2025 Salesforce Predictions + 2024 Year in Review with All Star Panel

Episode Transcript
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Announcer (00:06):
And now the number one audio program that helps you
to hire, get hired and soarhigher in the Salesforce
ecosystem.
It's the Salesforce Career Showwith Josh Matthews and Vanessa
Grant.

Josh Matthews (00:24):
Welcome everybody to the Salesforce Career Show.
This is our year-end wrap-up.
I'm Josh Matthews.
I'm joined by my co-host,vanessa Grant.
Welcome, vanessa.
Hi, josh, we have some wonderfulfolks that are going to be
joining us today.
They're going to be adding alot of insight and color.
We've got Theron Stanley fromSalesforce.

(00:45):
Josh LaQuire, si owner friend,amazing guy.
We've got the AppExchangewhisperer, peter Ganza, and we
may even get to see a little bitof Fred Cadena and maybe even
Brandon Stein in a little whilehere, and possibly some others,
because this is a brand newformat for us.
It's kind of exciting and it'sgoing to be a little bit of a
learning process too, and that'sokay.

(01:06):
So what's going to be a littlebit different about LinkedIn
Live this is for our regularaudience, versus our X Spaces
Live podcast show that wetypically run is we won't be
limited in how many people wecan bring up on the stage and
interact with, but everybodygets to interact through
comments.
So whether you're listening tous right now or viewing us right

(01:28):
now on YouTube or you'rewatching on LinkedIn Live, both
of those will offer you anopportunity to throw in some
comments.
It could be like you're wrong,you're an idiot.
It could be oh my God, that'sthe smartest thing I've ever
heard.
Or it could just be a littlebit of color and if it makes

(01:49):
sense, we can go ahead and addthat comment or address your
question.
So don't hold back on questions.
So now with that, we're going togo ahead and just jump into a
little bit of I don't even knowif I want to, vanessa.
Okay, there we go.
There we go.
Smartest thing she's ever heard, nicely done.
So we're going to dive into acouple of quick little things.
Again, if this is your firsttime, welcome.

(02:10):
It's nice to have you here.
We've had a pretty incredibleyear, vanessa.
What do you think?

Vanessa Grant (02:16):
Certainly it has been a year.
It's been a year.

Whether we like it or not.
That's right, but I'm talkingjust in general about the
podcast.
We've been able to do a coupleof things that we've never done
before, and we've been runningthis show for four years,
recording it for two.
Vanessa and I have been workingon it for over three years
together.
This year we were able to run acontest and give away a couple
thousand dollars worth ofcertification vouchers, which

(02:44):
was fantastic.
We and give away a couplethousand dollars worth of
certification vouchers, whichwas fantastic.
We've got a new it's not reallya contest, but we've got a new
giveaway that's going to becoming up in January that we're
very excited to talk about in alittle bit more detail next
month.
And I got some cool stats fromour podcast platform.
This little show of ours iscurrently ranking in the top 25%
of all podcasts on any platform, so we're pretty stoked about

(03:08):
that and we've been listened toby I think it was 65 countries.
Tune into this show.
Thank you so much, and I thinkthat the wildest thing that I
saw because it talked about likeyour most popular city and it
was shocking, I think, for bothof us was actually Melbourne,
australia.

(03:28):
So we've got a couple of superfans out there in Australia, and
so thanks for listening.
I love you, love you.
Aussies Missed my time there.
It was really wonderful livingover there back in the day.
So with that, let's go ahead andjust kind of jump into
something that I'd like to share, which is open jobs.
I've got some open jobs.
I took in a brand new one today.

(03:49):
We're looking for someone who'smore of a junior SA or very
senior consultant withSalesforce, who's excellent with
clients but has a deepexperience, or at least some
experience, with implementationsfor insurance companies, or at
least some experience withimplementations for insurance
companies.
So if that sounds like you besure to reach out to me.
You can do it on LinkedIn, youcan do it on email.

(04:10):
It's josh atthesalesforceretruitercom.
It's going to pay right about$165,000, $170,000 all in, and
35-hour work weeks guys.
35-hour work weeks that's kindof unheard of in the SI
ecosystem.
So you're certainly invited tothat.
There is no job posting yetbecause I just got it, so I'm

(04:32):
going to post it in a littlewhile, probably tomorrow or the
next day, so you can keep trackof that too.
By the time this comes out, isreleased as a podcast on Spotify
and Apple, you'll be able toapply.
I also have a couple positionsthat require nonprofit
experience.
One would be a team lead, soyou'd be a senior consultant and
you would be a team lead ofthree or four other folks and

(04:53):
working directly with theclients.
It's not a dissimilar positionto the insurance one, and I have
a more technical role that'scoming up too.
So definitely sometimeChristmas week, pay attention to
our work, our channel onLinkedIn, or you can visit the
salesforcerecruitercom and clickon jobs and go ahead and apply.
All right, well, with that, itis almost the very end of 2024.

(05:19):
We're fast approaching theshortest day of the year.
Thank God for that.
I love it when the sun startsto come out more and more, and
I'm really excited to hear fromour guests.
But let's just go ahead andstart with Vanessa.
Vanessa, this has been aninteresting year for the
Salesforce ecosystem, and Idon't know about you, but for me
it feels like 23 and 24 werepractically just one long year.

(05:44):
You know, what do you think?
I mean, did you notice any realdifferences?

yes there yeah, for me, I felt it a little more
palpably as far as the like.
I know, when we did the wrap-upshow last year, we were talking
about ai, but we were talkingabout AI, but we were really
kind of talking about more ofthe applications of chat, gpt
and I think this year,especially being Salesforce

(06:11):
folks like we're seeing the acouple of things like one, the
real push for agent force.
So seeing Mark Benioff is veryclear talking about digitizing
the workforce, which is a littleterrifying, but so that's been
interesting is seeing the moveto agent force.

(06:33):
Also the push to educate theSalesforce ecosystem as far as
AI goes.
So this year they announcedthat they were doing classes for
all of the Salesforce featureslike Prompt Builder, build your
First Agent, things like that,like free classes and free
certifications for the AIspecialist and the AI associate
certs, which is a pretty bigdeal, and those are going to be

(06:54):
free until the end of next year,which is fantastic.
But that's really the bigdifference.
Last year we were all talkingabout AI and wondering what the
real impact was going to be andI feel like now we can more
tangibly put use cases to someof the some of that.

Yeah, it almost feels like last year there was
one product it was called chatgpt I know I'm wrong about that,
but it sure felt like that andnow it's like it's everywhere
and it's integrated in so manyplatforms and products, not just
salesforce.
Let's actually go ahead and get.
Why don't we just make this awhole panel thing?
Let's do it.
We're going to get TheronStanley up here, we've got Josh

(07:31):
LaQuire and we've got PeterGanza.
Welcome everybody.
Really appreciate you guys.
Really appreciate you guysjoining us today.
Thank you so much.
What do you think, theron, whenyou look back on the year?
What's something large that hasstood out for you?

Theron Stanley (07:49):
Go ahead and tell everyone what you do and
where you are.
Theron Stanley.
I manage some of our strategicaccounts here in Texas.
I've been at Salesforce forabout eight years, almost nine
years, and in the ecosystem forover 20.
I think this past year marks ahuge amount of change.

(08:10):
No big shocker right.
Everything is about AI.
I think the difference is we atSalesforce have been in on the
game for 12 plus years probablya little bit longer, but this
was truly transformative thisyear from think about the
co-pilots we started with at thebeginning of the year to a big
shift more agentic AI solutions.

Yeah, it's definitely a big deal, Josh, you
want to share everyone who youare, what you do, where you're
from and your thoughts on this.

Josh LeQuire (08:37):
Sure, josh, vanessa, thanks for having me.
I'm Josh LaQuire.
I run Seacurrents.
We're a systems implementationpartner for Salesforce.
This is the second firm I'vestarted up and run as an
implementation partner withSalesforce and based in
Charleston, south Carolina, andI've been in the Salesforce
ecosystem since about 2011,.
Building apps for about 20, 25years.

(08:59):
So I've been doing this a longtime and I think, aaron, I'm
going to echo one of yourcomments because I think it's
probably the most salient one.
The pace of change isaccelerating rapidly with agents
, with data cloud, we have seen,I think, in my opinion, like a
shift in the landscape this year, analogous to the internet
coming out or the invention ofthe car or any of these major

(09:23):
transformations that happened totechnology.
With Data Cloud, for example, wecan now connect to applications
, share data with Salesforce.
What used to take myconsultants and me six, eight
weeks or longer for projects cannow be done in clicks.
It's really powerful andamazing.
So I think what's really greatabout that is that opens up a
world of possibilities forclients and agility.

(09:46):
We no longer have to worryabout looking at a single
implementation.
We can be very agile withimplementation, so I think
that's really going to change alot for us as consultants, us as
developers, in terms of how wedeliver solutions.
It's going to be more aboutsmaller pilots, it's going to be
more about rapid agility.
It's going to be more abouttesting, getting input from
users and changing.
So I see that as one of manypotential changes and a whole

(10:10):
lot of things happening in ourlandscape because of that.

And Josh, thanks for sharing that.
Was there a highlight to youryear in the ecosystem?

Yeah, I think the highlight for us and if you go
to my website you'll see we'rerebranding, as we're kind of
shifting our business to alignwith us.
I'll say candidly, salesforcehas made a lot of product
announcements that kind of, youknow, fizzle and fade or maybe
just don't turn out to be allthat's promised, and I'm not one
to really typically follow fads, but this one's been a big

(10:41):
change.
So I think it's been tough inour space in general.
We've seen a reduction inworkforce.
We've seen a lot of people onLinkedIn looking for jobs.
I think it's been a little bittougher this year in terms of
being able to deploy people tojobs, the availability of jobs.
But I will say, towards the endof the year, the conversations
with Salesforce, theconversations with clients
looking at business out there,has grown tremendously.

(11:03):
So I do think we're ending theyear on a good note.
But it did start off kind ofslow and things were dragging a
little bit.
But generally speaking, itseems like people are getting
back to work, things are pickingup and the year has improved
towards then.
But we did have a little bit ofa dip this year, at least in my
business and with many folks Ispoke to out there in the world
of Salesforce in general.

Yeah, I mean that's an incredibly, very real
thing.
We've talked a little bit aboutit throughout the year,
throughout the last couple ofyears, and it really started
with Salesforce's reductionforces December two years ago.
I mean it feels like yesterday,almost right, but it's been two
years.
I can't believe it's been thatlong since that news hit the

(11:44):
street and everybody kind ofwigged out, freaked out, and a
lot of people were really reallyhurt.
They were really in a bind.
There are still people rightnow that are affected by that,
by those layoffs.
There's still people that areaffected by the experience that
they had in COVID.
They might not have been partof that bounce back and we all

(12:06):
felt like this incredible lift.
Remember that the salad days,right, 22, it was just like 21,
22, it was just like boom andeverything went crazy.
And the last two years havebeen a struggle.
I forget what the specificstats were, but around hiring, I
think, was reduced by about 37%last year or this year, 42, 43%

(12:31):
the year before.
You do the math on it and youdon't even have to do it, you
can just go.
Okay, there were 45,000Salesforce jobs posted in any
given 30-day slot throughout.
What is it given?
30-day slot throughout.
What is it?
22.
?
And now there's about 4,500.
So that's a 90% reduction ofopen jobs being posted.

(12:52):
That doesn't mean that there'sa 90% reduction in hiring, but
certainly people are trying tobe a lot more cost effective in
how they do it.
We're going to talk a lot aboutthis today because it is, after
all, a career show and peoplegenerally tune in because they
want to know what can I dobetter or differently to hire
better and make smarter choices?
What can I do to make myself amore viable candidate?

(13:14):
How can I get a promotion?
How can I ask for a raise?
How do I perform better ingeneral for myself or have more
life balance?
And these are all parts of thecareer.
But before we do that, I'd liketo get Mr
AppExchangeWhisperer's thoughtson that.
Welcome, peter.

Peter Ganza (13:31):
Hello, Josh and Vanessa.
Thanks for having me andapologies, I'm losing my voice.
I've been talking so much.

That's okay.
So what do you think?
You look back on the year.
What's the big thing thatstands out for you?

So real quickly.
I'm the AppExchange Whisperer.
My name is actually Peter Ganzaand I help Salesforce partners
get more deals.
So a couple of things.
Josh and Theron covered thetopic.
No one mentions AI and agentforce and all that kind of good
stuff.
I wanted to mention what youstarted on, which was I mean I
don't want to call it the yearof the struggle.

(14:03):
This was my best monthpersonally, but I mean I don't
want to call it the year of thestruggle.
This was my best monthpersonally.
But I mean, from a jobperspective, right, this is a
career show and I just I'venever seen so much anxiety and
questions and concerns andconfusion, if you will, around
getting jobs in the ecosystem.
It's just come up to a boilingpoint, right.

(14:23):
A couple of years it startedand I think now we're seeing
those downstream impacts, right,hey, I'm an admin with 52
certifications.
Why can't I get an interview?
Right, it's just coming to theforefront.
So from my perspective, thatwould be the biggest thing.

Yeah, thanks for sharing that, buddy.
Let's talk about that then,okay, and I want everyone to
stay tuned because we will betalking about our predictions
for 2025.
I think that's probably themost fun part of these year-end
wrap-up shows, but let's talkabout it.
One of the things that's beencovered on our show it's been

(14:58):
covered throughout the years theimpact of AI on the workforce,
and I'd like to understand whohere has actually started to
experience that.

Go ahead, josh.
Sure I can offer someperspective there.
So, as a consultant, we see AIapplied to our jobs in different
capacities.
Right, you've got Copilot andGitHub that can make suggestions
for how you might want to builda lightning web component, how
you might want to write an Apexclass or make other changes and
applications for clients, takingthe place of how we would

(15:31):
traditionally deploy a chatbotor how we might traditionally
look to automate a process oractions or flows inside the org.
So AI is not I don't think it'sreplacing jobs yet.
It's just transforming jobs, astechnology often does.
Right, it's giving people morecapability to do more with less.
That being said, I do think overtime, we'll see a fundamental

(15:52):
shift in how job roles arespecifically defined for people
using agents, using AI to dotheir jobs.
I think expectations willbecome higher.
Productivity expectations willprobably rise because we have
these tools that increase ourcapability in terms of the
volume, the quality and thevelocity that we deploy to work.
But I don't think that's goingto happen overnight.

(16:12):
I think a lot of people arestill trying to figure out, at
least in clients we're workingwith.
Where does AI fit?
Where does it make sense?
It does make sense to deflatecases from support agents.
It does make sense totranscribe and summarize calls.
It does make sense to automateactivities to get information,
but it doesn't really replacejobs.
It just gives people morecapabilities.
So I think we're seeing a shift.

(16:32):
We're not going to know reallyfor a couple of years, as the
job is going to be eliminatedbecause of AI, but I do think
expectations for performancewill increase and our capability
to do work will increase, andthat's kind of the trend I'm
starting to see now.

I'll throw another thing on there.
What I'm also seeing is,besides people being able to
apply AI as consultants or asSalesforce professionals, that
is going to continue to beimportant.
What I'm also seeing and thisis just my two cents here, but
I'm also seeing where, ifcompanies aren't actually

(17:06):
staying on top of it as far asbeing able to leverage AI in
their processes, it's going tobe frustrating for those really
innovative Salesforceprofessionals and they will
start leaving your organizationsand moving to more innovative
organizations.
I mean, at this point, you know, just from a business analysis
side of things, like if you'renot using an AI transcription

(17:28):
tool, like what are you doing atthis point?
So and I'm kind of done takingnotes on certain things you know
, like that's where I'm at in mycareer, and so if your company
isn't thinking about what theirAI strategy is, how to make
those things productive and notlistening to folks as far as how
we do that, then I think we'regoing to start seeing the divide
.

Yeah, and I'm kind of curious if anyone has
any sort of dissenting opinions.
I mean, josh, one of the thingsthat you shared that I thought
was interesting was around theidea that you won't necessarily
know how much it's affectingjobs.
It's just going to become moreimportant that people become
more efficient use tools.
Hopefully I heard all of thataccurately, but I happen to

(18:11):
think it's definitely going tocost jobs.
I don't see how it doesn't now.
I made this analogy, I think, acouple of weeks ago.
What happened to farmers whenthey started building tractors?
Right, I mean, well, now youhave tractor jobs.
Now some of those farm workerswho were displaced are going to

(18:32):
go work at John Deere and startbuilding, and other people are
going to fuel in, and otherpeople are going to work on
maintenance and people are goingto go to the green paint
factory to paint them and on.
So there's always this sort ofanytime we're advancing in the
industrialization of our world,there's all these new jobs and
you just think about it.
I mean, there are twice as manypeople right now walking planet

(18:54):
earth as there were when I wasin eighth grade back in.
I don't even know when that wasthat 1985 or something like
that right?
So there's twice as many peopleon planet earth and as long as
there's more people, there'salways going to be more jobs.
So in a way, I agree yeah, thejobs aren't necessarily going to
go anywhere, but the jobs arechanging and some of those jobs
are just going to be gone, justcompletely gone, particularly

(19:17):
when it comes to theorganizations that can afford it
, that can do a big data cloudproject and do a big agent force
project and work out all thekinks because we all know data
cloud has kinks right, work outall the kinks on some of that
stuff.
I mean, there's going to be alot of people, probably in the
Philippines and India, whoaren't answering service calls

(19:38):
anymore.
How much is that going toaffect the US?
I don't know some, but I thinkit's going to affect a lot of
the low-cost offshore labor.
I'm kind of curious what youguys think.

I'll chime in.
I'll echo a little bit of whatJosh said, and I think it is.
We're not yet seeingreplacement of jobs.
The words I hear from customersand partners is it's optimizing
work.
So digital workforce is goingto be becoming more common.
It's optimizing how thoseworkers today spend their time.

(20:08):
Become more efficient.
That should result in businessgrowth and with business growth,
jobs open up.
So I take a more optimisticviewpoint of it.
Without a doubt, things likecall centers, offshore, those
things may be reduced, but thosepeople may have new roles.

Okay.
So I'm kind of curious, josh doyou see any specific roles
becoming less relevant in 2025than in 2024?

Echoing some of Theron's remarks where we can
deploy agents, generative AI andAI capability to take on the
mundane tasks.
Let's say you have a researchassistant who may go out and try
and find information for you toinform competitive research,
inform a sales deal and informany kind of strategy.

(21:00):
You might be able to rely ongenerative AI to do a little bit
of that research for you.
If you have sales operationstype roles that are very manual
in terms of logging taskslogging activities that AI can
now do I think to Darren's pointyou're going to see those
responsibilities eliminated ifnot entirely for the most part
and new responsibilities come onboard.

(21:21):
I have this conversation withmy clients a lot because,
ironically, in some cases whenyou sell a client on these types
of capabilities, there arepeople sitting in the room from
IT, data services or other teamswho say, well, I don't know if
I want to implement that, thatmeans I'm going to lose my job.
And the conversation is neverabout losing the job.
It's about do you really wantpeople doing the day-to-day

(21:43):
VLOOKUPs in Excel and managingdatabases, or do you want people
trying experiments for targetedmarketing messages and looking
at response rates and analytics,like you transform the nature
of the role into higher valueactivities, in a way, from lower
value just wrote let's get allthe silos to talk to each other

(22:03):
and do manual integration work.
Now we can do moresophisticated strategic type
work for the business.
So this is where I kind ofstruggle.
I think you're right, josh.
The tractor analogy makes a lotof sense, I do think when you
see the innovations in the field, you go from 10 people plowing
a field to one using a tractorand then the other nine might
work for John Deere.
But I think we're kind ofseeing the same thing with AI.

(22:26):
It's just going to change thenature of our jobs and I think
to Theron's point, with thatcapacity we're freed up to do
more strategic things and, inthe optimistic view, echoing
Theron, it allows us to focus onhigher value activity for the
business.
So it's a complicated question,josh.
I'm not sure if I reallyanswered it head on, but yeah, I
think all these dynamics arecertainly apply.

Yeah, I mean I think you answered it very head
on.
I mean it just makes me thinkabout, nevermind the industrial
revolution, you can go back tothe agriculture revolution and
consider what happened way backin the day.
I mean, we're going way back inthe day, effectively.
The invention of the plow rightand the invention of the plow
allowed agrarian societies tothrive versus the hunter

(23:09):
gatherers, and what thatafforded people, particularly
those in power, more thananything was leisure.
I mean, you think about what itjust from an AI standpoint
overall and now we're nottalking Salesforce career, so
I'll get off this topic realfast but just think about, well,
what does it take to book avacation?
The R1 rabbit would have youthink that you just say, book me

(23:32):
a vacation to London and it'sdone.
It's not quite there, right,but you can jump on Expedia and
you can search prices and youcan book an entire vacation in
about five minutes if you wantedto, right, without a lot of
research.
So that gives you what Moretime to watch Netflix or play
piano or whatever it is that youknow, go to soccer games with
your kids, like whatever ithappens to be, but you get to do

(23:55):
that.
And so I think that we're alsogoing to experience a little bit
more leisure.
You know, some of us not all ofus but I think that we're going
to experience a little bit moreleisure and we're going to
reduce a lot of the mundanetasks in our own lives, and that
may or may not impact how muchtime you actually are able to
spend at work, because we're notso busy.

(24:15):
Like remember, do you guysremember the days when you had
to leave work early so you couldget to the bank in time?
It wasn't that long ago, 15years ago, 10 years ago.
It wasn't that long ago.
So you don't have to do thatanymore.
So I'd like to ask you guys whatyou see as far as products that
are becoming more or lessrelevant.

(24:37):
Let's start with Peter on thisone.
You're involved with a lot ofdifferent clients with a variety
of different products.
I know that you're heavyworking with the ISVs, but are
you privy to any kind of insightor information, peter, about
what products you think, asidefrom AgentForce and Data Cloud I

(24:57):
think everybody knows thatalready, right that are going to
become more or less relevant inthe coming year?

That's an interesting question, so
obviously can't share anythingconfidential, but just in
general, I feel like and I hatesaying it this way but Slack is
coming back and the reason I saythat is when Salesforce bought
slack right, mark my F was upthere saying everything slack
first, slack right and frommarketing and from a messaging

(25:27):
perspective, I feel like it kindof fell to the wayside for a
little bit.
It hasn't gone away.
I don't.
I don't work at Salesforce,even though it looks like I do.
I did work at Salesforce, buteven though it looks like I do,
I did work at Salesforce.
But I just feel like and fromwhat I see, that is going to
begin to come to the forefronthow that fits in with data cloud
and agent force.

(25:48):
We're going to find out, but Ifeel like the conversations
around Slack are going to comeback, if you will.

Yeah, I agree.
I think Ben McCarthy fromSalesforce Ben agrees to be
penned an article recently thattalks a little bit about some of
the predictions or some of thethings that are really strong.
Vanessa, what do you think?
Products that are starting toreally rise, and then we'll go
to Theron.

I've always been a fan, but I think the genre
that I foresee will be even moreimportant is going to be
companies like Elements Cloudthat are looking at your
metadata and helping you withdocumentation, with AI, I mean,
I think while this year has beenlike, oh, that's how you apply
it, I think maybe next year isgoing to be the horror stories

(26:33):
of people applying it poorlybecause they had really poorly
documented business processesand their data was a mess.
So when you've got productslike Sonar Elements that can
help you put together a datadictionary that can fast track
your tech debt cleanup projects,I think that's where I kind of
see things.
Just my two cents what I thinkwe'll see.

Sure, what about clouds?
I mean, does anyone want topipe up about what clouds
they're seeing?
I mean, personally, I startedto hear about RCA.
I hadn't even heard of it,right, like there are certain
things that are kind of poppingup now with RevCloud and some of
these others that are CPQs.
I mean, I was working with itsix years ago and it's not the

(27:18):
mystery that it once was right.
It's like yeah, I need some CPQand you can find someone who
can do it.
Back in the day it was like whoknows this, who knows how to do
this stuff?
And people were like, well,they know Skillbrick, good
enough, come on.
So it's a little bit different.
I'm kind of curious what youguys think.

Josh, I'll just echo some of that.
I've heard some account execsin there and you might have some
insight on this as well.
Talk a little bit about revenuecloud being pushed.
You know it still sounds.
I haven't touched it, seen itmyself personally, so I can't
speak to it authoritatively butwhat I hear from a lot of folks
is still a little early indevelopment but it's come along
fast.
It's the native platformsolution and answer to

(27:56):
Steelbrick CPQ and Velocity CPQand it sounds like Salesforce is
really getting behind that.
I can tell you.
Salesforce is also gettingbehind modules like order
management.
I've seen that come up in a lotof conversations.
Marketing cloud is stillkicking and screaming.
It's got the same technology itdid back in the 90s but it
still runs and people still needto execute marketing automation

(28:17):
, although I will say marketingcloud growth seems to be really
at the forefront of a lot ofconversations, more so than
marketing cloud corporateedition.
So I work a lot in the customerengagement space, so these are
tools I see a lot of, butRevCloud is a big one.
I'm hearing a lot about ordermanagement on both the e-com
side and also the orderlogistics supply chain side, and
marketing cloud is stillrunning, for better for worse.

(28:38):
I tell people all the time Ihave a love-hate relationship
with MarketCloud.
It's a great tool, it works,but the learning curve is high.

It's not an easy one to get into.
It requires specialization.
I can help with that, by theway.
Theron, what do you think?

I think we're seeing a shift from looking at
Salesforce products as pointsolutions solving unique niche
problems, to adopting Salesforceas a holistic platform and
that's being driven byinnovation across the business
right.
Some of these products, likeCPQ, order management, maturing,

(29:15):
getting better Salesforce,offering industry cloud type
solutions for finance,healthcare, energy where I sit
so that's what's driving a lotof that.
I love that you mentionedmarketing.

Yeah, we got a little Theron Stanley freeze
thing.
That's cool, I don't know a lotof people who can hold a pose
as long as Theron can, so thiscould go on a while.
Oh, he's back.
You were good.
We just missed probably theimportant things that you were
saying.

I don't know where I left off.

You were talking about Marketing Cloud, so you
were glad that he mentionedMarketing Cloud.

Yeah, that's where I started my career here
and a lot of the success inselling lots of marketing cloud,
especially in the energy andindustrial space, was thinking
about marketing cloud use casesbeyond marketing.
So the early iterations of datacloud, when it was just CDP a
marketing born solution applyingthat to a business trying to
connect all of its data.

(30:13):
So the latest model ofinnovation in those areas, data
cloud, as we all know, is reallyhelping proliferate that.

Yeah, you can see that with data cloud, marketing
cloud, activation targets right,yeah, that was one of the first
activation targets built intodata cloud and I think,
expanding on your point thereand I agree, I see multi-cloud
solutions.
Yeah, we used to just go inwith a client and talk about
sales cloud, service cloud.

(30:42):
Now it's a combination ofproducts and it's looking at a
two to five-year roadmap andthinking about phasing products
experience cloud for portals andmarketing cloud for, to your
point, transactionalcommunications in addition to
the commercial marketingcommunications, and I think that
with data cloud, josh, you'dasked something earlier about
the transformation of work in2025.
I think what we're going to seeis now Salesforce consultants,
salesforce admins, developers.

(31:03):
You can't really, you have to bea mile wide in an industry to
an extent, but you still have tohave specialties, right, like
you have to understand thebusiness applications,
landscapes, how these things canconnect through data cloud, how
they can activate segments inmarketing cloud for targets, how
they can activate calculatedinsights.
You're going to see all thesepieces come together.
So I think consultants, likeour job is going to be extra

(31:25):
hard.
There's going to be higherexpectations for us to know a
lot more and be a lot moreconsultative across a wider
breadth of products, now thatwe're looking at a more
connected landscape of businessapplications.

Yeah, and I'll just throw in a little bit here.
One I'm excited to see with theSalesforce acquisition of Own
Backup, a backup being a moreimportant part of the entire
Salesforce package that you get,and for me that's part of the
DevOps process, so I'm excitedabout that as a new product.
But what I'm not excited aboutis and I'm concerned about as

(32:01):
far as the future goes is thereare rumblings that maybe
Salesforce is not putting asmuch into their architecture
program and with all thesemulti-cloud solutions, I think
the well-architected system isone of the best things that
Salesforce has ever done, and soit's a little troubling to me
that some of their resources aregoing more into kind of the

(32:23):
shiny new revenue generatingthings and less into how do we
actually make all of thesemulti-cloud solutions and these
really complex systems work well?

I mean you don't think that they're working on
that in the background?

I mean you don't think that they're working on
that in the background, tryingto figure that out right now.
I don't know.
Historically, salesforce hasreally, as a company, had their
finger on the pulse of whatSalesforce professionals are
doing on a day-to-day basis.
And that's just from what I'mseeing from, like the.
Where are they puttingresources versus taking
resources away?
And that's where I'm like, atthe end of the day like, yes,

(33:02):
these are great that you canspend some money on and get an
industry solution.
Like these are wonderfulsolutions, but they cost a lot
of money to maintain.
And I don't know that peopletalk enough about.
And this is the AI portion too.
Like, yes, you can buy agent,agent force, but if you don't do
the right level of businessanalysis, you don't do the right
level of testing is, if yourdevops process is garbage, if

(33:24):
your delivery process isterrible, like that is the stuff
that will make yourimplementation fall apart, that
will make you have tore-implement the whole thing in
five years and for a while,salesforce was really focusing
on that stuff, or three or two,or having to call that second
consultant to come in to fix themess because MVP really wasn't

(33:44):
MVP.
That's where you know and thosearen't sexy revenue generating
things.
But I think those are reallyimportant and will continue to
be more important, as I imaginehorror stories will come out of
agents going rogue or whateverit is, because people had dirty
data, didn't do the rightbusiness analysis, were trying
to get to market too fast.
Whatever it might be, You'rebringing up.

Oh, I'm sorry, josh.
Okay, let me just jump in herereal quick.
Look, salesforce is a company.
They have shareholders.
They have a fiduciaryresponsibility to these
shareholders.
They need to focus on revenuegeneration.
They have spread so fast overthe last 10 years I don't even
know what it is now 90% ofFortune 500 companies or

(34:31):
something like that.
It's a lot, and you have tokeep coming up with ways and
reasons to generate revenueright.
And making the lives ofpartners easier is probably not
100% and it's probably not theirtop one or two or three things

(34:51):
that they have to do right.
It's the partners to do that.
It's the customers to make goodchoices about which partners
they work with.
I'm playing a little bit of adevil's advocate here, because I
don't disagree with you at all,vanessa, but it's a
multi-billion dollar business.
If they slump, it's like youmake a small mistake with a

(35:14):
large public company like that.
It's a massive impact.
And then there goes allinnovation, because all they're
trying to do is scramble andkeep the business together.
So I don't blame them forfocusing on revenue generating
products.
I mean, yeah, they're a company, what else are they going to do
, right?
But I think everybody who'sever touched the product, knows

(35:36):
that, particularly in the worldof consulting, knows that half
of the implementations are theworst.
Half of implementations, I meanthey're terrible.
I get calls almost every weekwhere companies are like we
bought this, we implemented it,we don't think we're using it
correctly, we're not sure whatwe're supposed to do, we don't

(36:01):
have anybody here that reallyknows how to look at it.
And then you break in and youtake a look at it and it's like
sometimes it's an easy fix and alot of times it's not.
A lot of times it's scrap thething.
I mean I have a client theywere looking at.
Not A lot of times it's scrapthe thing.
I mean I have a client theywere looking at.
It was a client of mine, seniorVP of all business systems,
billion dollar company, and he'slooking at.

(36:23):
He joined a new company, he waslooking at the product and he's
like Josh, I might have toscrap this whole thing and just
start from scratch, becausethey've just been making what's
ticky tacky for the last sevenyears.
I don't know what to do withthis thing.
So fortunately we found someonethat came in.
They're helping them clear itout.
They didn't have to start fromscratch, and so that's a good
thing.
But boy, it's impacting tinylittle companies, $100 million

(36:47):
companies, billion dollarcompanies on up.
It's definitely a challenge and, I think, one of the challenges
that these small companies aregoing to be facing and are
currently facing.
And anyway, like, correct me ifyou think differently.
I'm completely, a hundredpercent open to dissent here.
But a lot of these contractorsthat are not contractors, these

(37:08):
employees lost their job.
So it's almost half a milliontech jobs gone in the last two
years.
Right, and no matter what theWhite House administration or
any of them is going to tell youabout jobs, it's bullshit.
There's not clarity in thosenumbers.
They'll say, oh yeah, we added200,000 jobs or 160,000 jobs

(37:29):
this month.
It's like, wait a second, butyou lost 250,000 full-time jobs
and you added 160,000 part-timejobs.
And if you don't read the fineprint on this, you don't
actually read the articles.
If you just read the headlines,you're going to be so
misinformed you won't know yourass from your elbow.
And you've got to stay informed, you've got to stay up to date,
you've got to pay attention.

(37:50):
So a lot of these people thatlost their jobs went out and
hung their shingle yeah, I'mgoing to be a consultant, and
Vanessa's doing it right now andI think that's awesome because
she's good.
But there are a lot of peoplethat aren't good that started
and not only are theynecessarily not good at the
technical stuff, they might notbe good at the analysis, the
business analysis stuff, and Ipromise you more than half of

(38:13):
them are not going to be good atsales and marketing.
At least half, probably closerto 70% or 80% of them aren't
going to be crushing it.
So there's some challengesthere.
We've got Janine Markhart.
Welcome, janine.
We're going to get to you injust one second, but I wanted to
welcome you to the stage, josh,you had some input, and then
we'll go to Janine and see whatshe has to say.

All right, I think you, vanessa, just really
introduced some fantastictalking points.
This is stuff I geek out on.
So, yeah, I can't remember thelast time I went into a client's
implementation followinganother, second, third or fourth
consultant, that wasn't just adumpster fire.
It is so prevalent, sowidespread.
There are a lot of badconsultants out there, period.
I'm sorry, not sorry, it's justa fact.

(38:57):
I've done so many rescue jobs.
It feels like every job I do isa rescue job these days.
But I will say I was part of theSalesforce partner enablement
team with a lot of theHealthCloud rollout activities
back in 2019.
I did a New York World TourDreamforce.
I spoke, I worked with ZachBacon, some of these great
people there, and I rememberthen it was a common complaint
the rollout of Health Cloud andenablement for partners was just

(39:19):
garbage, and that's true.
It was garbage, like it neededa lot of work.
They were pulling inconsultants like me in to help.
However, I will say I didparticipate in the Data Cloud
cohorts and went to Dreamforceand AgentForce sessions.
Salesforce is offering betterenablement now for partners than
they've ever offered, offeringbetter enablement now for
partners than they've everoffered Now.
That being said, salesforceoffering enablement because they

(39:40):
know they have a problem withpartners doing terrible
implementations.
That's destroying Salesforce'sreputation.
I'll never forget a trip I tookto Houston, speaking to the CEO
of a big giant finance companywho said Salesforce is nothing
but a bullshit pipe dream Afterhe had seen just terrible.
And he wasn't wrong.
Right, because Salesforce cando great things when it's
implemented right.
It can also do terrible thingswhen it's implemented wrong.

(40:01):
It can go both ways.
So I think the problem is todayit's not necessarily Salesforce
offering the training forpartners.
It's partners consuming thattraining and acting on it and
being good consultants.
Like there's a huge differencebetween somebody who's gone in
and studied for certification, ahuge difference between
somebody who's gone in andstudied for certification,
somebody who's gone in anddelivered 20 implementations
right.
That is a real thing.

(40:22):
So it's difficult because beingcertified and delivering
implementations are not the samething.

When I met Josh, it was at Dreamforce 2019.
And I hope I have this numbercorrect in my head.
That week, mr LaQuire sat forno less than six certs and
passed them all.
And I know because he walked inexhausted into the bar and we
all had a beer.
So you can, if you're smartlike Josh, you can go in and
knock out certs.

(40:48):
Now, josh already knew thatLook, he already knew his stuff.
He already knew his stuff right.
So it was.
I'm not saying it was easy.
I know for a fact it couldn'thave been.
But if you study and you'regood at studying, getting in and
testing it's not the same asgetting in and working and
problem solving right, andthat's the thing that hands-on

(41:08):
experience is absolutelynecessary for.
Let's try and solve this forsome of our audience right now,
and then we're going to go toJanine.
No, actually let's go to Janine, but someone remind me.
I would like to hear what are acouple questions that customers
can ask their who are offeringproposals.

(41:29):
You know, in tandem withSalesforce, what's one or two
good questions that they couldask them to help prevent some of
these nightmare stories that wehear regularly.
But before that, janine,welcome to the show.
It's so nice to see you.
Nice to see you.
Did you have a highlight of theyear of 2024?
Something that stood out?
Good or bad?
It's almost over.

(41:49):
Okay, hey, fair enough, I'lltake that.
What about looking into thefuture?
And we're going to get deepinto the future here in about
five minutes, five, 10 minutes.
But what about the future?
Is there something about 25that you're excited about?

Janeen Marquardt (42:05):
I would answer your question that you just
posed, which is how do weprevent these bad
implementations?
But, like I'm with Josh, lotsof work for those of us who've
been at it for a while.

I would ask your SI how many implementations have
your implementation consultantsactually performed?
That's a good question.
What would be a sufficientanswer Like?
What would be a number thatyou'd be looking for before?

saying yes, More than five, on whatever
product cloud they're doing.
Okay, and I mean honestly,because one or two isn't bad,
but five is a reasonable.
It's not a lot.
But you've seen a few differentthings at five.
Five is still not a lot, butI've done like 500.

Yeah, some people do five within three months.

Right, I mean, it happens yeah, well, I would
say five to like beginning toend sure right, because there's
different things that happen.
but and that's everybody, likeeach person has done at least
five beginning to end, atdifferent points of time in
their career, because there'sdifferent things that happen on
them.
Because I think that there's alot of things and I would also

(43:25):
ask the methodology.
I mean, do you just say, as acustomer, build me a custom
object that does X, y and Z, andyou go, okay, I'm just going to
go do that thing, or do you tryto understand the nature of the
business problem you're tryingto solve?
and act consultatively to helpachieve the business goals,

(43:49):
because that's, I think, howmost of us act here and we've
also worked with consultants whodon't and that's the primary
distinction between customerswho are having a good experience
and customers who are nothaving a good experience and
where we have to come back inand fix the problems where.
How many times have you allcome to an org where the

(44:12):
customer is definitely not happywith what they got, because
they got exactly what they askedfor?

all right.
I remember the last time I didright, like that's kind of it
happens so often but all I'vedone in the last five years is
remediations.

Oh god tired yes, hey, john sisson.
Welcome to the show, john,former vice president for Sales
Optimizer, a good friend of mineas well.
Welcome to the show, john.
I'm kind of curious what do youthink when you look back on
2024, was there a highlight thispast year?

John Sisson (44:43):
I first agree with everybody it was the toughest 20
year in the 20 years I've doneSalesforce not even close, but I
think the highlights.
We did a lot of freeassessments for people and
everybody does assessments indifferent elements but the
difference is we did them from abusiness perspective rather

(45:04):
than a tech perspective.
Tech was part of it.
We did about 40 of them andwhat we identified over and over
again and this goes back toyour part is a lot of the
customers A were being sold tech, not business solutions.
B they didn't know there's beena ton of mergers and

(45:24):
acquisitions, everybody'srunning on empty and they didn't
know their business andbusiness problems well enough
and so they continue to do tech,which then led to the issues
everybody's talking about.
And my favorite part of thiswas digging in and coming back
and it was fun.
I'm going to shock everybody,but it was people process tech

(45:46):
adoption right, and very few ofit was because the tech was just
garbage.
It was a lot because I'll giveyou an example I had a huge
GovCon that we worked with thatwon a $2.76 billion contract
with a B and the craziest partis they were not allowed to

(46:08):
market and they had threesalespeople.
It was a division of a largegroup, and so it sounds like a
great problem, but they were a$100 million division and, worse
is, the government said if youcan knock this out, in five
years, we'll give you another$2.76 billion.
And they weren't even close togetting it done, and so, if we

(46:30):
hadn't dug in, there's nothing Icould have done on Salesforce
that would have solved that.
We ended up focusing onmarketing cloud and partner
community and using theirpartner piece as part of an
overarching solution to helpthem solve.
Those were fun, right.
Those were things where we feltlike we had a real impact on
that, and I think that's goingto be really critical going into

(46:52):
2025.
Here's the thing, though, guys Ithink as much as we talk about
tech and, believe me, I was onthis show last year and I
greatly appreciate it, because Iwas like AI is not ready, and
everybody else, and we hadsomebody on the show and they
were like let me give you sixreasons why you're an idiot.
And they were like let me giveyou six reasons why you're an
idiot, and they were right.
And since then, I've used AIreligiously.

(47:12):
I learned a ton from that show,right and so but I still think
a lot of customers arestruggling and it's a lot more
than just the tech.
And this goes back into yourpoint of finding a good partner.
To me, a good partner issomebody that sits down with you
and builds out requirementdocuments.
I know that's old school, butit showcases that you understand

(47:34):
their business, you understandtheir issues and you're
educating them.
Going through that, you're thentying it back to business
impact all the way through rightand then to your point on the
methodology.
It's our customers don't know alot of times what they're
asking for.
They understand the pain, butthey don't understand the tech,
and as Salesforce unleashes moreand more tech, it just gets

(47:57):
harder for them to stay up tospeed.
It's hard for us.
Hopefully that helps.

Yeah, I think that definitely helps.
Thank you for contributing.
It's great to see you, john.
I appreciate you jumping on theshow here today.
Thank you for contributing.
It's great to see you, john.
I appreciate you jumping on theshow here today.
Oh, it's great to be here.
I want to pivot just a littlebit.
Okay, we're almost a full hourin, but I feel like we've got a
lot more to cover.
Typically, these shows areabout 90 minutes, so if you
can't stay, if you're listeninglive and you can't stay, that's

(48:24):
okay.
You can find the SalesforceCareer Show available on your
favorite platform, includingSpotify and Apple and
iHeartRadio and all of those.
I think it's like 20 differentplatforms or something like that
.
So, if you've got a platformthat you love and you're
watching this live and you'dlike to catch up on some past
episodes, we'd love it if youdid that.
Speaking of which, our numberone podcast last year, I think,

(48:44):
was the very first podcast ofthe year.
We talked AI, mbas, the futureof careers in the ecosystem, so
I'd like to kind of get backinto that a little bit.
So let's talk about what we'reexcited about for 2025.
And I'd like to make somepredictions as well about what
I'm going to, what I believe isgoing to happen in 2025 as far

(49:09):
as ecosystem, as far as careersand this sort of thing.
But I'd love to hear everyoneelse's thoughts too.
So let's go back to Theron.
Theron, when you think about2025, and we're going to keep
this short so everybody can geta little bit of a soundbite here
but what's the most excitingthing about 2025 for you?

Yeah, no shocker here and this is not a plug but
agent force is proliferatingvery quickly across our customer
base.
That's evidenced by publicnumbers that we've talked about
of customers adopting.
That means lots of work forthis ecosystem, for people to
get ramped up in agent force andall the relative products
around that.
And then one shameless plug isSalesforce is hiring a thousand

(49:50):
plus AI sellers.
That will help teams like minego out and sell more of the
products.
So very excited about that.
All of my customers are veryexcited about it.
So there you have it.

Very good Josh.

Yeah, I think 25 is going to be the year even
with all these great changeswith data cloud agents of
getting back to the fundamentals, john, I couldn't agree more
Getting back to a propermethodology and I'm speaking
from a consultant's perspectiveand what I'm going to see in the
SI landscape and how our jobsand expectations will change.
But automation means weunderstand a process and how to

(50:25):
automate it right and weunderstand where AI can play a
role in that.
So I think it's going to becomemore imperative and important
than ever to really as aconsultant and, by the way, if
you work inside a big companyand build Salesforce or you work
as a consultant, you're also aconsultant right, you're
consulting the business on howto adopt the technology, enable
an outcome and drive a metric.

(50:46):
So I think this year is goingto get us really.
It's going to separate thecream from the crop, in a sense
of the really good performersare going to succeed in their
jobs, are going to be able toidentify very specific outcomes
that this technology can enableand are going to do a really
good job of understanding abusiness process and how it
delivers that outcome and how totake this technology forward.
So I see Data Cloud Agent Forceas a huge opportunity.

(51:09):
Yes, they're in.
We're going to have to stayahead of the curve, we're going
to have to understand that, butI think it's going to make us as
consultants, as developers, asadmins, look really good because
we're going to actually be ableto put our hands on
understanding the business a lotcloser and understanding these
outcomes.
We're trying to drive in thebusiness with this technology
better and seeing real outcomes,and there's nothing better than
this job and that feeling ofsuccess when you deliver

(51:30):
something and see it influencethe business.
I think that is the bestgratification of the world as a
developer, as a consultantworking on Salesforce.

Yeah like oh, this works.
Wow, I didn't know it could dothat.
I love that stuff, vanessa.

Oh, you know what ?
I'm really excited that We'vebeen talking for almost an hour
and I think I've heard the wordflow once and not that I have
anything against flows, but Ithink there's been so much focus
over the years of like here's atool that'll solve your
problems.
It's not about the tool.
People are talking aboutbusiness processes now, and I'm

(52:03):
so excited about that.
I feel like everything thatI've been talking about for
years is finally going to startbubbling up and people are going
to start realizing the value.
I mean, people are starting torealize the value, let me put it
that way.
So I'm excited what that meansfor me personally, since I am
kind of starting my own thingnext year, with a focus on
business analysis, of course,because that's my jam, and I

(52:25):
love that the technologyimplementing it is going to
focus on how do we add value tobusinesses, how do we make
people's lives easier?
Not here's a tool that'll justsolve your problems and
companies don't have to focus onwhat their problems are and
really unpack them like theyshould.
That's what I'm looking forwardto Business analysis always
Business analysis.

Well, it ties in with what John said.
It ties in with how Joshsupported what John said.
I mean it's figuring out whatthe needs are.
What's the problem that'sgetting solved, versus just
introducing more tech.
Vanessa, one of the things thatI remember you would quote
quite a bit in our early days ofrunning the show was that
technology will just exacerbate.

(53:05):
It just amplifies.

Oh, yes, if you take a bad process and you throw
technology on it, all you haveis a faster bad process.
Yes, I love that we're actuallyfocusing on the process.
Take the tech out.
Let's look at your process.
Does your process actually makesense?
Is it optimized?
Once we understand what thisshould look like in an optimized
way, we have brought thestakeholders together, we have

(53:29):
consensus, we have documentation, throw the technology on and
make it better, make thatoptimized process faster.
And that's what I'm lookingforward to is good documentation
and great processes and peoplefocusing on business analysis
and also the continuation of,since I launched my sorry, I
should have said it earlier thething I'm excited about from

(53:50):
this year was launching mySalesforce BA community, the
first and only Salesforce BATrailblazer community group,
which we're over a thousandmembers now, which is wild to me
considering we just startedthis year.
So continuing on with thatSalesforce BA community,
considering that these skillsare going to continue to be
really important in the nextyear, with all the AI stuff

(54:12):
going on, I'll get off mysoapbox now.

No, it's good.
I mean, this is our soapbox andyou're doing great, so hashtag
BABA, badass BA.
And if people wanted to jointhe BA group, how would they do
that?

They can look in the Trailblazer community groups
.
There's a little kind of searcharea.
If they look in the Trailblazercommunity groups, there's a
little kind of search area.
If they look at the virtualgroups.

They'll see the Salesforce VA virtual community.
Okay, right on, Janine.
What are you most excited aboutfor 2025, other than 2024?

being gone, because I know you were probably
going to say that no, no,really, it's okay.
I'm actually really excitedabout Agent Force.
I had the pleasure of being inthe room yesterday for the 2.0
announcement, so that wasterrific and I think we are just
scratching the surface of wherethis is going to go.
But, like the reality of humanbeings, we need to make sure

(55:04):
that we're doing the rightthings with our agents.
We need to make sure that we'renot just asking our agents to
build me a custom object, thatwe're having our agents solve
our business problems, thatwe're talking to them about the
right things and that we're notjust doing the wrong things
because we can, that we'reteaching our people to do the
right things.
And I had some really greatconversations with some folks

(55:26):
from Salesforce yesterday and Ilook forward to continuing those
conversations.
So I'm excited about where thiscan go.
I'm a little concerned, alittle wary, that we're making
sure that we're not putting thetechnology in the hands of
people who are not knowingnecessarily what to do with it,
that the right people helpsupport it.
Help support it.

(55:51):
Like Vanessa, as a strategist,as an architect, I like to think
of it as taking that to thenext level.
I mean, she's been screaming itfor five years.
I've been screaming it for 30years.
It's really hard when you feellike nobody's listening.
It's like that's what I've beensaying all along.
Right, you can't just take abad process and automate it.
You can't just take a badprocess and throw technology at
it.
You've got to start with theprocess.
You don't have a technologyproblem, you've got a process
problem.
Let's look at that process.
Let's look at what you need.
Let's fix that first and thenlet's support it with the right

(56:14):
technology.
I'm trying to help my customersfigure out what the use case is
and how we can help supportthem with agents.
Where can we improve what theyare doing and move the things
that are just bogging them downwith people and move that on to
agents and let their people dothe things that we need people
for?
I like that.

So what are the?

right use cases yeah.

I mean, there's definitely a theme going on here
this evening right Aroundbetter processes, better systems
and then enhancing thoseprocesses and systems with
Salesforce and technology ingeneral.
I'd like to go ahead and jumpin, just give our audience a
little bit of my take on what Ibelieve they can expect in 2025.

(56:57):
And, by the way, take it allwith a grain of salt.
I've said this before, but Ipredicted Lady Gaga, britney
Spears, christina Aguilera andNSYNC would all fail when I
first saw them.
I'm like that's never going totake off.
So I'm not the best atpredicting things, but I feel

(57:19):
like I've got a pretty good gripon this after about 25 years in
this industry Sorry, excuse me,industry.
So we might have talked aboutthis previously, but I think it
stands to reason to mention itduring this episode.
The bounce back When's theeconomic bounce back going to

(57:40):
actually happen?
And there might be listenersthat have been hanging on for
the last hour going, yeah, butwhat about me and what can I
expect?
Walking into January, february,march of this year and I've had
a lot of conversations, some ofUFOs, some of our panelists
right here and clients andcandidates and a lot of
different folks Ben McCarthy alot of different folks.

(58:01):
And here's my take I think thatwe're going to have a bounce
back.
I don't think it's going to bea big bounce.
I think it's going to be a slowbounce.
And when you think about I cantell you this as a business
person I called the wrong playtwo years ago.
I thought, okay, we're going tohit a bump.
It's going to be.
The average dip in the economyis 56 days 59 days, something

(58:24):
like that and it's only everynumber of years that we
experience something that goeson this long.
I also feel that we've had alot of not great information.
I mean, people are like, yeah,but stocks are soaring, and not
the last 10 days, but stocks aresoaring.
These are all key indicators ofa healthy economy and it's just
like everybody.

(58:45):
Just stop for a second, wake up, look around, look at your bank
account, talk to your friendsand neighbors.
What's going on has beenabsolutely nothing short of
devastation in the Salesforceecosystem.
I'm just going to say it.
It's been fucked and it's hurta lot of people.

(59:07):
It's hurt a lot of people inthe wallet.
It's hurt a lot of people inthe wallet.
It's hurt a lot of people intheir self-esteem, how they feel
about themselves, how they areas a parent, as a provider.
It just, it affects people.
And it's not Salesforce's fault, right, it's not.
It's just that's what happened,and we have all everyone here

(59:28):
has had to find a way how tomove forward, and some people
have found a way to move forwardby leaving the ecosystem, and
other people have found a way tomove forward by hanging on with
your fingernails right Untilthe good times roll back in.
So my prediction is that thegood times are going to roll
back in, but they probably won'tbe nearly as similar as what

(59:51):
good times might mean for you.
So I don't think that it'snecessarily going to be the kind
of bounce back that we saw backin 21, 21, 22.
So much pent up demand postCOVID that you couldn't I mean
you can get an architect withoutgetting into a bidding war not
a good one without getting intosome sort of bidding war for

(01:00:14):
them.
And those same architects rightnow are more than happy to take
a 15% pay cut just to startworking again Right.
So part of that had to happen.
There's a little bit of amirage, a little bit of an
illusion of how things should bewhen we experience a bounce
back from COVID, but it lookslike this you take a tennis ball

(01:00:35):
and you slam it into the groundand it comes down here and it
pops back up here.
It's going to pop up reallyhigh, really fast, and that's
what happened post-COVID.
It dipped really hard becausethings are going darn good.
I mean, I don't remember aneconomy as a working adult that
was nearly as good as what we'dexperienced right before COVID.

(01:00:56):
Okay, and now you got to thinkabout well, what's the bounce
back going to be?
Well, you think of like someonebowling a cricket pitch right
or throwing a baseball, throwinga grounder.
That thing's going to come inat a low angle and it's going to
bounce back up at a low angle.
That just means it's going totake more time or more distance

(01:01:16):
till it gets higher, back up tothe height of the original pitch
, and so we're going to I thinkwe're going to experience that.
So my prediction for 2025 ismore jobs, a nice lift.
I think that the new White Houseadministration and love them or
hate them, it doesn't matter,they're in and I believe that

(01:01:36):
the number one issue thateverybody voted on was the
economy.
So clearly it's been impactingpeople and that's what they ran
on, that plus border stuff, butthey mostly ran on the economy
and I think that the motivationthat the administration has to
put into place certain thingswhether it's reducing regulation
and just making business easieror tax breaks or things like

(01:01:58):
that I don't think we're goingto really feel too much of those
effects.
For a little while, john and Iwe were talking I think it was
earlier today, I can't remember,but we were talking earlier and
we're in agreement on this alittle bit Like, yeah, it's
probably going to be May, june,right, when these things
actually are enacted and theinks on the on uh, dry on the
paper.

(01:02:19):
And then people are like, cool,let's go.
Like, let's fricking rock,let's go, because we've all been
waiting to rock it for like twoyears, right, and we haven't
been able to.
I'll tell you what I did.
I completely dumped whatever Ihad available into growing the
business when things went bad.
So I thought I knew this lessonfrom back in the day when

(01:02:41):
things die, you either cut allyour expenses and hang on by
your fingernails or you dumpeverything that you can invest
and grow and grow and then, whenthe bounce back comes, you've
got greater market share.
That's how it works.
I think everybody knows thatright.
I made the wrong call.
I couldn't have in my wildestimagination believed that this

(01:03:03):
downturn was going to last thislong in this ecosystem, but it
has, and so you know what.
We make adjustments, but look toexpect slower hiring.
More hiring, but slower.
People are going to be a littlebit more careful.
There's more competition foryour jobs.
If you're working at all,you're in a better position than

(01:03:24):
if you're not working.
So take that job, get thatpaycheck, stay active and stay
involved in the ecosystem, right?
All of these things are veryimportant and you have
competition.
Most candidates out there rightnow have a lot more competition
than they ever experienced backin 2021, 22.
And so you're going to have toprepare for that, and to do that

(01:03:45):
, I want everybody to thinkabout their resume, their
LinkedIn profile and, moreimportantly, their communication
skills, their ability toarticulate their value.
What are their accomplishments?
What did you actually achieve?
I see resumes every single dayand I say the same thing over
and over again, because themessage isn't out there.
Stop putting your jobdescription into your resume.

(01:04:07):
That's not at all anything todo with what you did.
I mean, if I had a jobdescription for me.
I mean, it's like that wouldn'tsay anything about my successes
.
So focus on yourself.
What value did you bring tocustomers?
Did you bring to the businessthat you worked in?
And really stand out.
And if you're not capturingwhat your accomplishments are,

(01:04:27):
start doing it.
You can do it weekly, you cando it monthly.
Everything that went great thismonth, everything that sucked
this month, everything I learnedfrom what sucked.
Everything I learned fromwhat's great reminders like how
I can do more and more or dobetter or do things more
efficiently.
So start tracking yoursuccesses and be ready to
articulate that.
We have talked at great lengthon this program over the last

(01:04:49):
year and really since AI startedto come up, but more
specifically the last year andeven more so the last six months
, about how do you stay relevantin an AI age, and the number
one way to do that is to just bemore human, right.
I mean, the more human you are,the more you're open,

(01:05:09):
transparent, willing to listen,diplomatic, asking good
questions, paying attention,showing interest, validating
other people right,demonstrating confidence, being
open to ideas, like all of thesethings.
It's absolutely critical to dothat and get good at that.
So if you are in a positionmoving forward, either in your

(01:05:34):
current role or you want a jobin the ecosystem moving forward,
and for a fact that thoseskills of yours could use some
brush up, then go get that brushand start working on it.
There's a million good advisorson YouTube that can teach you
communication, but you've got topractice it.
You've got to practice itbefore you get into work.

(01:05:55):
You've got to practice itbefore you go into your
interview.
So start learning from some ofthese experts that are out there
and I'll tell you I feel likeI'm not a bad communicator.
I have spent years on it.
I've done it with coaches, I'vedone it with training, I've
done it with workshops, I'vedone it with therapists.
I've done it like crazy, andI'm still having to work on it

(01:06:17):
Right.
So, no matter where you're at,level up demands more humanity
in an age of AI, whether it'sthe blog you write, the message
you write, the email that youwrite, you really want to stand
out.
Well, use AI, get your grammartidied up, get your thoughts

(01:06:42):
organized better, but, man, thattone, that message and what it
sounds like should sound veryhuman.
So, be human in 2025.
And I think that is what'sgoing to give you the very best
advantage, and I mean that forhiring managers as well as
candidates as well as currentemployees.
So that's my thought.
Let's talk about others.
Who else is excited aboutsomething for 2025?

(01:07:02):
Or what should people befocusing on paying attention as
far as products for 2025, newcerts that are up that will help
them to stand out or gain someknowledge?
I'm going to just open thefloor.
Dive in, guys.

John Sisson (01:07:17):
Josh, that's impossible to follow.
That's like you just gaveGettysburg a dress and we got to
now follow that Brutal Dude.
You're like come on, I can'tfollow.
Fuck that's hard.
You're like, come on, I can'tfollow.
Fuck that's hard.
You're too sweet, john, and I'mgoing to go a different
direction on this as we gothrough this, because you guys

(01:07:39):
will know this search betterthan I do, the different
elements.
Learn business, understandbusiness, make sure that you go
through.
I say this to all the reps Iwork with and I've been
incredibly blessed for 20 yearsthat Salesforce has let me in
the foxhole with them and theylet me be part of the team when
they didn't have to right andalways did it in a partner way

(01:08:00):
right Partnership way, I think.
Know business.
Help your customers by helpingthem actually solve their
problems.
I can find a thousand peoplethat have a thousand certs that
know nothing about business.
If you want to be moremarketable, continue to learn
about models.
What makes a constructioncompany different than a

(01:08:21):
manufacturing company?
What makes a manufacturerdifferent than a services
company?
Until you know that it's justtech.
And, by the way, I've had a20-year career with Salesforce
and I've been incredibly blessedevery day that the product is
that good.
The difference of it, though,has been I think we've lost that
.
Going back just to humanity, Iwould argue this there's more

(01:08:46):
competition than there's everbeen, there is more people
looking for help and frustratedthan there's ever been, and they
want somebody that is going tostep up and step in and help in,
and help yeah.

Josh Matthews (01:09:03):
Yeah, thank you, john.
Thanks for sharing that.
Deep thoughts by John Sisson.
They're always good EveryThursday in my back, that's
right, john and I talk everyThursday morning.
We have a good, we have a greatrelationship and that's one of
the highlights of my week everyweek.
So thanks for doing that withme, john.
What?

Theron Stanley (01:09:22):
else.
I'll add something that Johntouched on earlier in several
aspects, and that is partnership.
Me working inside of Salesforce, one of the most important
things is my partnerships,whether it's the Accentures,
deloitte's, ibm's of the world,or it's small partners that are
engaged at my clients.

(01:09:43):
Please work with your accountteams right.
Partnership is not a two-waystreet, it's a three-way street,
it's a multifaceted street, andif all three aren't connected
from your Salesforce team toyour partner you're working with
, your consultant you're workingwith and the customer, that's
where projects go awry.

Yeah, it makes sense.
What can hiring managers do in2025 to make sure that they're
picking the good ones?
I mean, everybody knows I'vegot about a million thoughts and
I should probably talk about itfor 35 hours, so I'm not going
to say this today, but I reallywant to hear what you guys think
.
What can hiring managers do?

(01:10:27):
They're looking at a bunch ofcandidates and look, I mean, we
already know certs aren'tnecessarily everything that
they're made out to be, but theydo help partner relationships.
So having them is helpful andit's going to be something
that's attractive for them.
But what's something that?
What's an adjustment, a littletweak that hiring managers
probably should make in thecoming year when they're growing

(01:10:51):
their teams?

Josh LeQuire (01:10:51):
Sasha, I think when you and I sat down and
talked last, you told mesomething you've conducted like
20,000 interviews.
Is that right?

If I recall.
Yeah, it's somewhere in there.

Yeah, I don't have that nearly that many under my
belt maybe a couple hundred, Ithink, if I think over all time.
But I think in this age of AI,in this age, I love the points
that John and Darren brought upabout trust and partnership.
I'm going to kind of tack on tothat and say trust and
transparency, right.
When you as a hiring managerare talking to somebody, I try
and hire people smarter than me.

(01:11:21):
There's no reason for me tobring somebody in.

Good luck with that dude.
You're one of the smartest guysI know.

I'm going to really pull the wool over your
eyes.
Thank you, josh.
No, but typically I like to sitdown and just, hey, here's the
problem I'm trying to solve.
Tell me how you go throughsolving it and have a
conversation about solving aproblem.
I think that exposes a lot ofsomebody's true capabilities.
It exposes their thoughtprocess, it exposes the
methodology.
It exposes quite a bit.
And when people are honest andsay, hey, I don't know

(01:11:51):
Experience Cloud or I don't knowRevenue Cloud, but I really
know Sales Cloud, and people arereal, candid and open about
what they know and what theydon't know, not trying to tell
you they know everything ortrying to say things that make
you feel like, oh, this personis the best hire in the world,
that sincerity, that honesty issomething I look for.
So help me solve a problem andtell me the truth.
Those are the two mostimportant things I typically

(01:12:13):
look for I love it.

Transparency is key.
Anyone else?
What do you think, vanessa,like if you were going to grow
your business that you've nowlaunched?
When you step outside of the BAshoes for a minute, right, and
just think, how would you try tobring some sort of certainty?

Vanessa Grant (01:12:36):
All right, I've got it, I got it, I've got, it,
I've got.
I've got a an idea.
So to so to kind of build on Ithink what John was talking
about earlier.
It is really important to beconversational in business.
I think understanding thatvocabulary is really important.

(01:12:57):
But I also think to your point,josh maybe back in 2010, when I
first got into the Salesforceecosystem, somebody could like
conceivably say that they kneweverything about Salesforce.
You cannot do that in a 2024.
And so I think maybe if you're ahiring manager, talking about
the resources that people wouldtap into if they didn't know

(01:13:19):
something in Salesforce andthat's where you can see how
connected people are to thecommunity, to experts within the
community, to resources withinthe community Like, are they on
Ohana Slack?
Are they on Wizard of Ops?
Do they know Salesforce Ben?
What blogs do they follow?
What YouTube channels do theyfollow?
If they were on a cloud thatthey've never been on before,
because you're trying toimplement a multi-cloud solution

(01:13:40):
, then okay, how would they findthe resource for Experience
Cloud if they don't have acertification in it?
And have them talk you throughthat process, because I think
one of the skill sets that isgoing to be well, not going to
be.
It has been important.
I just don't know that peoplehave emphasized it quite as much
is not how much knowledge youhave sometimes, but how quickly

(01:14:03):
you can get to that knowledgewithin the Salesforce ecosystem,
so that you're not spending allyour clients money doing
research.
How can you find thatinformation and good information
?
I'll do a quick story if youdon't mind.
Just really quick, because I wason AgentForce last week.
I was like I'm going to try outthe Salesforce AgentForce thing
and I had a run into somethingthat I've never done before.

(01:14:26):
Okay, I've got a business caseand I know I can help Salesforce
can support me here.
So I asked agent force, can yougive me preferably a demo on
how this is, how this isimplemented?
Well, but I have thisparticular business process in
this particular industry and I'mlooking for the Salesforce
features on how to implementthis well, and preferably with a

(01:14:49):
demo.
Agentforce came back with fiveresults because it has all the
Salesforce documentation right.
Came back with five results andI looked through all the
results.
All the results were literallythe same link.
Literally the same link.
It gave me the same thing fivetimes and it was a less than two
minute demo on agent force forthat particular industry that
I'm working in right now and I'm, like you know what, googling

(01:15:12):
and being connected to peoplethat know Salesforce in the
areas that I don't is stillvaluable.
Agent force isn't going tosolve that problem yet.
Salesforce help isn't going tosolve that problem.
Yet.
Having access to resources,knowing where to go and who to
speak to, that will help solvemy problems.

There you go.
I love it.
I mean we're talking aboutrelationships, connections,
network, real networks, right?
I mean I could push a buttonright now, some magic button,
and we would have head ofpractice, head of sales, head of
discovery, head of architectureright here right now, and then
HR Like, just like that, boom.

(01:15:51):
Now it's my job to be connected, but it's also part of my fun
job and hobby to help otherpeople understand how to get
connected, how to be connected,how to stay connected, and if
you'd like information on that,well, just follow the show.
We've got tons of episodes.
I think we had 60, over 60hours of content that we
produced this year, and some ofthose episodes focus very much

(01:16:13):
on networking.
But if we take some of thesepoints, like transparency from
Josh, solving the businessproblems from John, like all of
these things, and put ittogether, I mean you're going to
get the kind of communityaround you that you want, right?
You do these sorts of things.
You're going to build thatcommunity and it's not going to
happen overnight.

(01:16:34):
For those of you who arewatching or listening, it takes
time, so you just put your footforward right now.
Vanessa, what's a message thatyou would have for people who
are maybe they've got theiradmin cert, they've never had a
job.
I mean, we get this question alot, so there's always new
viewers coming in all the time.
I think we had 125% year overyear growth in our audience, but

(01:16:59):
we have some churn in ouraudience because people's
careers get better and then theyfly the coop and off they go
and they don't stay in tune withus.
So, for those people who arenewer that maybe haven't
listened to one of thoseepisodes, what would you tell
someone to do who is excitedabout 2025?
They're excited about theircertification.
They've heard great things, butthey're walking into what is a

(01:17:21):
very new reality that we're allexperiencing right now.
What would you tell them?

I would say the certification is not enough.
Like you'd mentioned earlier,josh, that 2021, you know,
anybody who has a pulse and canstring a sentence together,
let's throw them on a Salesforceproject.
We are out of that era at thispoint.
So, okay, you've got your admincertification or you're working
towards your admincertification Back to, you need
to be connected, so you need tobe able to find those resources,
because as an admin, you'regoing to run into things every

(01:17:48):
day that you don't know theanswers to.
So how do you find thatinformation quickly?
So that you're not a burden toyour organization, I would
direct them to the admin skillskit so they have a better
understanding, and that'ssomething that Salesforce
released, with like 14 skillsthat they think admins should
have, and that also helps themhow to articulate that on their
resume as well.
Look to your transferableskills.

(01:18:10):
So, if you have industryexperience, maybe try to be an
admin in a particular industrythat you're already familiar
with, so that you can speak thesame language as those end users
and have that type of advantage.
And then, lastly, you can't getaway with getting a job these
days unless you're like, veryconnected or also and or have a
strong LinkedIn presence, and somake sure your LinkedIn is up

(01:18:32):
to date.
Make sure that you are activeon LinkedIn.
I'm a big fan of learningpublicly.
I'm a big fan of sharing yourexperience.
You are an expert, whereveryou're at in your career, and so
be showing what as you learn itand the things that you're
learning along the way.
Don't just be like hey, I'msharing every trailhead badge
I've ever gotten.
What did you learn about thatbadge?
Is it a good badge for otherpeople to take?

(01:18:53):
What are your takeaways?
That's the kind of stuff thatthat will bring people towards
you and that will bring peopletowards your journey and
hopefully the folks will helpgive you a leg up.

But that's yeah look, I mean, I don't know a
better example of anyone in mylittle world who has exemplified
that better than you, vanessa.
I mean, you've really done anincredible.
You've done an incredible job,I think, with your Twitter
followers and your LinkedInfollowers, and the number one
thing that you've been issomething that Josh LaQuire was
talking about.

(01:19:25):
It's like being transparent.
It's another way of sayingbeing vulnerable.
Right, when we're transparent,it just means that we're putting
ourselves at risk fordisappointment.
Jordan Peterson said it once inan interview this woman was
just bashing him.
She was coming down on him witha sledgehammer, and some people

(01:19:47):
don't like him for certainreasons, and you're welcome to
that opinion.
My opinion is he's literallyone of my favorite people
walking planet Earth right now.
I find him absolutelyfascinating and insightful and
his ability to synthesize avariety of disciplines and
convey it in a way that can bedigested and acted upon.

(01:20:07):
I don't know a whole lot ofother people in the world that
can do it quite like him, butanyway, she's bashing on him and
she was talking about beingoffended and they were talking
about free speech and this kindof stuff, and he's like well,
look what you're doing right now, the way you're talking to me
and I'm going to misquote it,but it's like not being

(01:20:28):
offensive.
You're being offensive to me,but that's okay, because if you
don't do that, we can't have aconversation.
You have to put yourself atrisk.
You have to put yourself atrisk, and so what I would say to
folks in general, real quick,is when you don't have a lot of
LinkedIn followers, twitterfollowers, tiktok followers,

(01:20:56):
whatever, and you're like okay,I'm ready, I'm going to put
myself out there, don't worryabout it, no one's watching your
shit anyway, like who cares?
Right?
I mean, no one's watching.
No one of influence is probablygoing to be following your
every word, right?
It's going to be your friendsat first, and then one or two
people, and then maybe four orfive people, and then maybe 10,
and if you get to 50, I mean man, I'm not talking 50 connections

(01:21:19):
, I'm talking 50 people who payattention to you.
Consider your network solved.
I don't think you need to havea thousand insecure
relationships or fakerelationships to have a network.
You have to have somewherebetween five and 25 people that

(01:21:40):
are on your phone that you cancall when you need an answer or
you need some help or advice.
So just do that, cultivatereally good relationships and
surround yourself with greatpeople A lot of people have
talked about.
I know Tony Robbins is a hugefan of this.
It's the idea and I know he'schanged some of his thoughts.
I don't remember what his newthoughts are on it, but one of

(01:22:02):
the things he talks about islike look, you're the average of
the company that you keep.
You are.
So if you are hanging around abunch of people who wake up and
smoke weed and go work at thedetail shop and then do kickball
the third Thursday, like you'reprobably not going to get
exactly where you want to be,there's nothing wrong with that.

(01:22:24):
If you're 22, right.
But if you're getting seriousabout your career, if you're a
provider for others or just foryourself or you have ambition,
start thinking about the companythat you keep in 2025.
Who could you drop?
Who should you add?
Right?
I think that's really importantand I mean I'll bang on about

(01:22:45):
that till the day I die.
When I look at my friends, whenI look at my friends and some of
my good friends are right hereon the stage with me here right
now I mean you're all friends.
I feel so lucky.
I'm surrounded by really smart,hardworking, caring, thoughtful
people with a heart, and thatdoesn't come easily.
It takes time to find thosepeople.

(01:23:06):
I mean, josh, we met five yearsago and we've probably broken
bread twice, right, but we talkand when we do talk, it's
meaningful, it's deep.
You know what I mean.
So think about that.
It doesn't have to be theperson that you call every
single day.
Just be that person who's therewhen you need them, and as long

(01:23:31):
as you're there for them, it'sreciprocity.
You'll get to move forward.
Guys, we're coming.
I mean, we're 90 minutes in, sowe're going to wrap it up.
So I would like to do one quicklittle last round robin and
have everybody say the thingthat they're most grateful for
2024.
I'm a huge Thanksgiving fan andI'm actually a big fan of
giving thanks any day of theweek because I think it feels
good.
So, janine, what is somethingthat you're grateful for?

(01:23:53):
2024?

Janeen Marquardt (01:23:54):
Well, certainly my great network of
friends and family for you guysand for Vanessa, who's turned
into one of my best friends sowho would have known that when
we met?
And just for having all of youguys.
And for Vanessa, who's turnedinto one of my best friends so
who would have known that whenwe met?
And just for having all of youguys.
So thank you and thanks forincluding me.

Thank you, janine , you're awesome Josh.

I have to say, my children first.
That's always paramount, butI'll say, putting that aside and
defaulting to that, I amextremely grateful that the work
we do does not necessitate usgoing into a coal mine, having
to pick up garbage off thestreet and so forth.
The fact that I can sit here atmy house, plug it in my
computer, do what we do day inand day out and actually have an

(01:24:34):
impact on the people I workwith and honestly, the people I
work with have more of an impacton me than I think I ever do on
them that gives me just a greatfeeling of satisfaction,
fulfillment.
I love the people I work with.
It is a blessing.
The people I work with onprojects, the clients I work for
and with the people who workwith me.
I feel very grateful for that.
I've come into contact with you, josh, and you folks here, of

(01:24:56):
course, and the people you meetthrough this job.
I think that's it.
I'm grateful for the peopleI've connected with.

Extending on that thing those connections are
very fulfilling.

John Sisson (01:25:10):
Josh.
Our connection's been verybeneficial for me.
So thank you, Thank you all.
Thank you, Josh, Mr Sisson, Iam thankful for my family.
I'm thankful for my friends.
Mr Matthews, I have a22-year-old son that graduated
college.
He did great in college andhe's trying to get into the
intel space within governmentand has really hit a brick wall.
And I called Josh out of theair and said, hey, I need your

(01:25:33):
help.
And Josh got on the phone withmy son for an hour and
everything that my wife and Isaid to him for the last three
months, Josh got through and myson, two days later, got through
and he was like you know what?
These four things are reallyimportant and I was like son of
a bitch.
I told him that for threemonths, but that's what I said.
So the friends and family isthat's what life's all about.

(01:25:57):
So thank you, Josh.

Thank you, John.
I loved getting the chance towork with Peyton.
What about you, Vanessa?

So just quickly, I think, theron's backstage, if
you want to ask him as well.
Thank you, so something that Iam grateful for.
I had a layoff in August andthat was fairly devastating for
me.
I've always been pretty riskaverse, actually, when it comes
to work, and I was very muchlifted by my network and my
community to the point that Ifeel confident enough to go out

(01:26:27):
on my own, which is probablyhappening maybe years before I
ever intended it to, and I don'tknow that I ever intended to at
all.
So that is what I'm mostgrateful for.
This year is a possibilityopening up because of the work
that I've given into thecommunity.
It is given back to me and I'msuper grateful.
It's that I've given into thecommunity.
It has given back to me, andI'm super grateful.
It's the friends we make alongthe way.

Yeah, yeah, that's wonderful.
It's actually incredible,vanessa.
I mean your journey is one ofmy favorite journeys of all and
getting to watch you walk itover these years has been a real
treasure, a real treat, mrTheron.

Theron Stanley (01:27:04):
Yeah, I'll go family first, Thankful for my
family and my friends.
But from a business perspective, I've got great customers.
I'm in a really good spot atSalesforce.
I love my company.
I'm glad I'm in the ecosystemdirectly in my network.
It's growing.
It's not as big as yours, joshand Vanessa, but I've got a
tremendous amount of customers,friends, partners I've worked

(01:27:25):
with over the years so it makesmy life easy.
I love that.

Well, I'm just going to echo what everyone else
here has said.
It's almost 100% people.
And I look at my family Charlieand Oliver and Naya and Brenna
and Connor, me and Casey's kids.
It's just, they've had aphenomenal year.
I'm so grateful and proud ofall of them.
I'm so proud of Casey.

(01:27:50):
She's had a tough year.
Oh God, I'm getting emotional.

Janeen Marquardt (01:27:55):
Give our love to Casey.

I will.
She's watching right now.
So, Casey you heard it, so Icouldn't have gotten through it
without you guys.
So thank you and sorry to oh, Ipromised myself I wouldn't do
this.
It's like I'm on BarbaraWalters, but it's when we think
about our family, when we thinkabout our careers and these
things.
How can it not, how can it nottouch your heart?

(01:28:18):
So just a lot of gratitude andlove for everyone that I'm close
to, all all of those people whoimpact me and all the people
that I am in a very fortunateposition to hopefully positively
impact.
You guys make it all worthwhile.
So that's our year-end wrap-up.
Sorry to end emotionally, butit's been an emotional year and

(01:28:42):
I think everyone else has done agreat job keeping their
emotions under wraps.
I don't have such an easy timedoing that sometimes, and I
think today was a good exampleof that.
I'm really grateful foreverybody.
This has been the SalesforceCareer Show's wrap up.
Thank you everybody to ourincredible audience.
Your comments mean the world tous.
Your LinkedIn messages, I meanI saw some stuff this week from

(01:29:05):
some of our listeners about howwe've impacted their lives that
have absolutely just I mean,warmed my heart, made my week.
It's absolutely incredible toget that kind of a feedback off
of something that is, let's faceit, it's a hobby.
I mean, we don't make moneydoing this.
It's just a hobby and we loveit.
We love giving back.
Thank you to every single guestthat we've had, every single

(01:29:26):
contributor that we've had onthe show.
You have helped grow ouraudience.
You've helped to grow thecontent that drives real,
impactful change.
I mean, you think about it.
If one person hears one thingand they take action on it and
it changes their career, wellain't it worth it?
But I think we can count in thedozens or the hundreds of
people that we actuallypositively impact, and we know

(01:29:49):
this because we look at thestats.
We know that they come back.
We know how many people likethis is their number one podcast
or this we're in their top fivepodcast, and it's not a small
number.
So thank you everybody aroundthe world and here on LinkedIn,
the YouTubers who are watching.
We can't wait to see you inJanuary.
We hope that you're going totune in early.
I think it's the third.

(01:30:09):
I'll have to double check, butit's going to be two weeks from
today and we're going to belaunching a whole new giveaway
for about a dozen people to getthe kind of training that we
talked about tonight.
It's the kind of training todevelop those VA skills and
develop those interpersonalskills.
On a six month program.
It's going to be a hundredpercent free, so we're so super

(01:30:31):
excited about that.
Can't wait to see each of younext year on this program.
And that's it for 2024, by 2024.
We will see you next year.

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