.
Jason Ventura is a Salesforcefunctional analyst at Steampunk
LLC, specializing in declarativeSalesforce development in
support of government servicesat the Department of Homeland
Security.
(02:26):
Jason holds five Salesforcecertifications multiple
cybersecurity and AWS cloudcertifications, along with
project management and scrummaster certifications.
Jason is a retired navalofficer with over 20 years of
technical leadership experienceas a nuclear engineer.
So let's not waste any more time, let's dive on in.
(02:48):
So, without further ado, I'mreally happy to have you, jordan
, and you, jason, on the podcastdiving on in to kind of started
all off again.
We talked about this is for thenext generation of admins, for
(03:11):
the people who are eitherfinding that second career in
life or people just gettingstarted out.
I'd love to dive into y'allstories and letting Jordan kind
of dive in first.
What inspired you to kind ofstart down this path of being in
the Salesforce ecosystem?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah, well, I wouldn't say I was fully
inspired to get into Salesforce,more so how most people get
into it as an accidental admin.
So I actually, going out,coming out of college, my main
goal was to just work for asports team did not care Well, I
(03:52):
did care what I was doing, butI wanted it to be more data
analytics.
So when I got my job at theAtlanta Braves, I was doing
analytics for the business teamwhile also helping them
transition from MicrosoftDynamics to Salesforce, and
during that I got inspired toactually stay with Salesforce
(04:14):
and part of it as well marketingclouding account engagement as
well.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
We're a part of forever group over here, so yeah
, cool, cool part of the entiretime.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
But yeah, that's how I got into the Salesforce
ecosystem.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
See, I love the stories of accidental admins.
I was talking with Haley Tullerabout this on the last episode,
but I do feel like there's kindof this misconception about
what is an accidental admin, ordo accidental admins kind of
deserve to be where they are?
Did they just kind of againaccidentally fall into that to
it, or did they actually putforth the work and effort to
(04:54):
grow and develop as a admin?
So I know we'll dive more intoyour story, because I know
you've absolutely earned it andthen some.
But it's always kind of funhearing from the people who say,
yep, I was just an accidentaladmin.
But I know, jason, you're onthe opposite end of the spectrum
though, so I'm curious yeah,what brought you into the
(05:14):
ecosystem?
Speaker 3 (05:15):
I am a intentional admin, if you will.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
So how it?
Speaker 3 (05:23):
happened to me.
My story is a little bit longer, I guess, but it starts pre
COVID.
I've been in the Navy for 18 orso years and I was thinking,
you know, retirement's coming up.
I still had no idea what Iwanted to do, so I started just
(05:43):
looking at transition programsand I got accepted into this one
transition program called FourBlock, which is sponsored by the
Syracuse University and it's athrough a foundation Started by
an army captain who was injuredin Iraq in the early 2000s, and
(06:08):
this Program was designed toexpose transitioning military
invets to some of the larger,like fortune 500, companies.
So they're sponsored by a bunchof different companies Microsoft
, you know, the Bill and MelindaGates Foundation is really huge
out here in Washington and onthe West Coast.
(06:29):
So basically they do, you know,you do campus visits, and so I
went to the Google campus here.
I've been to Amazon.
I went to go daddy headquartershere we did presentations on
career development and stufflike that.
And so I was like man, how do Ido this?
Because I've been a projectmanager forever, right, like if
(06:51):
you're any kind of leadership inthe military or project manager
.
I mean, it's all.
I mean it could just be, youknow picking up trash, but so
project is it's transferableskills, 100%, 100% yeah, so Did
four block.
It was amazing and a lot ofgreat people made a lot of good
contacts.
Talk to Mike Kelly.
(07:14):
It's not the same Mike Kelly.
The works are surcontae, but heworks for SAP.
He's Yep, he's a CIS SP, youknow internet security guru guy,
and he recommended that I Checkout Salesforce.
(07:35):
He's like it, look it's I don'twant to say it's a low barrier
of entry, but you know, it's askill that's in demand and all
kinds of stuff.
And so I started doingtrailhead and Learning and I was
like, oh man, this stuff'sreally cool.
Then the pandemic hit, you know, and it kind of changed
everything.
My job got insane because I was, you know, the guy I was
(07:57):
working with technically.
He was the, he was the, thelead operations officer, the
operations officer, and I washis deputy.
He ended up leaving, he retired, he's like I'm leaving, I'm
getting out, this is the timefor me to go.
And so I ended up being theoperations officer and the COVID
Officer for my base, which isthis was the third largest Navy
(08:19):
base in the world.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
It's five installations spread out over
like I don't know, it's like 175geographic miles yeah so I mean
, yeah, that's not projectmanagement, I don't know what is
.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
I'm getting you know, I'm getting phone calls at 2 am
and just sailors doing dumb andI get a phone call and I'd have
to call my chiefs and havepeople you know and then I have
to call captain, I mean it wasjust crazy and all the time, you
know the whole, while I'm likein the back of my head I'm like
retirements coming, retirementscoming, and so as I got closer
and my relief showed up, whichwas the new guy and God bless
(08:54):
him, he's.
He's still there, he's still,he's still trucking along.
But you know, then I joinedMaravis, I did some veterati
phone calls, which veterati is agreat resource.
Anybody can.
Anybody can be a mentor inveterati.
You don't have to be retiree orprior military if you just want
to do mentorship, for you knowtransitioning active sir, active
(09:18):
duty, you know veterans andmilitary spouses.
You know it's been invaluableto me.
I mean, I talked with three orfour different mentors before I
decided on the path I was gonnago on.
I still have a group of mentorsthat I bounce ideas off of and
everything else, and the mentorin particular that I talked to,
(09:39):
jerry limb.
We are actually now really goodfriends and and she still, I
still would consider a mentorshe recommended I applied to
Maravis and so I I checked itout and I applied and I got an
email from At the time was AmyHarris, who's the project
manager.
She's moved on, works at cloudcare and she, you know, was like
(10:03):
yeah, you're in.
So then that started my journeyand then I met Haley there
through Maravis and then shereferred me to.
So I'm saying so, for me it wasvery intentional.
I made the decision that thatwas something I wanted to do and
but I also think it's reallyfascinating for that.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
You were Passionate about this enough to move
quickly.
So I mean you said that and Ididn't realize this until you
and I had kind of briefly talkedprior to the recording and
everything.
But you had said you had justgot started and thought about
doing this Right before slashlike mid at COVID.
So I mean you've only been inthe ecosystem as a whole as a
(10:47):
starting admin, learning thesystems to being the subject
matter expert for multipleclients, all within a One and a
half two-year period of time soyeah, I mean yeah, next month
would have been my two-yearanniversary at Sarkante, so I
joined the team and I was Supergreen.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
the only work I had done was in Trailhead and some
other side project stuff like,but that does just go to show
that you can learn a lot inthose systems and finding those
platforms.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
So whether, like you're an accidental admin and
you are with a company andyou're thrown into the fire to
learn it all, or You're justgung-ho Into learning the
systems on your own, whetherit's reading the documentation
or going to Trailhead, I meanthat's really really impressive
to to get where you've gotten.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
The best thing of the best piece of advice I can give
anybody is get into a salesforce, get into it, and I don't
mean Firing up a trailheadplayground and doing trails, I
mean get in, break it and thenfigure out how to fix it.
I mean that is the absolutebest way to do it.
I Honestly, like I hit triplestar ranger or whatever, like I
(12:08):
don't know, six, eight monthsago and I've gotten three badges
since then, because I havespent so much time in the orgs
yeah, in the orgs, like forclient work and and even our own
, you know, circante work, doingwork in there, I'm helping make
things better there.
So, like getting in the organand trying to do complex things,
that's the way to do it I wantto take that actually, because
(12:30):
that's a wonderful point.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
I learned that way as well.
I need to be in the system.
I need to to break the fun toysand learn how to do that.
Jordan, I'm curious if you'resimilar in that regard.
Or how, how do you go aboutlearning more, learning new
things in the ecosystem?
Because there's I know thatafter talking with a few
(12:52):
different people now about thein throughout these interviews
and kind of learning how peopleUnderstand and consume.
We're kind of all over theplace in the ecosystem of
whether you are a Documentationperson, you're a trailhead
person or you just need to be inan org.
So I'm curious your take onthat.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
I'm definitely similar to where being in an org
hands-on experience, movingaround, navigating, learning
everything kind of on your ownin the fun.
That's definitely a way I liketo learn.
But I'm also heavily intotrailhead.
Similar to Jason, I think I'm asix-time Ranger.
(13:35):
I don't know, I forgot where Iwas.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
You're an all-you've got to be like an all-star
Ranger, then I think as five asa list badge, like then you get
the-oh, cool, you get the bigone, then I believe I am an
all-star Ranger.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Um, yay.
The big thing I want tohighlight on Trailhead is if you
aren't currently working forsomeone and you don't have
access to an actual org outsideof, you know you can get a dev
org and whatever play with that,but sometimes it's nice to have
an actual org like real-lifebusiness cases that you have to
(14:09):
go and build stuff out.
I highly recommend Super Badgeson Trailhead.
I really love going intoactually having a full-here's a
business use case.
You need to spend the next fourto six hours figuring it out
all on your own.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
So kind of thinking through that kind of breakdown,
because I know for me I don'tpersonally use Trailhead all
that much, only because I wantto work with all the variety of
data options.
So, plus, my background is moremarketing focused, so the
things I would need to work onand grow within Trailhead
(14:53):
usually revolve around email,HTML design and kind of the
different things you can doinside of an engagement studio
program.
That would require a little bitmore meat than what a dev org
can provide.
But I'm curious though Jason,you got your start and you used
solutions and kind of learningtraining resources like Maravis,
(15:15):
like Vetter is it Vetterati?
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Yeah, Vetterati, I'm saying that correctly.
Vetterati is like a mentorshipplatform, so it's a little bit
exclusive, but they're kind ofexclusive kind of groups to
veterans, yes, but there's theirother non-veteran groups exist
though for those kind ofmentorship programs, kind of
like a more advanced and morecomplex user group, is kind of
(15:38):
how I think of those situations.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So I'm curious whenever whether prior to being
in working with Sir Conte orprior to working with a company
where you can get your handsinside of an org if you learn
there's a new topic out there,if you learn there's a new
product feature, how are yougoing about learning said new
thing?
So for use case though, for newadmins getting started, they're
(16:04):
probably hearing a bunch aroundAI.
They're probably hearing abunch around what you can do
with that for being an admin inthe ecosystem right now.
So if I wanted to try to learnthat new topic or learn more
about, kind of some of the newautomations you can do as an
admin, how would you get startedin that situation so I can
(16:27):
repeat what you're doing?
Speaker 3 (16:28):
So what I would say to do is the blogs on the
community, blogs like the adminblog, the developer blog, the
architects they all have, youknow, content specific to that
group, but they always get, theyalways touch like the new
(16:52):
hotness or whatever it is like.
It's AI this year and last yearit was marketing cloud and data
rama and all that stuff.
Got my CDP shirt on, yeah.
Customer data platform, omnistudio and Omni channel the year
before that they always do alot of like really big blog
posts on it with a video thatshe's really attached.
(17:13):
You know Shailen Brand and herteam and everybody who does all
of that there for the contentfor specifically admins, that
admin blog man, I can't tell youhow many times that thing saved
my ass on, you know, inbuilding and learning and really
truly understanding a keyconcept.
Because you know, back toJordan's point about super
badges, yeah, you're going tolearn how to do it and you're
(17:37):
going to pass that badge, but itmay take you.
Yeah, four to six hours is agenerous, is it?
Or is a that's for somebodywho's like super proficient with
Salesforce.
Some people it takes 20 hoursto finish one of those things,
but you may.
There may be some features orsomething that you don't realize
, because a lot of times inSalesforce there's a couple of
different ways to do something.
(17:58):
You know you don't always haveto be pigeonholed into.
Like, if you're really good atwriting NET notation and you
have background in JavaScript,your solution may be more
inclined to go down the apexroute.
You know Now, as an adminstarting out, you may not have
that.
But you never know, likeanybody.
You know admins come fromanywhere it could be you know
(18:19):
anyone.
You may have a background orsomething that can affect that
or be able to help you solvethose business problems, and you
may not know it until you watchlike or you read a blog or you
know watch a video by somebody,or something like that.
So I would say you got to go tothe mothership at first, right,
because everybody's going to.
Everybody else who writes it isgoing off of what they're
(18:41):
saying.
So go to the source, get the.
You know it's still going to becolored by.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
You know, with Salesforce's, you know
sprinkling of, yes, this is theamazing thing but, you know I
mean to pass any cert, to passany super bench, you have to go
by what?
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Salesforce says the answers yeah, you get to build
it their way, but that's just abad thing.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I do want to call out for the people helping pay our
paychecks.
They it's not a bad thing tofollow the Salesforce way, but
there are always going to bedifferent use cases and
different paths to go down,because no company does things
the best practice kind of way.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
Yeah, and your, you know those blogs and those
resources that are out there arefantastic.
That's a fantastic way toreally kind of just wrap your
brain around any kind of newSalesforce ecosystem technology
concepts.
And then you go from there.
Then you've got you know the,you know Salesforce Ben, then
you've got the spot formarketing and all around other
(19:42):
good stuff.
So I totally recommend you know, start at the mothership, go to
Salesforce, check out the.
You know the different blogs,join user groups and because
you're also, you could get lucky.
And you know your user group isa larger one and somebody from
Salesforce comes in and demossomething to you for you that
nobody's seen yet.
So expose yourself to all ofthat stuff and get yourself out
(20:07):
there.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
I want to kind of transition a little bit, because
we've talked about ways you canlearn new things and some of
the resources to find.
I want to pass to Jordan onthis one.
You were talking earlier.
You got your start.
You wanted to work for a sportsfranchise and you were able to
accomplish that, which in and ofitself is a hard and amazing
(20:29):
thing to do.
You now, after however manyyears displaced from that are
double digits, timed, certifiedyou are an all star ranger
inside a trail ahead.
You do all these amazing things.
Additionally, you are also apart of helping with the
community event north of thecommunity event, northeast
(20:52):
dreaming, and you also have auser group.
You help, do you lead it or colead it?
Speaker 2 (20:59):
To lead.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
So but still you co lead a user group as a whole to
go from kind of accidental admin.
How did you, what was thatjourney like to get from kind of
point a to point b, but alsowhat were some of the things you
and resources you use to get tothat point?
Because I know a lot ofstarting admins out there would
be interested to kind of learnhow do I get involved like that
(21:23):
and how do I learn how to be abetter admin so that I have
enough clout and resume to bethat person.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah, I think for the most part, find your support
system.
And going back to my time withthe Braves, so as we implemented
Salesforce, I was brought on asthe Salesforce admin just
because I had showed interest init and no one else needs
(21:55):
Salesforce at the Braves.
And it was definitely astruggle of my first two years
in the ecosystem because I didnot have any I don't want to say
human resources like supportsystem.
Basically, I don't want tocontinue use support system.
I only had one other teammember, salesforce developer,
(22:20):
who it was a little difficult totalk to and he was a code first
person.
So, as a new admin trying tolearn, like flow and everything,
we have a process requestcoming and like this is perfect
for flow, and then he would belike no, I'll just go.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
Like Python or something.
Yeah, this is, we can code thisout.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah, yeah, it's like no, Jordan, you don't need to
work on your admin skills, I'lljust go code this out.
So it was definitely a struggle.
During that time and shortlybefore I finally left the Braves
, I ended up at a part usergroup meeting and, through my
(23:08):
teammate who we kind of co-partat admin for the Braves, megan
McFerrin, which I believe you'vemet Yep.
Through that experiencelistening to Aaron Duncan run
that meeting and everything soonafter I moved back up to the
Northeast.
In general not even in myprofessional life, I just needed
(23:31):
a better support system.
So in general, moving to theNortheast, back to where I was
from, it helped.
And then, of course, got a jobat my alma mater, northeastern,
and then pandemic yay.
But it was actually kind ofpositive for me in the way that
it helped me get so much moreinvolved with the community.
(23:53):
At that time, right around thattime is when the inaugural
marketing champions programhappened and it was you nominate
yourself and I threw my hat inthe ring, even though at that
time I wasn't even in marketing.
I did nothing marketing relatedfor two years but I was like,
hey, let's do this, why not?
(24:15):
And getting accepted into thatprogram and having the
requirement I don't want to sayrequirement like homework, but
as a marketing champion we'resupposed to help out in the
ecosystem once per quartereither through speaking blogs,
whatever.
So having that opportunity justkind of helped me, give me a
(24:36):
good push to start getting intothe community.
So started with blog writingacross different websites until
Salesforce then found me, stoleme, but now we use this thought
Sorry, salesforce, then I'mjoking.
I'm still doing stuff withSalesforce then too.
(24:57):
But luckily during that time Iwas able to do one in person
Boston Women Tech meetup meetthe leader at the time, right
before shutdown happened, andthen a few months later she had
reached out in the community andsaid that her co-lead had moved
on to the mothership and couldno longer co-lead.
(25:18):
It sounds like she died.
Yeah, I know.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Yeah, so for the new admins if you work for
Salesforce which is an amazingopportunity but just have to
throw it's amazing opportunityto be able to work for
Salesforce, However, you don'thave the ability to lead a
community events when you startbeing employed by said company.
(25:42):
So that is one drawback, butone person's kind of benefit of
being a Salesforce turned intoyour benefit of being able to be
a part of this user group, apart of this community.
So kind of transitioning alittle bit.
What do you believe is the mostbeneficial thing of being one,
(26:03):
being a part of a user group butthen also kind of leading a
user group?
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Yeah, I think in general, just being a part of a
user group, it is very nice toget collectively, get around
with a group of people you allhave like minds, whether or not
it's the women in tech, thedeveloper, architect, whatever
user group you know.
You're meeting up with peoplewho have the same interests and
(26:32):
I do love how a lot of the usergroups have variations of what
they do.
They'll have panelists come inshare their experience.
Maybe we do virtual happy hoursevery now and again.
Let's come, let's chat.
You have problems you have tohelp solution each other.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
That sounded very weird If you have issues within
Salesforce, we will help createsolutions.
But I guess back to youroriginal point, which I really
like, is that you have to findyour people.
You have to find your supportsystem, whether it is a
professional support system or apersonal support system.
(27:11):
This ecosystem and the workthat we do as Salesforce admins,
part admins, architects, admin,admin, ellipers, whatever you
want to call it.
The work we do, while easiercomparatively than some
professions out there in theworld, it's still difficult work
to do because you're not onlyhaving to work within a
(27:32):
technology that is not theeasiest to manage software, but
also you're working alongsideother people.
You're having to do a lot ofpeople managing alongside the
software management.
Having that group, that supportsystem, those people to call
your own, to vent with, to learnfrom, to share those
(27:54):
experiences with, I think is areally, really important thing
to make sure you find early on.
I love that you organicallycalled that out, Jason.
I'm curious.
Same question for you what isthe biggest value you get from
user groups?
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Well, I'm in a different situation here.
The closest user group is theone in Seattle and it was
defunct for a while.
It has started back up justrecently.
However, they do it on theweekends obviously, like
Salesforce Saturdays and stufflike that.
I have kids and they take awayall my time in my life
(28:36):
Salesforce Saturdays is so hardto go to Just in general, I
participate in support andMarivis I have my circumnautate
chat at the top and then Marivisis right below it.
I'm always in there getting oncalls, doing resume reviews with
(28:57):
people who are looking at abreak into the ecosystem, or
giving advice very similaradvice to a lot of the advice
that I give to our coworkers.
I feel like Thanks for watching.
I went from you know and beingpart of an organization like
Circonte.
We're kind of our own usergroup too.
So I find that, yeah, it'sgreat to get somebody's opinion
(29:24):
on something, whether it's acareer transition or it's.
You know where should I?
You know what?
How do I need to change thevalidation rule or formula or
whatever?
I think it's invaluable.
I think having that supportsystem is incredibly helpful,
but I also think it does takesome work to find it right.
(29:44):
Like I mean just listening toJordan's story, you know.
I mean it was just you have toseek it out.
It's not like I mean let's justbe honest.
I mean things just don't fallfrom the sky.
You know most of them.
So I think the one thing thatuser groups give you that you
(30:05):
don't just get if you're toilingaway as a lone admin on your
computer is you get perspective?
You know we just talked about afew minutes ago.
You know that they're, yes,super badges you got to do
things the Salesforce way butthat there are multiple ways of
doing it.
You can get so locked into aproblem that you can't see the
(30:27):
forest for the trees right,because you're just staring at
it and you're like, man, I'mgoing to use the force and will
this thing to work.
There's been multiple times,like whenever I worked on things
and just having a second set ofeyes to say, am I going crazy?
Does this look right?
And then it's like oh, yeah,okay, you know, like, especially
(30:47):
like.
This is one thing that alwaysgets me like.
You work your ass off.
You build this really awesomeformula, you go check syntax and
it gives you the red FU at thebottom, where it's like you have
, but then it says it gives younothing else.
It just says you have an extraparentheses and you're like I
know I've counted them all.
That's happened to me a coupleof times and I'm like, hey, adam
(31:10):
, you know, or at Sir Conte,right, because we're going to
talk about them, I used to workthere.
I'd be like, hey, Adam, thisformula is kicking my ass.
And he looks at it and he'slike, oh, you need to put a
space between the comma and theterm.
And I'm like, then why the hellis it telling me about the
parentheses?
And he's like, because it'sdumb, it's just telling you it
can't compile and run.
So you get that perspective ina user group and it's not in a
(31:35):
professional setting, but it'snot in your work setting.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
No, you know, you get that Plus you don't have to
worry about that fear of failure, which I think for me was a
really important distinction,and I love how you organically
called out the doesn't have tobe a Salesforce branded user
group.
It can just be a.
It can be, it can be like.
(31:58):
So again, we all we all at onepoint or another, have worked
for Sir Conte and that in and ofitself was kind of a user group
.
We could bounce ideas off eachother.
You are able to have Marifus.
There's so many other placeslike that that either are
affiliated to a Salesforcecommunity thing or they're just
their own entity.
(32:19):
But you do have to seek it outand find that to get that extra
set of eyes, to get thatvalidation.
I said it on the last episode,whether it's something that just
with the culture the way it is,we from a young age strive for
validation.
As children, as young adults,as older adults, we want a need
(32:44):
to have that extra person comein and say what you are thinking
is correct or no, tweak things,look at things in a different
perspective, whether that's froma technical standpoint or
that's from a just kind of howyou're operating in the
operating in the ecosystemstandpoint.
Having that validation iscrucial for growth and one of
(33:05):
the biggest benefits you'regoing to get from a support
system you find.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
The bravest thing people can do when they first
try the ecosystem and raisetheir hand is raise their hand
and say I think I know what I'mdoing, but please tell me, help
me out.
That's the bravest thing youcan do and that's the hardest
thing that people can do.
To much to your point, Jacob.
I mean you were in theecosystem for six years before
you really started.
(33:32):
Did anything with anyone, yeahbut then you realize you just
get exposed to this wider groupof people and whether you
interact, with them.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
I made things way harder than I needed to make
them.
Speaker 3 (33:43):
And that's honestly, that's human nature too.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
That's an episode for another time in itself.
We are ending the kind ofinterview itself.
We've had a lot of greatconversations so far.
I do want to kind of wrap thisup though, kind of talking about
one kind of big question.
I'm trying to change it weekover week so that we're not
asking just the same questionover and over, because likely
(34:09):
we'll get a lot of the sameanswers.
So last week I had asked Haileyif you could give one piece of
advice to admins in the futureand how they should grow.
A lot of it was kind of whatwe've talked about Find your
support system, find ways youcan be a mentor, find ways to
(34:29):
teach, even if you're justlearning things.
So on the opposite side, what'sone of the biggest regrets you
have throughout your Salesforcejourney that you wish you could
tell your former self you'restarting out admin self to do
differently.
So I'm going to let Jasonanswer this first.
Speaker 3 (34:50):
So what would I?
So I would even go further backand say get into Salesforce a
lot earlier than you did.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
That's like one of the things I would say.
Speaker 3 (35:02):
To go back two years and to tell myself I would be
like don't be afraid of failure,don't be afraid of imposter
syndrome.
You know you're here, it's timeYou've.
You know you've done your timein the barrel, as we used to say
in the Navy.
You know you didn't.
(35:25):
You got hired because of whoyou are and what you can become,
not because of what you areright at this moment.
That's what I would tell myself.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
So I'm curious.
I love that answer because Imean I think Jordan and I can.
I don't want to speak for you,jordan, but I know I experienced
imposter syndrome and have thefear of failure.
I mean, I talked about thebeginning.
Even just putting this podcastout there, I was constantly in
the mindset of no one's going togive one care in the world,
(35:54):
with this 30 year old white guyis going to say no one is going
to care at all what this personis going to think.
But I'm kind of putting myselfout there being vulnerable and
just having these conversations.
I do think there's value toyour point of you want to tell
your former self don't worryabout the imposter syndrome, own
who you are and just give ityour all.
(36:16):
How did you overcome that whenyou were first getting started?
Where are some of the thingsthat maybe admins can kind of
put into practice to get overtheir own insecurities?
Speaker 3 (36:28):
I think the biggest thing for me was realizing that
everything that I did that Ifound stressful in the beginning
.
I wasn't the first person tostress out about it, you know,
whether it's building formulasor it's doing things, doing
configuration, that I'd neverdone before Asking questions to
(36:49):
me.
You know, if you look back inour internal channels and stuff,
I very rarely, if ever, askedsolution questions when I first
joined the team.
Now, well, up until today, youknow I was very, you know I was
a participant, very activeparticipant, and it's because I
learned as much from talkingabout it, because anytime I
(37:11):
wrote advice for somebody inthere, I would jump in and check
it out and make sure I wasright.
I always, almost always,whenever I was answering a
question from somebody orwhatever somebody was reaching
out to me and having aSalesforce question, I would do
some quick research myself tomake sure that I wasn't crazy.
That has become a part of mydaily life, like when it comes
(37:36):
to working in Salesforce anddoing anything Before I do it,
even something simple well,maybe not something simple as
creating a field, but somethingthat's a little bit more
configuration based.
I want to make sure likeenabling accounts as campaigns,
you know, as campaign members.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
I looked it up, even for field like double check, the
formulas, double checkingrelationship, lookups Like, even
stuff like that you always haveto double, triple check.
Speaker 3 (38:01):
To just get into the rhythm of it, and I think that
is the way that you overcome theimposter syndrome is you set a
routine, okay, like if I'm goingto do a configuration change,
before I do said configurationchange, I'm just going to go
take a look and make surenothing's changed, make sure
that Salesforce didn't push ahot fit or hot fix or something
overnight is going to changewhatever, just so that I can go
(38:23):
into doing that task withconfidence.
Now, if you're brand new, ifyou've never done the task
before, you can find videos onYouTube and Google is your
friend Now, chat, gpt, google,barred, whatever.
Take all that stuff with agrain of salt, because it's a,
it's not an AI, it's a, it's alanguage learning model.
Just be aware, it's a.
(38:43):
It's a algorithm that pulls outkey words and maybe come more
in the future.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
But yeah, you're absolutely right, it is
scrolling the internet andhelping answer your questions.
Yeah better form of Google.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
But the other point of that is, you know, like I
said, you're not the firstperson to try to do this.
There are hundreds, if notthousands, of people out there
who've done this and had issueswith it.
My first task as a professionalSalesforce professional was to
build a formula field thatdisplayed a little JPEG of stars
(39:17):
based on a rating.
You know you do something verysimilar to this in like one of
the basic admin trails.
I freaked out about that shit,like I was like oh my god, what
am I doing wrong?
What is wrong with this?
And I seriously worked myselfup into a tizzy over it and the
reality was is like you know,the way overcame, that was, I
took a huge step back, I walkedaway from my computer and I was
(39:41):
like you know what I can do this, and I finished it and I sent
it off to the consultant andlife was okay.
It's just being is.
You know, taking that first stepis really really hard, it's
really really daunting, so askfor help.
You know, don't be afraid offailure, because you know you
(40:02):
got to learn and that's howyou're gonna learn right.
It's by breaking stuff.
You're gonna fail at it andyou're gonna finally get over
your, your pride and yourself-consciousness to ask for
help, and that you know, ifyou're a solo admin like you're
the single admin in the companythat help may come from that
user group or the communityforums.
(40:24):
Or throwing up a flare onLinkedIn saying, hey, how the
hell do I do this?
You know that that may be whatit comes down to.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
I love that.
Just don't be afraid to putyourself out there and ask the
questions.
I know it's, it's.
There's probably somepsychological answer we could do
, like how to overcome theinability just to even ask the
question in the first place.
But that's a different podcastfor a different time as a whole.
But I am with you, I will say.
Coming from previous companieswhere my whole background was I
(40:57):
was the subject matter expert, Iwas supposed to be the one to
answer the questions when I camein to be a consultant and this
job as Serkante was the firsttime I ever done anything
consulting oriented.
When other people are coming tome for the answer and I'm just
like wait, do I actually know?
Maybe I've just been likefooling people for the last
(41:17):
seven, eight years, maybe Idon't know the answer, and so I
definitely think not having thatsupport system.
But then don't be afraid to tapthat support system for answers
for that, for that information.
I love that.
Jordan, you get the lastquestion to wrap us up
Throughout your journey andyou've had an amazing journey
(41:39):
what work?
What is that kind of one keyregret you may have and what
would you want to tell yourformer self to change that past?
Speaker 2 (41:49):
Similar to Jason whole imposter syndrome,
everything.
But I took it in a differentdirection where I was like,
alright, I need the proof toeverybody that I know everything
, everything there is to knowabout Salesforce and when I say
everything, I mean all the damnproducts.
And it's actually funny becausemy first few badges on
(42:13):
Trailhead, if you look, is forSalesforce Classic.
The Atlanta brand's never usedClassic.
So, starting my journey, Idon't even know what I was
learning.
So figure out what to learnfirst.
Don't confuse yourself, but tryto find your niche or what you
(42:36):
want to be a subject matterexpert.
In Very early on I thought Ineeded to get badges and
everything, have a high levelreview of all the clouds, get
all the certifications, prove Iknow it and, of course, with my
(42:57):
certification amount that I havenow you can see I am not doing
the best at bringing that back,but I've definitely been more
intentional about my learning.
I want to go on an architectpath.
Let me focus on that.
Yes, I want to learn thingslike health cloud, financial
services cloud, so we can bringclients in this country with
(43:18):
those clouds.
But also I need to realize calmdown, focus on your own journey
.
You don't need to know everysingle product.
To be a Salesforce expert I'mpretty good at sales cloud,
nonprofit cloud, partot,whatever I can bring that
expertise.
Yes, I want to learn other ones, but let me focus on honing
(43:42):
those skills, becoming a subjectmatter expert in those fields,
and then I can play around withlike other products later on in
my free time if I want.
But yeah, finding your nicheand if you're new to the
ecosystem, try to look into that.
Try to look and see what toolsare needed.
And a CPQ has been somethingthat forever in OEs.
(44:07):
We need CPQ experts in theecosystem.
I attempted to learn that.
I'm glad I'm not doing thatanymore.
It's a difficult one but that'sa great example as you're
coming into the ecosystem.
See what we need talent for Datacloud is a big thing.
Start learning data cloud,marketing cloud, but also pick a
(44:33):
path that you actually enjoy.
Don't go and learn CPQ, becauseyou'll get a job.
Uh, lawrence, apq if you likeit.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
No, I think I love that.
That is a very good.
I mean I got lucky because I Igot a degree in marketing, I got
an internship in marketing,just thinking I'd become like a
director of marketing somewhere,and it fell into part.
Out fell into marketing,automation and data org.
But for so many admins outthere they hear Salesforce and
(45:08):
then they hear how muchSalesforce admins make and
whatnot and they just gostraight into something and they
try to learn everything aboutit, to just make that paycheck
and it's to remind yourself getgood in a thing, yes, but also
do it because you enjoyed andyou can be really good at it.
I love that kind of advice toget good at one thing.
Speaker 2 (45:32):
So I would like the ad on the notifications.
I know we're at the very, veryend, Uh, but one thing that I've
done don't study a topic andjust go for a certification and
now say you're an expert.
I have the education cloudconsultant.
Sir, I have never stepped footin education cloud, so I feel
(45:54):
like an imposter at this pointwalking around with this cert
when I have no actual experience.
So, granted, I was supposed toget experience.
Northeast room was going tomove to Eda.
I didn't get involved, whoknows whatever.
So there was a reason why I gotthe search.
I didn't just do thatwilly-nilly, I did.
Speaker 3 (46:16):
I did a little bit of bitterness, but that is a good.
Speaker 1 (46:18):
That is a good kind of thing to call out and I've
seen this kind of conversation alot of just because you have
the cert.
That does add some credibilityto you and that's an amazing
thing to have, but a cert doesnot make it SME, so I love that.
Well, thank you both forjumping on today.
(46:39):
We've talked about a lot ofstuff.
I really really appreciate youtaking the time.
Jordan, I'll be seeing youaround.
Jason, I'll be seeing youaround.
I really appreciate you bothand thank you for providing this
insight for the admins oftomorrow.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Yeah, yeah, thank you for having us.
Speaker 1 (46:55):
Bye y'all, Take care.
Speaker 2 (46:57):
Bye, I'll miss you, jason.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
And that wraps up another insightful episode of
admins of tomorrow.
Now, I don't know about you,the listener, but for me, I took
away from this episode thatsuccess isn't merely just
getting the job or completingyour next project.
It's the journey, thechallenges you face, the lessons
you learn, but ultimately, thedrive and motivation that keeps
(47:31):
you moving forward.
So we hope you found thesestories of success as motivating
and enlightening as we did.
A big thank you to ourincredible guests, jason and
Jordan, for sharing theirremarkable stories with us.
I also want to thank you, thelistener.
We said it last week, we'regoing to say it again we're so
incredibly thankful to have thisopportunity to be working with
(47:53):
our amazing guests, but also toshare such inspirational stories
.
Also, if you have any feedback,we'd love to hear your thoughts
.
So please don't hesitate toconnect with us on LinkedIn,
twitter or go to our website,adminsoftomorrowcom, and share
your thoughts with us.
Don't forget to find us onApple podcasts or Spotify.
Subscribe to get updates eachweek when new episodes come out
(48:17):
and share it with your fellowtrailblazers.
Once again, I'm Jacob Catalano,your host, signing off.
We appreciate you for listeningto Admins of Tomorrow,
trailblazing the next generation.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!