Building a Successful Salesforce Team and Advancing Your Career with Samantha Bragg

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Are you ready to unlock the secrets of building a successful Salesforce team and advancing your career? Join us as we discuss these topics and more with Samantha Bragg, the Director of Architecture at Rose Tree Solutions, who boasts 8 impactful years and 21 Salesforce certifications. With her expertise and insight, we uncover the importance of culture, core values, and how to recruit top performers for your team.

In this captivating conversation, we explore the challenges of getting to the authentic individual in an interview, as well as the role of a solution architect in helping businesses develop their strategy, process, and technology plans. Listen in as Samantha shares her work with Montrose Grace Place, teaching Trailhead badges to homeless and housing insecure youth, and exposing them to a potential Salesforce career path. 

Finally, we discuss the importance of networking and community within the tech industry, and how understanding the destination and having representation can make a significant impact on one's career. Don't miss out on this inspiring conversation.

Episode Transcript

Announcer (00:02):
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 (00:21):
Okay, guys, welcome to the show.
Another Wednesday, anothergreat afternoon to get into some
deep discussions with somereally smart people about the
Salesforce ecosystem, and I'mreally excited that today we
have a special guest with us.
We have Samantha Bragg with ustoday, and Samantha is the

(00:42):
director of architecture at RoseTree Solutions.
She's got eight impactful yearsin the Salesforce ecosystem.
She's accumulated a wealth ofknowledge and experience that
she's very keen to share with ustoday, aren't you, sam?
And she's boasting a staggering21 certifications Salesforce
certifications and a mule softcertification under her belt.
Her expertise in Salesforce isabsolutely nothing short of

(01:04):
extraordinary.
Not only does she do her dayjob, but she's been a leading
voice at several significantevents, such as Texas Dreaming
and Dreaming sorry, apostropheand Dreamforce, and numerous
user group meetings, sharing herinsights, sharing her knowledge
with the wider Salesforcecommunity.
I think what really sets Samapart, though, is her commitment
to giving back.
Through her participation inMGP does trailhead.

(01:27):
She's helped homeless andhousing and secure youth gain
valuable Salesforce skills,contributing to empowering the
next generation of Salesforcepros, and we're going to get a
chance in a little bit here totalk about that, so stay tuned,
we're going to dive right intoSam's journey, unpack some of
her strategies for achievingsuccess and discuss her
inspiring work in communitybuilding and philanthropy as

(01:47):
well.
So we're going to talk to Sam injust a moment, but first a
little bit of housekeeping, onething I wanted to do.
I wanted to give a big shoutout to Seattle and to New York.
Seattle and New York are toppodcast listeners on Apple and
on Spotify.
Our following has been growingtremendously, so if you're
listening to this program andyou haven't clicked follow,

(02:10):
definitely do so.
We've got some amazing pastpodcasts that we strongly
recommend you check out,including last week's with
Kristin Lengua I got it rightthis time who's the chief people
officer for 10K, and you cancheck them out at 10KViewcom.
And in two weeks from now, wehave Mark Baker.

(02:30):
Mark Baker is the director ofdelivery management at
Salesforce for MuleSoft, so he'sgoing to have a wealth of
information from an insider'sperspective with Salesforce.
He'll be talking about thelayoffs, the impact and some
other things that people can doto hopefully future proof their
career here in the ecosystem.
Now one thing that I'd like todo is also just invite people in

(02:53):
general.
Please go ahead, and if youhave a question, all you got to
do on this show is raise yourhand.
We'll call on you.
You can ask the question.
If you're listening to thispodcast and you'd like your
question answered live on thisshow, you're more than happy to
do that.
I know we've got at least acouple today to cover And to do
so you just have to message me.
Josh atthesalesforcerecruitercom.

(03:16):
Again, j-o-s-h atthesalesforcerecruitercom.
Okay, so with that, let's goahead and jump in here.
If anyone has a question again,go ahead and raise your hand.
Otherwise we're going to starttalking to Samantha here.
Hey, sam, hi, josh, all right,thanks for joining us on our
show today.
Really appreciate it And I hopethat you've been having a great

(03:37):
week so far.
How was that introduction?
I hope we got most of the goodstuff in there.

Speaker 3 (03:45):
Um, I'm not used to hearing somebody say so many
flattering things about me allthe time.

Josh Matthews (03:50):
Well, we've got to fix that right.
Let's change that.
You just send me your list ofyour best friends and your
closest family and I'm going tohave some words with them, okay.

Speaker 3 (03:58):
I'll get right on that.

Josh Matthews (04:02):
Okay, Fantastic.
So, look, we've had a littleintro about you, but tell us
specifically what is it youactually do in your current role
.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
Yeah, that's a great question.
So in my current role I am thedirector of solution
architecture at Rosetree.
We are a Salesforceimplementation partner.
Um, my role is probably ahybrid between delivery

(04:33):
excellence and solutionexcellence.
So I have a large team that Iwork with.
I've got all of our declarativefolks roll up under my umbrella
, so all of our architects andour consultants and senior
consultants and principalconsultants and CPQ, fsl,
project managers.
you know I make sure that weare staffing the right skill

(04:57):
sets to engagements for clientsso that everybody gets what they
need.
Um, on both sides of theequation, you know, our team has
that fulfillment of doing goodwork and clients have that
satisfaction of getting a goodproduct.
And I spend a lot of timereviewing solutions and builds
with our teams.
you know, kind of taking thatthat top down look of all of the

(05:23):
experience that I've got to say, hey, here are some life
lessons we've learned the hardway And I think that's maybe
apply those here so that we'renot doing the same thing again.

Josh Matthews (05:34):
Man, I like.
How do you have time to sleep?
or you know, watch, watch someNetflix.

Speaker 3 (05:39):
With all that going on, I have amazing team leaders
that help me to keep the ballsall up in the air and just a
fabulous group of architectsthat keep all of our projects
running really smoothly withreally good solutions.

(06:02):
That I'm almost unnecessary.

Josh Matthews (06:06):
Well, well, that's, that's amazing, you know
.
It just goes to show like itreally takes a team like the
right team, like all of ourcareers are tied to the quality
of the teams that were in orbuild for ourselves.
I mean, if, if anybody doesn'tagree with that, i'd be shocked.
But it's, it's just a truth andit keeps coming up.
Every podcast I listen to,every conference I go to, every

(06:28):
interaction I have with businessleaders, like a couple of the
ones that I spoke to today.
It's absolutely critical.
And you've been at Rose Treefor about four and a half years
now, is that correct?
Yeah, that's right.
And in that time, i mean, haveyou guys what you've grown by at
least 50% in the last couple ofyears, sort of a post COVID

(06:48):
boom?
is that accurate?

Speaker 3 (06:50):
Yeah, we've.
we've grown quite a bit overthe last four years And we went
from a team of probably 10 or sowhen I first started in 2019 to
about a team of 50 now.

Josh Matthews (07:05):
That.
You know that's incrediblegrowth.
I'm kind of curious.
I want to, we want to talkabout your career and your
contributions.
But I think it's reallyimportant too, because some of
the people who listen to ourprogram work They're.
They're maybe not listening tothe show because they need to
break into the ecosystem, ormaybe they're not listening to
the show because they they wantto be an architect although

(07:27):
there are plenty of people,plenty of our listeners, in that
position.
But some of them are clients ofmine or people who are running
businesses, people who areworking at Salesforce partners
And they want to know, like,what's the code, like how do you
crack the code to grow aSalesforce partner business?
And I'm kind of curious arethere, are there one or two or

(07:48):
three things that you can kindof boil down?
what has been sort of thenon-negotiable critical few that
has led to the success of yourorganization so far?

Speaker 3 (08:02):
Um, short, you know, the number one thing I would say
is definitely our culture.
You know, we, when we interviewfolks, when we're looking to
add to the team, we definitelyinterview for culture as well as
skill.
We want to make sure thatyou're going to fit in and fit

(08:23):
with our core values and ourcore beliefs, um, because we
want to make sure thateverybody's trying to achieve
the same thing.
You know, i like to I like tojoke with people when I'm doing
an interview that our team isvery much made up of high
achieving nerds.
right, that that's what we'relooking for when we're talking

(08:44):
to folks, or those highachievers who are those self
motivators who want to come in,and they have that passion for
the platform.
They have that passion to buildgood things, you know, and so
we want others who share in thatwhen we're adding folks to our
team.

Josh Matthews (09:04):
Oh yeah, of course, like everybody's worked
somewhere maybe they even worksomewhere right now where they
know like there's some deadweight on the team, right, most
hiring managers that I work withusually have someone that they
want to hire or fire.
It's sort of both And it's it's.

(09:26):
It's I've seen it myself,stephen, and I have seen it when
we work together at Robert HaffWhat it looks like when you
have one person that can justreally weigh down the team.
I mean, it's, it's like I liketo think of.
You know, if you got 10 peopleall hanging on a rope and then
there's just dead weight at thebottom, that that rope can snap

(09:47):
and it can really undo so muchwork.
So are there certain questionsor like like, how do you, how do
you figure out the appropriatebehaviors of you know, we say
culture, we say behaviors, it'sthe same thing.
How do you identify and sort of, to the best of your ability,
de-risk those hires when you'rebringing them on board?

Speaker 3 (10:09):
You know, the questions kind of vary depending
on the role and the expectation, right?
So when interviewing somebodyfor, say, an architect position,
we're looking for someone whoexhibits more leadership
capabilities, that they're ableto modify their speech and their
language and their word choicesto suit different audiences,

(10:32):
right?
Some of it is some of it comesacross in an interview with the
body language.
You know, is your camera on?
Are you looking at the cameraor are you looking at your
keyboard?
and I'm seeing the top of yourhead, you know.
Are you distracted by what'saround you And appropriate

(10:53):
things in your background?
you know, i'm judging you onall of these things when I'm
interviewing you, right, becausethese are the things that
clients are going to see.
Yeah, it's going to come out.

Josh Matthews (11:06):
It's going to come out right.

Speaker 3 (11:07):
Exactly.

Josh Matthews (11:10):
And is there a question or two that you like?
here's the thing people areoften looking for, kind of a
silver bullet when it comes torecruiting or when it comes to
screening and interviewing, andyou and I talked about this the
other day, didn't we?
Yeah, like, is there, you knowwhat's sort of the bulletproof
failproof?
I know you're laughing becauseit's bullshit.

Elizabeth (11:31):
It is?

Josh Matthews (11:33):
I always think it's.
I don't think it's hysterical,i think it's a little bit sad.
Honestly, when people are likeI've got the best questions,
it's like, well, great, but whatabout your ability to interpret
those questions or follow up oridentify the pink flags and the
yellow flags that are comingwith the answers So you can
actually get to the truth, right?
Because everybody's got alittle bit of a persona.
I'll admit I have a little bitof a persona.

(11:54):
When I'm on a podcast, it'sdifferent than when I'm hanging
out with a friend having a cigarIt's not the same thing, right
And so we tend to meet theperson that people want us to
meet when we're in an interviewand kind of breaking through and
getting to that authenticindividual and really figuring
them out right.
That's kind of the challenge.

(12:16):
Do you have any words of wisdomfor our listeners about?
you know what are some of thesteps you take when you're
screening for top performers onyour team?

Speaker 3 (12:28):
Sure.
So one of the questions that Ialways ask towards the beginning
of an interview and you know,kind of really speaks a lot is I
will introduce myself and Iwill tell candidates up front
hey, here's what we're going togo through, here's what we're
going to do, the cadence of theinterview.

(12:48):
We're going to start with somequick introductions so we get to
know each other, so we're notstrangers on the screen, because
that's weird And I will alwaysgo first to set the tone.
You know I will give a veryabbreviated three minutes or
less.
Here is my background, here'swho I am, here's what I do, and

(13:09):
then ask the candidate to do thesame.
You know, having laid out theexpectations that we're doing
abbreviated intros, you knowthat I've looked at your resume
or your LinkedIn, you knowprofile, that we've got other
things that we're going to cover, and then ask them to introduce
themselves.

Josh Matthews (13:32):
I like that You're literally talking about
giving them an example of thetabo and pace that you want the
conversation to be conducted in.

Speaker 3 (13:40):
Right, And then I look to see you know, are you
taking 20 minutes to regurgitateyour LinkedIn profile to me, Or
are you hitting the high notesAre you telling me all about?
here are my bestaccomplishments, my highlight
reel, You know.
here are the shining starexamples of who I am.

(14:01):
your chance to brag aboutyourself before we get into
things, Right.
Yeah, do you think?

Josh Matthews (14:09):
like, let's say, if you reflected, maybe, on the
last 20 people that you'veinterviewed, how many of them do
you think talk too much?

Speaker 3 (14:18):
Five at least.

Josh Matthews (14:20):
Okay, at least five.
So 25% of the people.
Okay, right.
And anyone who talks too much?
is that enough to kind of likesort of set the wrong tone or
set the wrong kind of standardin your own imagination for how
successful they'll be working onthe team?

Speaker 3 (14:38):
It is.
You know, i'm usually yes, i'mgoing to fully going to caveat
that and say usually yes, butnot always, because there's,
there's a few things there.
It shows a, you know, a lack ofunderstanding of the situation.
It shows a lack ofunderstanding of time management

(15:00):
and we're consulting, you know,and so you've got to, you've
got to be there in the momentwith the clients and the
conversation and, you know, besituationally aware.

Josh Matthews (15:13):
Yeah, i hope if no one learns anything other
than this, like if you're goingto take something out of this.
Right, i think you're spot onhere from a stats standpoint,
sam.
You know about 25% of peoplejust they blow it and it's not
because they didn't do a goodjob in their last job, it's not
because they don't have theability in the skill set and

(15:35):
it's not because they don't wantto do the work Right.
It's not simply because theyhave failed to prepare their
ability to communicate thecritical few when asked to do so
, and particularly in thepartner world, i think any kind
of consulting type role man,that is absolutely a must.

(15:55):
That doesn't mean, just nowsomeone asks the question, just
say yes or no.
You know you got to hallucinate,but this, this too much talking
thing I probably talk too muchto.
But but the reality is, is it'sa, it's a big no, no, anything
else that since we're giving,since you're sharing some really
good perspectives here onbringing people on board When

(16:19):
you talk about culture, right,and here's the thing Kristen and
I got into this a little bit acouple weeks ago when she was on
the show.
So the difference between Ithink it was Kristen, but we
talked about the difference,maybe, between culture and
behaviors, right, becausesometimes we think culture like

(16:41):
what's the culture of a company?
But is it culture or are theyjust sort of common behaviors
that people share?
I'm just kind of curious, likephilosophically, what your take
is on this.

Speaker 3 (16:56):
I think a lot of it is definitely behaviors.
But there's also that aspect ofyou know, like your I don't
necessarily want to say likeyour morals or your ethics but
you're driving forces behindthose behaviors, right, if they
would based on behaviors and youmake a lot of mistakes, then

(17:17):
that can be interpreted in apotentially negative light, when
it wasn't malintentioned, right, you know.
But definitely, definitely,behavior is a big part of it.

Josh Matthews (17:31):
Okay, yeah, and that's what I see too.
You know, i just I'm kind ofasking everybody this about
culture versus behavior becauseI have yet to kind of pin it
down, you know there's.
So we, vanessa and I talkedabout it this winter for a
little bit And it's, it's really.
And, by the way, if you'relistening and you're wondering

(17:51):
where my co-host is, vanessa isat London calling.
So she's at the Salesforceconference in London.
I just saw an amazing pictureof her looking out the window of
a tall building looking down onthe gherkin in downtown London.
So I think she's having a greattime And on the next show we're
going to be able to get a nicelittle recap about how this

(18:14):
event went for her.
Sam, can you spend?
I want to talk about yourcareer and how you got into
everything and some of thecontributions that you're making
to the community as well.
But since we're sort of talkingabout you know what partners
can do or what you know what youhave done to help grow an

(18:35):
amazing team, what are some ofthe things that clients do that
you work with that really helpyou, to help them succeed?
Right, like we all know,they're good clients and there's
bad clients and there's a bunchof people or organizations in
between right.
So when you think about sort ofthat ideal client, what are

(18:57):
some of the qualities andbehaviors that they're bringing
to their partnership with youwhen you're consulting with them
?

Speaker 3 (19:05):
You know, as almost counterintuitive as this may
sound, a client who recognizesthat it is a partnership, that
hiring a partner does notnecessarily equate to pressing
an easy button.
You can't just go.

(19:26):
we need to set this up.
Here's the access to our org.
Good luck to you And off you go.

Josh Matthews (19:32):
Right, because we don't.

Speaker 3 (19:35):
Right, you know it requires a time commitment on
both sides of the table, and sothe clients who recognize that
they do need to be activeparticipants in discovery, that
they do need to be activeparticipants in configuration
reviews and they do need to beactive participants in UAT

(19:58):
testing are the clients who arethe most successful because
they're investing in theirsystem.
Right, they're investing intheir future.
We can build anything, but weneed to know what to build to
suit that client's specificbusiness process, that client's
specific needs.

(20:19):
Right, because no two companiesare the same.

Josh Matthews (20:24):
Yeah, it's an incredible point that you've
just made And I'm kind ofcurious, like if you were to get
.
Well, let me just backtrack alittle bit, one of the
consultants I have.
He's working for a partner.
He's a terrific guy and I'veknown him for some time And we
got into a discussion recentlybecause the client of my client

(20:44):
so the client of the partnerthey're just not, they're
dragging their heels ondiscovery Right In an incredibly
slow, slow way.
It's just not working for them.
They want to do discovery overone hour sessions across 12
weeks instead of knocking it outa couple of days, which they

(21:06):
could do.
Right, they definitely could do.
And so what do you do when youhave a client that just isn't?
They're just kind of draggingtheir heels.
And I'm going to ask the secondquestion too Do you think that
salespeople in the partnersystem could do a better job of

(21:28):
sharing the importance of thepartnership?

Speaker 3 (21:33):
I'm going to answer your second question first.
I've worked at a couple ofconsultancies and you can
definitely tell the differencewhen expectations are set up
front during the sales cycle,right, when it's explained to
clients what goes into a project, what the expectation is on

(21:57):
their side, what they need to doto come to the table and be
successful.
Now, that's not to say that thewords don't fall on deaf ears
occasionally, but it's importantfor long-term success of the
relationship with the client andfor long-term success of the
project that every expectationis laid out clearly, right.

(22:23):
I have a project manager that Iwork with at Roastree who likes
to say projects are not mysterynovels.
Nobody should be guessingwhat's going to happen.

Josh Matthews (22:34):
I love that.
I love that, that's great.

Speaker 3 (22:40):
So it's important from the very beginning to set
the tone of the relationshipappropriately Right, to make
sure that sales and delivery arein lockstep with what is our
message, what are ourexpectations, so that it carries
through the entire relationship.

Peter Ganza (23:02):
I'm just curious, samantha, does that resonate
with every customer?
Are there ones that just say Ijust want to get this done?

Josh Matthews (23:12):
This is Peter Gonza, by the way, piping up.
Thank you, peter, keep going.

Speaker 3 (23:18):
Of course There's always clients who are like I
want to get it done.
There are always clients whoare they're going to come and
they're going to say, well, idon't need a whole methodology
for project management, or Idon't need my solution
documented, or we don't need todo UAT, we just need to get it

(23:43):
done.
We do our best to explain whatthe potential ramifications of
those life choices will be.
We do our best to mitigate therisks as much as possible, but

(24:04):
at the end of the day, we can'tspend a client's dollars for
them.
As much as you want to lead thehorse to water, you can't make
them drink.

Josh Matthews (24:15):
Do you think it's mostly like a price
conscious?
They can spend whatever it is.
Let's say they can spend ahundred grand, but when you
throw in UAT and some otherdocumentation now it's 110 or
115, and it's just beyond theirbudget.
Do you think it's mostly amoney thing or just a lack of
interest in involvement?

(24:36):
or they just aren't sold on ityet?

Speaker 3 (24:41):
I don't think it's necessarily one thing
specifically across the board.
We've worked with clients whohave been burned by bad
implementations of tools in thepast.
We've worked with clients whothis is their first major IT
project and they don'tunderstand that those things are

(25:04):
really important.

Josh Matthews (25:08):
Who's never done an IT project being in charge
of this?

Speaker 3 (25:12):
I don't get to make those decisions.

Josh Matthews (25:14):
You don't.
Oh, come on, sam.
It's incredible to me like thesort of mess that people make.
I was talking to someonerecently and they said look,
what we do as partners is wemostly go in and we fix

(25:36):
everything that got messed upwith the prior partners.
I've heard this from a numberof different partners and
delivery managers or directorsof delivery in the past.
The one thing that seems toring true is it's not so much
that the partner really messedup, it's that the client didn't
listen to the partner the firsttime.

(25:58):
They made mistakes and thenwere too embarrassed to go back
to the original partner and thenhave to go find someone else to
fix the thing that they shouldhave handled accurately the
first time around.
Do you think that's the case?

Speaker 3 (26:17):
I definitely think that's the case.
A lot of times There areclients who you know they'll
start a project, and especiallythe ones who are like get it
done, get it done.
We say, great, let's do somediscovery.
Who are we inviting to thetable?
And the stakeholder goes justme, I know all the things and

(26:39):
refuse to bring in more SMEs toprovide more insight and
opinions and thought leadershiparound what happens in their
business.
And so, right from thebeginning, a project really gets
hamstrung by a lack of trueinsight into what's going on.

(27:00):
Because I can tell you, as as adirector, I don't know all the
things that my team doesintimately enough to say Let me
tell you how my businesscompletely runs, from the top to
bottom.
I don't.

Speaker 6 (27:13):
I'm not involved in those cases Sorry.

Peter Ganza (27:17):
No, i was just going to say so.
I talk to partners all the time, and at size typically will
take.
You know, anybody with aheartbeat And one of the
difficult questions I often askthem is you know you have to
learn to say no.
Right, and that's the questionthat I have for you.
Have you ever said no to anactual client?

Speaker 3 (27:39):
I say no all the time .

Peter Ganza (27:42):
Awesome.

Speaker 3 (27:43):
I do.
I say no all the time.
I do because when you become anorder taker, you stop being a
thought leader, right?
And clients are hiring partnersand bringing someone in
hopefully to give them directionon what is the best way to get

(28:06):
this done?
What's going to work for mybusiness?
What is going to be, you know,the most scalable solution?
What is going to increase ourspeed?
What is going to allow us toautomate more of our processes?
And most of the time, thoseclients don't have the
Salesforce expertise on staff tosay here is the best practice,

(28:31):
Here is how we should architectour system, here is what we're
doing.
They're hiring the partner forthat.
And when the partner says hereis what you should be doing,
because this followsarchitectural best practices,
this follows, you know, codewriting best practices, this
follows automation bestpractices And a client goes well

(28:54):
, that's not what we wanted todo, okay, well, let's talk about
that, you know.
Or when the client comes toDiscovery and they go, this is
what we want you to build, thefirst word out of my mouth is
always no, and it's a shock.
It's a shock to a lot ofclients because they're not used
to hearing no, you know, but itgets that attention real quick

(29:14):
of every year in the room Whenyou redirect the conversation to
say okay, i need you to explainto me what you do And I will
tell you how we're going tobuild it in Salesforce, because
that's what you hired me to do.

Josh Matthews (29:30):
So there you go, sam.
I love that.
In fact, two days ago I waslistening to Realist Fuck with
Andy Frisela.
He's a he's a podcaster andkind of interesting guy And he
had a nice little session on allabout, basically on like
raising standards, holding yourstandards in your organization

(29:52):
and what to do about quote,unquote.
Yes, men, right, the people whojust nod and say yes all the
time, and I loved what you said.
You just to reiterate or notreiterate, but to emphasize it,
i think you just said you know,once you start just saying yes
all the time, you're no longer athought leader, right?

(30:14):
I don't say I'm like that's it,that's it, that's a perfect
quote.
And you know there are so manypeople in in the world that
really struggle with all sortsof things confidence, imposter
syndrome right, i just read anarticle on Andrew McCarthy and

(30:34):
how he suffered from impostersyndrome during his years of
being in the Brat Pack.
Again, i might be aging myselfout here talking about him and
Molly Ringwald, but you knowit's a real thing.
We've talked about it on theshow before, but this idea that
when you just say yes and nod,it doesn't really work out.
And you know I say no toclients all the time.

(30:54):
We probably say no to about halfthe clients or organizations
that reach us out, to us for ourhelp, because they're just not
in line or they won't operatewithin the.
You know, basically, the roadthat we have built that always
leads to success.
I mean our organization.
In four years, we haven't had asingle person fired from a

(31:16):
full-time job in four years,right, i don't know any other
recruiting company that can saythat, right, but it's because we
, it's only because we say no,it's only because we don't take
on every single client, and it'sonly because the clients that
we work with and continue towork with have.
You know, look, we got to.
You got to listen to yourclients' needs, right, and you
got to do the thing for themthat they need.

(31:37):
You've got to have anexceptional product or service
or whatever it is you do.
It's got to be amazing,otherwise you don't get to work
with them again.
You don't get to stay inbusiness five or more years,
right, like it just doesn't.
It's not going to happen, butit hinges on this, this idea of
the ability to say no whenneeded, and then, of course,
knowing how to say no iscritical.

(31:59):
So how do you say no Like?
how do you have theseconversations without
necessarily, you know, offendingsomeone or embarrassing someone
when you're having thesediscussions, sam?

Speaker 3 (32:15):
That's a hard question for me to answer.
I am a very direct communicatorand I literally just say no.
I don't leave it as a no or Idon't leave it as just a no.
For me, it is essentially shutdown that path.

(32:36):
We're not going there.
Here is where we are going andredirect the conversation in the
direction that I think it oughtto be going.
Instead of yeah, when clientsare like hey, i need you to
build me an object to hold this,i don't think that's a great
idea.
Let's talk about what you needto be in that object and we will

(33:02):
help you find the right placefor it to be.

Josh Matthews (33:04):
Right, i love that We've got a hand raised.
Jason's like what's up?
Jason?

Speaker 6 (33:10):
Yeah, hello Smith, i really like what you were saying
right there.
I want to piggyback onto thatand also about the previous
comment about how you'll have anexecutive who is trying to
speak for everyone instead ofbringing SMEs there or end users
there.
My role as a technical trainerI feel that pain when I come to

(33:34):
the training and the end userssay what about this?
We say, oh, that's a greatconsideration.
Thank you for bringing that up.
This is going to now sendeverything in another direction.
Being able to bring thatfurther, shifting that left into
the project before things arebuilt is always better.
I think that's importantexpertise to bring as far as

(34:00):
saying no to someone who'strying to represent everyone
right there, bringing them toprovide that expertise, just as
you were just saying, with theobject as well, about the
architecture, how they may bethinking of one architecture,
and you could bring yourexpertise, based off of your
experience, to provide anotherarchitecture, another way to say

(34:21):
no, in addition to just beingable to explain how things may
look and being able to mapthings over so they could be
able to see, instead of atakeover, they can understand
the transformation because theycould see how it relates.
They're able to grasp onto whatthey already know.
So it's not a huge tectonicshift, it's they're able to see

(34:43):
how it goes from their level ofthinking.
Just as how people are, humansare able to learn.
We're not thinking machinesthat feel, we're feeling
machines that think.
So we have to be able to helppeople learn incrementally.
That's how that goes onto thatapproach.

(35:04):
Another one that I picked upfrom the past Life Fire I've had
we're doing communityorganizing and helping people
get registered to vote is withhaving people unravel their own
ideas and concepts by uncoveringthe Dunning-Kruger effect.

(35:27):
So the Dunning-Kruger effect iswhen someone knows just enough
to be dangerous to themselves.
They think they know too much.
So they have unconsciouscompetence.
So they don't know what theydon't know and they don't know
that.
So they have unconscious I'msorry, unconscious incompetence.
Unconscious incompetence, sounconscious they don't know.
There you go And, yeah, youjust broke down the whole curve

(35:50):
of that.
It's a curve that looks like abell, going from unconscious
incompetence to consciousincompetence.
So now you know, oh bong, yourealize that you don't know, and
then you're learning.
So now you're having consciousincompetence until finally you
have unconscious competence.
So that's where it's justinstinctive, oh, it just seems

(36:14):
so natural for you, where itlooks completely complex for
someone else, you don't evenrealize it.
But I'm digressing with thatlittle lesson right there, that
fun lesson.
What I wanted to bring up isthat if someone is saying no,
they feel like they're an expert.
You can and you're trying toexplain, but they're just not
listening because they're justreally completely walled in with

(36:35):
their ego.
You can ask for them to explainit.
Oh wow, you're a bicycle expert.
Well, how does a bicycle work?
Well, so people realize howlittle of an expert they are
when they actually have toexplain things.
Or when you ask questions thatyou could be able to think of,
critical questions based offyour expertise.
You could be able to poke holes, to have them take on your

(36:57):
thinking through those questions.

Josh Matthews (37:00):
Yeah, I love that one.
Jason, You know there's anexceptional book on negotiating
by a fellow named Tim Foss,V-O-S-S, called Never Split the
Difference.
I recommend it for everyone,whether you're.
Oh, Chris Foss, thank you, Whatdid I?
say Tim.
Yeah, i'm so crap with names Ihonestly don't know why I got in

(37:21):
this industry, but okay.
So thank you, chris Foss.
So you've read it, and one ofthe first things, chapter one,
is just a simple question, whichis well, how do I do that?
Right, i want this done, okay.
Well, how do I do that?
Well, you just click on thebuttons and it's like, right,
but that's going to lead to this.
Like, what do you think thatwill lead to?

(37:42):
But what if I told you?
it's going to lead to X, y andZ.
Is that something you stillwant me to do?
You know, like, how do Icircumvent my own expertise to
do something stupid?
Like, why would I do that?
You know, and, using plainspeak, right.

(38:03):
So it's good stuff.
And I think too, since we're onthe subject of this, of like
how you tell people know, or howyou give someone, how do you
tell someone something that theyprobably don't want to hear,
i'll tell you a quick littlestory.
There was this fella came inback in the day.
He was looking for at the time,a job in IT.

(38:25):
He had a modicum of experience.
He'd been a captain in themilitary, in the army, in the US
army.
He was a nice guy, a quiet guy,and he came in and sat down
with me and you know I was niceand friendly And he kept his
leather jacket on during thewhole conversation And so at the
end I said, hey look, are youopen to some recommendations?

(38:47):
And, honestly, his face, hesaid yes, because who's going to
say no?
right, but his face, his facesaid no, his mouth said yes, And
I told him.
I said look, ben, you've got tolose the jacket when you come
into an interview.
It looks like you're ready tobolt out the door.
Now this fella happened to bethe fiance of a friend of mine,
someone I knew, and I heardthrough the grapevine that he

(39:09):
was extremely offended that Isaid anything about his jacket.
Right, because I think hecarefully plans his wardrobe
that day.
I don't know what the story was, but about a year later he goes
and he decides to skip out ontech And he goes to become a
state trooper in Oregon Andthere is this one final step.

(39:33):
There's like 20 guys up on thestage or something, where I
forget exactly what the scenariowas, but basically there was a
final step to being able to makethe cut to the academy And he
got to skip that step because hewas the only one who took off
his jacket for the interview.
And he reached out to me andhe's like man, I got to tell you

(39:55):
thanks, dude, you saved me alot of heartache.
And he was like, i got to tellyou I was pissed Like I thought
you were arrogant, i didn't wantto take your advice, i didn't
want to listen to you.
Like who's this guy?
and I'm a captain and like allof this sort of stuff.
He's like, but seriously like.
Maybe I would have got in anyway, but I was literally the only
one out of this whole class ofcadets that didn't have to do

(40:18):
something, all because I took myjacket off.
So thank you.
Sometimes we tell people thetruth and the benefit doesn't,
doesn't get realized for sixmonths or a year or even a few
years down the road.
So I appreciate that you canhold people accountable to that.
Go ahead, jason.

Speaker 6 (40:35):
Yeah, you know, and so actually there is another tip
from Chris Voss about that thatyou can be able to race them
for impact by overstate, sayinghey, listen, we're going to give
some feedback.
It might seem a littleinsulting but it's, you know,
taking with the best ofintentions, it's given with the

(40:57):
best of intentions.
So we're going to say something.
You know it might feel a littlepainful, so so to overstate
this way you under deliver, youknow like it's like really not
too painful.

Josh Matthews (41:08):
Yeah, that's called lining.
We call that lining back in mycar car sales days back in 96 to
98.
Right, you line someone.
It's like, yeah, it's.
You know what?
were you thinking?
you wanted to pay for this,like 500 a month, even if you
know, even though they couldprobably get it for four or
something like that.
So that's, that's lying, veryyou know, used car car sales,
you think.
But it's lining, it's priming,it's human behavior And there's

(41:33):
so much knowledge that we haveabout this type of communication
, proven studies that have havedemonstrated this sort of thing,
like even someone looking at.
I did this with my son, ali, whoretested for his SATs on
Saturday to just read somereally awesome positive things
about being successful before hewalks in and takes his SAT.

(41:56):
Right, because it actually itactually or like sharing some
facts about you know the successof students who take this test
on a Saturday, like whatever itis.
But you prime your brain thatyou're going to be successful.
It's not too dissimilar frompower posing, which if you type
in power pose, power posing, tedtalk you can find something out

(42:19):
about it.
But it's really about primingyour brain to be ready to think
about things in a very specificway And I've always called it
lining.
Some people call it priming,and I love that.
You've brought up what whatChris Voss said.
I think I used to know a TimVoss.
I think he used to be a clientof mine, like 15, 20 years ago,
so I think that's why I saidthat.

(42:40):
Guys, we're 45 minutes into theshow, so we're going to do a
quick mini announcement.
If you're just joining us rightnow, you're listening to our
amazing guest, samantha Bragg,who is director of solution
architecture at Rose StreetSolutions, a Salesforce partner.
We have with us on the floorPeter Gonza.
We also have Jason Psychowitzcontributing.

(43:02):
Vanessa, who's always on theshow, is in London at London
Calling right now.
If you are curious aboutadvancing your Salesforce career
at all, i want to make a coupleof recommendations to you.
Number one continue to join uson this show and on this podcast
.
Make sure that you'resubscribing on whatever platform
you like.
You can just type in Salesforcecareer or Salesforce career

(43:26):
show and it will come up.
The other thing that you can dois check out expand exchange.
You can just type in expandexchangecom.
This is a directory ofresources that Vanessa and I put
together.
It's handpicked, well vettedcontributors to the ecosystem,
so that if you're an architector you're coming from the
military or you're a BA oryou're an admin, you can quickly

(43:50):
get to the kinds of communitiesand support and information
that you need to advance yourcareer, advance your knowledge
and be a better contributor tothe company that you're in and
advance your career, even ifthat means you have to leave
your company.
Check out those resources.
The last thing I wanted to shareis a couple of critical

(44:12):
positions that we're hiring forright now.
One of them is actually adirector of delivery over
Salesforce core delivery.
It's for an exceptional partnerthat we absolutely adore and
love.
They have hired I think, eightor nine people from us in as
many months and everyone thereabsolutely loves it.
I got a text from our mostrecent placement and he said
Josh, these people are great,they're just fantastic.

(44:35):
So it's a wonderful place tocontinue your career and grow.
But, specifically, this isn'tjust being director of core.
This is also someone who canwalk in with those methodologies
and delivery practices that areso critical and vital.
They do a good job, they getstuff out the door right, but

(44:55):
it's not as uniform as theywould like it to be, so they
want a nice heavy header to comein and drive some methodology
change in the organization.
So if that sounds like you orif that sounds like someone you
might know, make sure that youpoint them towards me or towards
Steven Greger, and you can findSteven with the V-G-R-E-G-E-R

(45:16):
on LinkedIn or here on Twitter,and we'll do our best to take
care of the most candidates.
And then the other position isa B2B Commerce Cloud Pro.
Okay, so we're looking forengineers, developers,
potentially architects.
And, by the way, because we dohave an international audience,
i want to say we're in over 25countries And so this job you

(45:40):
can work anywhere.
Anywhere except a couplecountries where there's some
conflict going on.
They're open to consideration.
So if you are a B2B CommerceCloud Pro, make sure that you
reach out to Steven Greger or me, josh at
thesalesforcerecruitercom, orSteven with a V-S-T-E-V-E-N at
thesalesforcerecruitercom, getin touch with us And if you know

(46:01):
someone who's interested ormight be great for this position
, we pay exceptionally goodreferral fees.
Okay, so that's always been thecase And it always will be the
case, because building thisnetwork and supporting us to
help people get amazing jobsshould always be rewarded, and I
think some cash in your pocketis not a bad way to do it.

(46:21):
So there we go.
All right, and Steven, we'vegot to get you on here so that
you can speak too.
All right, yeah, elizabeth.

Elizabeth (46:33):
Good afternoon, thanks so much.
I've had a question but didn'trealize I didn't just
specifically raise my hand Andyeah, good boy.
So, samantha, i just startedfollowing you, of course, and a
few months ago I thought tomyself I'm a salesforce
consultant now And I am inspiredand looking to become a

(46:58):
solution architect myself in acouple of years.
I'm thinking maybe one or twoyears, i don't know how long
it'll take, but it's somethingI'm definitely started
researching.
And my question for you I know,like I said, you're the
director And so you leadobviously lots of other
architects and things of thatnature.
So I think my question for youis when you're working with

(47:24):
other architects or when youhave architects on different
projects, do you tend to havesolution architects as a
separate role from enterprise ortechnical architects, or do you
tend to have them wear multiplehats?

Speaker 3 (47:42):
That is such a great question.
We tend to have them as aseparate role from a technical
architect or from an enterprisearchitect, because the
expectations of those roles arevery different And the skill
sets for those roles are usuallyvery different for what they
bring to the table.
A technical architect is goingto be very focused on the

(48:08):
technical side.
They're looking at the systemlandscape, the integrations, the
data migrations, the code, allof the technical pieces of a
build.
An enterprise architect wantsto have a very broad picture of
the enterprise in general.

(48:28):
What is everything that's goingon?
What is the strategy?
What is the long-term goal ofyour IT and your business?
How do we break that out intomanageable steps to get there
And a roadmap?
How do we make sure that thereis alignment between departments

(48:50):
and between the systems so thateverything works together And a
solution architect is kind ofin the middle.
It's the marriage essentiallyof the strategy and the
technology to be able tounderstand what is the strategy
and how do we get there from amore technical aspect than where

(49:14):
I would expect an enterprisearchitect to get to, but still
understanding the business partmore than I would expect a
technical architect to get into,if that makes any sense.

Elizabeth (49:28):
Yes, it does.
That's helpful.
As a social architect, i heardyou just mentioned where they're
helping the business with thestrategy.
I'm assuming you mean helpingto develop.
Is it just the businessstrategy or the process, or just
the tech strategy, or all ofthe above?

Speaker 3 (49:49):
It can really be all of the above.
A lot of times we'll work withclients and sometimes it's the
but we would assume would be theeasy questions that really
throw them off because theydon't have a process or a plan
or even any concept that theyneed something.

(50:10):
It can be as simple as well.
How do we know when a lead getspassed from marketing to sales?
What's the trigger point?
What is the handshake Theclient goes?
I don't know.
Or how do we know when to movefrom one sales stage to another?
What is our sales process?

(50:31):
How do we hand off from salesto production or to service or
to whoever is downstream fromthat?
How does sales interact withmarketing?
A lot of these differentinterdepartmental handshake
areas where we're passing fromone to another.
A lot of clients struggle withthat.

(50:52):
They don't know.
Or if they have an idea,they've never formalized their
process or their plan.
So a solution architectsometimes even will go hey,
let's map out the process, we'regoing to come back.
It's things that a BA would doeven.
Let's map out the process andlet's make sure we understand.

(51:14):
How does your business work?
What is your strategy, even atthe very basic level of just
this specific process, not evenan enterprise level strategy.

Elizabeth (51:31):
And I have.
I'm sorry, i've got one morequestion.
Go for it, elizabeth.

Josh Matthews (51:35):
This is great.
I mean, look, guys, this iswhat the show is for.
This show started because ofall the requests for the time of
me or other professionals on mystaff from people And we just
you know we're like not enoughhours in the day.
This is why we started thisprogram three years ago.
So you keep running there,elizabeth, and I also want to

(51:56):
make sure that you get a chanceto talk about your organization
and what you guys are doing tohelp the community also, so make
sure you take a moment for that.

Elizabeth (52:07):
Oh, certainly I should be happy to do that, and
as soon as Samantha can answermy last question based on what
she was just saying, because oneof the things that, while I've
been researching more aboutsolution architects, i'm trying
to make sure I understand thedifference between that and a
consultant or, as you justmentioned, like a BA right?

(52:29):
So there's a lot of businessanalysis that goes on the
strategy side or almost similarto consulting.
So can you maybe point outmaybe some of the differences
between a solution architect anda consultant?

Speaker 3 (52:45):
Sure.
So a solution architect isstill going to be consultative,
right.
But when folks move into thatsolution architect role, there's
a certain level of experiencethat you've achieved.
You've worked on a lot ofprojects.
You've gotten that experienceof seeing different orgs doing

(53:09):
multiple implementations,learning some of those life
lessons, probably the hard way.
I'm sure we all have The firsttime you ask yourself why do I
need a sandbox when you're afirst year admin?
right, but it's more than justthe technical skills.
Consultants will come in andthey've got some of those

(53:31):
technical skills.
But a solution architect ismore a big picture thinker.
Right, they can say what isyour need now?
What are your needs in thefuture?
How can we architect theframework for your future needs
so that what we're building fortoday's needs don't inhibit you

(53:53):
or prohibit you from being ableto meet your future needs?
They also have more highlydeveloped soft skills, right,
it's very important to be ableto command the room to modify
the language based on who it isyou're speaking to, because the
story you tell to the C-suiteand the story you tell to the IT

(54:16):
team, while they tell the samestory, they're not written the
same way, right?

Josh Matthews (54:23):
You mean?
no, doesn't translate toeverybody.

Speaker 3 (54:28):
No translate.
You sometimes need to usedifferent words for no when
you're talking to the C-suiteright, No OK.
But you want to make sure whenyou're selling.
The vision of this is whatwe're going to build for you.
This is how it's going toimpact your business.
This is where you're going tosee process improvements or

(54:52):
system improvements or a returnon your investment.
Because of these changes Andthis is how we're going to get
there The IT team is going towant more of the nitty gritty
detail.
The C-suite wants the bigpicture.
The business leaders and thedepartment heads want to know
what's in it for them and whyshould they care, And an

(55:15):
architect needs to be able toanswer all of those questions to
those different stakeholders inthe language that they need to
be spoken to to get that buy-in.

Elizabeth (55:27):
OK, that's perfect.
That's really helpful.
I appreciate that, Samantha.
That helped me a lot because,again, I was just trying to make
sure I understand thedifference between the two.

Josh Matthews (55:40):
Yeah, it's a great question, Elizabeth, and a
really terrific response.
Sam, You've been so quotable sofar this evening.
Truly, we're one hour in.
We'll probably have a hard stopin 30 from now, but it's just
been terrific.
So thanks for such an eloquentresponse on that And honestly, I

(56:02):
never really thought about it.
I mean, I guess this might beone of those unconscious
competence things where youcan't necessarily articulate it,
you just get it already.
Elizabeth, since you are hereand have been brave enough to
jump in and be a speaker, couldyou do us a favor and please

(56:23):
tell us a little bit about BlackCRM Tech.

Elizabeth (56:28):
Certainly, josh, i'd be happy to.
Black CRM.
Tech is something that Istarted gosh over a year ago in
some change.
I initially started onClubhouse and moved over here to
Twitter And I like being ableto try to have a platform
specifically to address theneeds of Black professionals in

(56:48):
tech, especially, of course,specifically Salesforce, as CRM
is kind of the hint there.
I decided to start doing thatbecause I was, of course, having
difficulty finding others inthe Salesforce ecosystem like
myself as I was trying to learnto grow, to meet and network
with other individuals, and itreally just started gravitating

(57:13):
more to having safe spaces.
So, although I may not havedone Twitter spaces in quite
some time, we started with justhaving safe spaces for asking
questions similar to this, butalso different, because, again,
there are different needs forour community, but a lot of
times are unaddressed or justnot even asked about, and with

(57:35):
that, a lot of times.
I'd like to focus on hearingstories from other Black
professionals who have startedmaking their way in the
Salesforce ecosystem, the Ohana,and also being able to share
resources, as one of themessages that Salesforce keeps
talking about that you do notnecessarily have to have a
college degree.

(57:55):
I said, well, you know what.
There are a lot of folks thatmay be working in retail or
education I'm a former teacherfrom way back when a call center
done that too And I've done amillion things But the point
being that folks with or withouta college degree, of course, as
you all know, can be able toget into a lot of these

(58:19):
different Salesforce careerroles, but have no idea about
that, where to start theresources, Of course, now
Salesforce has made a lot morecareer paths a little bit easier
to understand, but still thereare folks who need help bridging
that gap and even just becomingaware of what's out there,

(58:41):
because tech is so fast, butjust providing just a little bit
of those resources to considerSalesforce as an option, as a
way to start getting into thetechnology roles.
So that is where I try to stepinto that gap.
A lot of times.
I do a lot of mentorship,looking at resumes, linkedin

(59:03):
profiles, of course, as well,and it's been a great journey so
far in speaking at conferencestoo.
So next week, dreaming in color, first Salesforce conference,
or is the second year actuallySalesforce conference,
specifically Black TechProfessionals, and I like to
speak on career development,which is why I love listening

(59:23):
into the career show when I havean opportunity to do so, and
last year I talked about careersponsorship And this year I'll
actually be addressing what it'slike to get into Salesforce
consulting, especially at a bigconsulting firm.
So that is a little bit of, asy'all can imagine, coming from

(59:45):
industry versus consulting.
A lot of folks, as y'all said,ask some of these questions And
this is a great opportunity toshare that with different groups
.
So that's a little bit of myspiel on Black, seattle and Tech
.

Josh Matthews (01:00:01):
That's great, elizabeth, and where can our
listeners who want to connectwith you or want to be involved
in the community that you'rebuilding, where can they go to
do that?

Elizabeth (01:00:14):
Oh well, certainly So, of course, here on Twitter,
Elizabeth's doing that Same onTikTok right, Gotta reach people
where they are, which is keyand important And, of course,
same on LinkedIn as well.
Elizabeth C Knot, it's the sameacross all three platforms And,

(01:00:35):
of course, each of thoseplatforms have links to my link
share as well that provide a bitmore information on some of
those same resources, but thoseare the best ways to reach me.
Again, as I said, that's wherethe people are.

Peter Ganza (01:00:47):
Everybody should follow Elizabeth.
She's amazing.
Hey, elizabeth, one of thethings I wanted to one of the
many amazing things you justsaid I wanted to reinforce was
when you were talking aboutcollege degrees and university
degrees right, and I got hiredinto Salesforce for a role that

(01:01:08):
required right In quotes, airquotes, air quoting here but you
can't see Required a bachelor'sdegree And I've had that
challenge my entire life.
So there is a past there AndI'm really glad to see that the
industry is finally starting torecognize that It wasn't by
choice.
I'm not downplaying educationat all.

(01:01:30):
I think it's quite valuable.
Just the circumstances.
In my case I wasn't able to doit.
But Salesforce took a chanceand I had a great champion, the
person that brought me in And Iwas actually able to get into
Salesforce without any kind of adegree.
No-transcript.

Elizabeth (01:01:47):
Oh my God, i absolutely love that.
Peter, thank you for sharingthat, and that's what we need
more stories of and morecompanies doing more of.
My company I was on aninitiative helping with putting
together an apprenticeshipprogram.
The applications had justclosed, but we're doing
specifically just that, andthere's a lot of other companies

(01:02:10):
that are helping with thingslike making.
There's lots of fellowships,internships, all kinds of stuff,
and I like to share thosethings because that's important
We want to.
Salesforce is so focused onequality and inclusiveness And I
think there's helping to setthat trend for roles in this

(01:02:32):
career 100% agree.

Peter Ganza (01:02:38):
One of the things that it speaks to the most is
and I'm not telling you anythingyou don't know already, but
diversity.
And one of the things I lovedand valued so much about working
at Salesforce was there wasdiversity.
And it's not just aboutdifferent, whatever groups of
people that we might call it,but people that are educated,

(01:03:00):
people that are not educated,because the interaction of all
these different upbringings andexperiences, that's true
diversity And it being extendedto education, it's just a
logical thing.
So I really value that And Ilove everything that you're
doing, And I wish I could havesponsored the first conference
that you put on it.
I remember we spoke reallyquickly but it didn't come

(01:03:22):
together, So I missed it, butmaybe next time.

Josh Matthews (01:03:26):
Yeah, Thank you, Elizabeth for sharing here And
thank you, Peter, also forsharing your story.
Go ahead, Jason.

Speaker 6 (01:03:33):
Yeah, so, elizabeth, i'm very excited about this
because so there's a websiteThat is linked on my Twitter and
on my LinkedIn So I couldmessage it or post it, but it's
you know, i already sent you aconnect, just sent you a
LinkedIn connection request, butif you go on my LinkedIn and my
Twitter, i created a websitethat's a Salesforce career
navigator.

(01:03:53):
That came out of me having totry to explain Salesforce
careers to.
This is a class I got to teachto New York City high school and
community college students whoare considered at risk by the
NYPD based off of the regionthat they're living in, and so I
think it's, you know, veryimportant to make sure that

(01:04:15):
we're providing equitableopportunities, and I say this
very passionately because a lotof people, if they do, they're
told to go to college.
If they do go to college, ifthey have that opportunity, what
are they studying in college?
College is a very uniqueopportunity as a privilege.
That should be, really, if itis taken, it should be taken

(01:04:38):
appropriately and it should betaken by taking those directions
, with thinking of thedestination, beginning with the
end in mind, and this issomething that me personally was
very I've taken missteps in mylearning journey of going to
school and, even before that,thinking what should I be

(01:05:02):
pursuing?
And then I wound up getting adegree that was in
sustainability, something I verymuch love, but realizing, oh,
there's no careers insustainability, so you know, at
least not yet.
And so that's where I did mynetworking to learn about
Salesforce careers.
And so this is something I'mvery passionate about is helping
people to get a motivation byunderstanding what they should

(01:05:27):
be moving to and to be able tohave that representation,
projecting that representation,because if we have a, you know,
like a lot of young adults whowant to be artists or musicians,
myself included, it's becausethat's what they see.
Representation, it looks fun.
But other professionals we'd beable to help expose them to, so

(01:05:50):
they can be able to understandthe creativity, the productivity
from careers, the accessibilityof that.
So that's what I think is agreat part of networking If you
know there's some job you'reinterested in, some professional
you're interested in, go talkto people who are in that role,
and so being able to help mapthat out, being able to define

(01:06:12):
everything, that's what thecareer navigator website is for,
but also more than happy topresent it, it's built as what I
call a site deck in that it's awebsite.
It's retained there.
But I give presentations whereI click through the website like
a slide deck.

Josh Matthews (01:06:26):
Yeah, thanks for piping up here, jason, and I
love what you know all you guysare doing to support the
community.
This is what makes theSalesforce ecosystem undeniably
the most community focused techstack in the world.

(01:06:46):
I mean, it's just incredibleAnd I've been involved in a
variety of tech stacks andrecruiting, head hunting and
leadership since 99 and neverseen anything like it And to be
able to get leaders such asyourselves all in one room here
to have a little discussionabout these types of things is
just nothing short of incredible.

(01:07:07):
And to have the technology tobe able to do it and broadcast
without needing to show up, youknow, to a local radio station
and not necessarily actuallyhitting the people that are
going to benefit the most fromthe conversation that we can
record it, have it as a podcastand share it You know your
voices, i think is absolutelyincredible.

(01:07:29):
And look, it's not a bad ideafor us to have a program focused
on education or talking aboutcollege.
I can tell you I've got one.
He's just wrapping up his firstyear and another one that's
going to be starting to applyhere soon, and I launched my
career without my degree yeteventually got it, but it's an
art.
I was an art major and I trulydidn't know what was out there,

(01:07:51):
i mean, in my world.
I thought, well, you could be arealtor, you know.
you could be an accountant, youknow, i think you can own a
restaurant.
I mean, like you know, i knowyou could own a gym.
Like I didn't know, like whatdid I know Nothing?
Like you really didn't know.
And I think a lot of people goto college simply for that
reason, to figure it out To yourpoint.
Jason, it's great to go tocollege with the end in mind.

(01:08:13):
Of course it is, but sometimesall you need is that degree to
kick open the door.
And there are certain jobswhere it's necessary engineering
, architecture, things like this, that like look you better, get
the education.
But then there are other, moregeneral liberal arts degrees
that can lead to a variety ofplaces, including, you know,
salesforce, even if what you didwas paint pictures and draw

(01:08:37):
naked people for two years orfour years, right, that's the
deal.
So it's cool stuff.
Guys, we only have about 15, 20minutes left in the program And
I want to make sure that wehave some, because it's special
for us to have Sam on the showright now And let's just go
ahead and tie it right in witheverything that we've been
talking about for the last 20minutes or so.
Sam, you're involved in MGP,does Trailhead?

(01:09:01):
Can you tell us what that isand what your involvement is
with that program?

Speaker 3 (01:09:06):
Sure.
So Montreuse Grace Place is anonprofit here in Houston that
works with homeless and housinginsecure youth, mostly in the
LGBTQ community, and so ahandful of years ago a guy named

(01:09:28):
Scott Loua Cart if anybody isfamiliar with him started this
program.
Mgp does Trailhead And once amonth we go to Montreuse Grace
Place and we work with the kidsthere.
We work with the youth there todo Trailhead badges and to
learn more about Salesforce andto explain more about a

(01:09:50):
Salesforce career path to helpthem learn some of those job
skills that, even if they don'tgo into a Salesforce career,
would still be beneficial, evenas a Salesforce end user, even
as a working in a call center,working in any.
I mean Salesforce is used in somany places.

(01:10:12):
So shameless plug.
If you are interested and youdo want to see more, there is an
episode on Salesforce Plus andI don't know if it's out yet or
not, it may be coming Where theyinterview Scott and the crew

(01:10:32):
came to Montreuse Grace Placeand filmed and you can see
everything that we do.

Josh Matthews (01:10:38):
You know what you're doing is so important,
sam.
It truly is like we used to doback in Portland do a fair
amount of volunteering for afamily homeless shelter, and one
of the takeaways that I hadfrom working with that
organization was a stunning statthat I had no idea, which is

(01:11:00):
that the number one predictor ofwhether or not someone is going
to be homeless is that theygrew up homeless, right, it's
just like we were talking aboutcareers and what do you know?
We tend to walk these automaticpaths in life, And so anytime
we can break that cycle and itneeds to be broken, because
homelessness is a severe problem, particularly in every city,

(01:11:24):
right, but it's very visible insome of the West Coast cities,
like Los Angeles, portland,where I spent half of my life
and almost all of my adulthoodSeattle it's just incredible how
much it has grown, and so kudosto you for doubling down,

(01:11:44):
getting involved in exposingthese people.
It sounds like Elizabeth isdoing it, sam's doing it,
jason's doing it, peter'sinvolved in it.
It's just awesome what you guysare doing, and if there's
something that we can do to helpand support and Elizabeth, you
can just pipe up.
You don't have to raise yourhand anymore.
If there's something that wecan do from this side, from
Salesforce stuff, and you justdefinitely let us know what we

(01:12:06):
can do to help support any ofthese causes, how did you
actually get involved?
Actually, go ahead, elizabeth.
And then I'm curious how yougot involved.

Elizabeth (01:12:14):
No, i was just about to ask the same thing.
I'm also in Houston, so I meanI definitely want to make sure I
have an opportunity to connectwith you, and your sugar doing
sounds amazing, so I'm so happyI guess I was able to listen in
on the show today and make a newconnection, find out hey, we're
both local and you're doingsomething just astounding, so I
wish about that.
So anything how this camereally came into being for you.

Speaker 3 (01:12:40):
Yeah, so it's one of those things that I just
happened to fall into it.
So Scott Leucard started thisback in 2018, 2017, i don't know
a handful of years ago, butScott lives in Austin and so
when he was getting involvedwith Montrose Grace Place and

(01:13:00):
wanting to start this program,he reached out to the Houston
User Group leaders to say, hey,is anybody interested in coming
to help with this?
And they broadcast it out toall of the user group members of
hey, there's this programthat's getting up and started.
Are there other Salesforceprofessionals who are interested

(01:13:21):
in coming to help teach theseskills?
And volunteer work is somethingthat I've always been passionate
about.
I've done it probably all of mylife and giving back because I
realized that I've lived aprivileged life, and so when I

(01:13:42):
saw that, i was like you knowwhat?
I think I had been an admin fora couple of years and I'm like
I think I know enough to maybehelp somebody do this.
Trailhead was still relativelynew at the time, and so I said
me, i will go.
And I didn't know anybody.

(01:14:03):
I had never met any of thesepeople that I was working with.
We all showed up at the timeand place that we were told, and
here we are, five, six yearslater still doing it.

Josh Matthews (01:14:17):
So Outstanding and we haven't really talked
about your own careerprogression, sam, and how do you
feel about taking a couple ofminutes to just kind of let us
know?
what did you do beforeSalesforce, what got you into it
, how did you get the bug for it?
Did you get a bug?
And what is some additionaladvice or recommendations you

(01:14:41):
can give to people on top ofwhat you've already shared with
Elizabeth about How do you growfrom?
what are the actual steps to betaken to grow from consultant
to architect?

Speaker 3 (01:14:54):
So I spent probably the first 15 years or so of my
professional career working inthe industrial manufacturing
space and in a variety of roles,mostly in accounting.
I've got an accounting degree,but I had a knack for computers
and so when we had any sort ofIT project that needed to be

(01:15:20):
done, i worked at a large globalcompany And so for our
particular office, anytime therewas an IT project, they're like
you, this is yours.
So, implementing BI solutions,implementing ERPs Because I
worked on all of those projectsand one of the ones was okay,

(01:15:44):
now corporate wants to implementSalesforce Great.
And so after we got Salesforceup and running and I was not
part of the implementation teamI was essentially the power user
for our location.
After we got all of that up andrunning, corporate then decided

(01:16:05):
they were closing our locationand we could all relocate to
Florida if we wanted to or findnew jobs.

Josh Matthews (01:16:11):
Hey, it's nice here, It's nice here.

Speaker 3 (01:16:13):
I'm not going to lie.
So that was not in the cards forme, and so I found another job
doing what my primary role wasat the time, which was data
analytics.
I went to another company to dodata analytics and probably
sometime around the second weekthere the boss went hey, new

(01:16:36):
girl, you know about Salesforce,right?
I'm like, well, yeah, we justimplemented it at the last
company that I was at.
I was like I am familiar withSalesforce.
Great, salesforce is yourproblem now.
So we've rolled it out to theUS, but I need you to roll it
out to, like, the rest of themanufacturing facilities across

(01:16:59):
the country.
We're going to be our admin,okay.

Josh Matthews (01:17:07):
That's an introduction.

Peter Ganza (01:17:10):
Hashtag accidental admin 100%.

Speaker 3 (01:17:16):
So there was a lot of and this was before Trailhead
became a thing.
So there was a lot of learningon the fly.
Life lessons learn the hard way.
I can tell you that I 100%learned the hard way the value
of a sandbox and why we don'tdevelop directly in production,

(01:17:39):
but spent a few years adminningthe org, the company that I
worked for.
I worked in one division.
it had three divisions.
Other divisions started gettingSalesforce and they're like hey
, you know more than any of ourother things.
So anytime we need somethingthat rolls up to corporate, you
have to go do this And all ofthe orgs.

(01:18:00):
we need you to admin all theorgs And it.
You know we had all the all thesorts of bells and whistles
that we were having at the time.
So I did that for a few yearsbefore I made the jump over to
consulting.
I didn't even know I wasinterviewing for a consulting

(01:18:22):
position, was just talking tothe gentleman who owned a
consulting company And at theend he was like I'm going to
offer you a job.
I'm like, oh, that isunexpected, but sure, let's try
consulting.
That was probably one of themost unexpected job interviews
of my life, and so I spent a fewyears going consulting and

(01:18:50):
architecture and became thedirector of solution
architecture because I told ourmanaging partner.
I said I want the director jobAnd he went.
What I said I want the directorjob, it's mine And he went.
Okay, there was slightly moreconversation to that, but

(01:19:11):
essentially, let me.

Josh Matthews (01:19:12):
Let me dig into this piece a little bit here.
Okay, because earlier today wewere talking about behaviors,
right, and saying that you wantthe director job that exhibits a
type of behavior, right, thatdemonstrates what we would call
reduced agreeableness, right,even though it's agreeable, it's

(01:19:34):
just a way to describe it,right?
So, like, how, like, i'm a bigfan of believing that.
You know, it's not just one,although one or two big
decisions can, of course, changeour lives, but it's a lot of
small decisions, right.
Like, if we want to lose 10pounds, it's not.
I've decided that I'm not goingto whatever eat past 10 at night

(01:19:56):
, or I'm going to stop eatingsugar.
No, that's like, five, six, 10,15 times a day.
You have to make a decision.
No, i'm not going to eat that,right Or no, i'm going to grab
this packet of celery Thank you,casey, for putting those in the
fridge right, like, whatever itis.
But it's a lot of little microdecisions that lead to the end
result and create habits.
So, with this in mind, whattype of habits do you think you

(01:20:21):
developed that helped you to getto the level that you are right
now, because not everyone'sjust going to be so lucky to be
the accidental admin and thensuddenly get a job in consulting
right Some of that.
A lot of people fight for yearsto try and get that and they're
still in that, you know, onthat track.
So, but you've developed thesehabits.

(01:20:42):
What are?

Speaker 3 (01:20:45):
they?
Um, that is a really goodquestion.

Josh Matthews (01:20:50):
Um, you know, I'm a recruiter, right?
That's all we're supposed to dois ask your questions.
That's hope They're goodquestions.

Speaker 3 (01:21:00):
So some of the habits that you know I had started
developing before I told my bossthat I just wanted to be the
director was that I, i juststarted taking on some of that
work, right, we did not have adirector at the time.
So when there were questionsaround, is this a solid solution

(01:21:21):
?
Great, let's review that.
Right, i will review that withyou.
Let's talk through the pros andcons.
When we were looking to hirenew recruits and add people to
our team Great, i'm going tocome and do the technical
interviews and help to vetcandidates.
When there were decisions to bemade around, you know well,

(01:21:44):
should we do this or do that, oris this the right tooling or
things?
Great, i'm going to invitemyself to the table and come be
part of that conversation.
Right.
And so by the time I had thatconversation with my boss to say
I want to be the director, ipractically invited myself into
the chair by that point anyway,because the name was there and

(01:22:08):
nobody else was filling it.

Josh Matthews (01:22:10):
Sam, this is okay.
Everyone take note of this.
What Sam just said.
Jordan Peterson has describedit as you look for where there's
a vac, where responsibility hasbeen abdicated, and you fill
that void Right.
That's what you're talkingabout.
It's the way to grow yourcareer Period.

(01:22:35):
You want to do something.
You want to grow your career.
You want to go from consultantto architect Right.
You want to go from admin toconsultant.
You want to go from director ofdelivery to vice president of
all things, sales force,whatever it happens to be.
You must find out what's nothappening in the business right

(01:22:55):
now that needs to be done, orwhat's something that maybe two
or three people could do, butyou insert yourself in, and you
insert yourself into thebusiness early and often and
assume those responsibilities.
When people talk about goingabove and beyond, this is
exactly what they mean.
They don't mean anything otherthan this, don't you think, sam?

Speaker 3 (01:23:17):
100%, because the easiest way to convince somebody
you can do the job is to do thejob Yeah.

Josh Matthews (01:23:24):
You just do the work.
And here's another thing thatgoes along with it You don't
bitch about it, you don'tcomplain about it, you don't
whinge, you don't whine Right,you can expect, if you want to
grow in your career, that you'regoing to have to do things that
other people aren't doingbecause, let's face it, there's
very few at the top, a lot ofpeople at the bottom.
I was talking to someone todaywho we might bring on the show

(01:23:46):
at some point, because he's aninteresting guy.
He does business developmentfor an organization called LEAF.
We had a chat because they'reinterested in some support for
their organization.
What they do is they basicallyfinance training for
underprivileged people so thatthey can do everything that
Elizabeth's talking about.
Jason was talking about, samwas talking about how people to

(01:24:10):
lift themselves up out ofpoverty and using the skill sets
that people in the sales forceworld utilize to have great
careers.
We were talking about all ofthe different kinds of positions
in the ecosystem and I likenedit to a chessboard.

(01:24:30):
I'd never even thought aboutthis before, because I don't
tend to think if my mouth's notmoving.
It got me thinking.
And if you look at a chessboard,you've got one king, one queen.
You've got a couple of rooks, acouple of bishops.
What else is on there?
A couple of knights, a lot ofpawns.

(01:24:51):
The pawns move forward, niceand steady, but they move
forward slowly.
They're on that single track.
If you want to turn yourselffrom a pawn into a bishop and be
able to go into differentdirections and go further, just
like a piece on a chessboard,you've got to start just
pretending to be, act like aknight, act like a bishop, act

(01:25:13):
like a queen, act like a king.
The sooner you start adoptingthat, the sooner you get to be
king or queen.
It's just how it goes.
If you say, no, i don't want todo that, or no, i'm not going
to do that, or that's not in myjob description, If they don't
pay me enough to do that, thenyou will remain that pawn,
moving forward one step at atime.

(01:25:33):
You're the front line.
That means that you're first toget fired.
That's what that means.
What do you guys think?
100%.

Elizabeth (01:25:46):
Yeah, I was just about to say yeah, being general
or generalist is okay, asyou're starting out in the
beginning, but I quickly learnedthat finding ways to specialize
in a particular area, howeveryou want to do it, is really the
way to go long term.
You want to be known forsomething and not be a jack or
jill of all trades and tellingpeople, yeah, I could do

(01:26:08):
anything, and not reallyfiguring out a path forward
which again keeps you in thesame place you've always been.
You have to figure outsomething new in order to grow.

Josh Matthews (01:26:21):
I mean, look, if you love working at small
companies, there's nothing wrongwith being a Swiss Army knife.
There's nothing wrong with itat all.
There is a place for that.
Not everybody's going to be aCPQ specialist and you can't
have a board full of Kings,Queens and bishops.
It's not going to work.
If you have the desire to breakout, Elizabeth, then definitely

(01:26:42):
you should absolutely do thatand figure out where you can
assume more responsibility.
Guys, we're coming to the end ofour show.
I just wanted to pitch a couplelittle things real quick.
Again.
In two weeks we have Mark,director of delivery over at.
I hope I got that right.
I'm not looking at my notesright now, but Mark is going to

(01:27:02):
be on the show.
Mark is with Salesforce.
In fact, I've got my notesright here.
Yeah, Mark Baker, director ofdelivery management at
Salesforce for MuleSoft.
That's in two weeks.
Make sure you tune in.
If you're not following us yet,make sure you click on the bell
or whatever it is, or subscribeto not only our Twitter spaces,
which you can't really do, butyou can do it with our podcast.

(01:27:23):
It seems like Apple Music isthe front runner, followed by
Spotify and Google and about 16other platforms.
Make sure you do that Two weeksfrom now, so in four weeks,
we're going to have a specialmilitary episode that we're
looking forward to.
We have Bree Hintz.
Bree is a military spouse.
She works in Market.

(01:27:45):
She Runs Marketing out ofOklahoma City for Salesforce
Organization.
Then we have Phillip Anderson,who's a wonderful guy.
Phillip spent over 14 years inthe Air Force doing special ops.
He's a really interesting guywho transitioned from military.
Now he's an MBA candidate andhe's a consultant at Deloitte.
We're going to get theperspectives from both military

(01:28:10):
professionals and militaryspouses on what options there
are for you if you have servedin the United States military or
possibly any militaryorganization.
That is, How can you break intothe Salesforce ecosystem?
What's some of the changes thatyou need to do in your style of
thinking?
What are some of the ways thatyou can communicate your ability

(01:28:32):
and effectiveness to performthe job in a really great way?
This guy was calling inairstrikes.
How do you go from that toconsultant?
Who's going to do his best togo ahead and let us know?
I'm really looking forward tothat episode As much as I've
been looking forward to thisepisode.
It's everything I was hoping itwould be, Sam, Thank you so

(01:28:52):
much for being on the show, andalso for our key contributing
speakers, Peter Gonza and Jason,Syke Wittz and Elizabeth Knott.
Thanks everybody for being onthe show here today, Samantha.
Any last words of advice beforewe sign off.

Speaker 3 (01:29:08):
Yes, come see me at Midwest Dreaming in August.

Josh Matthews (01:29:12):
Okay, perfect.
All right, guys.
Thank you so much.
We're going to go out with alittle Stereophonics again.
Have a wonderful, wonderfulcouple of weeks And please do us
a favor, tell your friendsabout the show.
Share our posts on LinkedIn.
Let's get even more peopleinvolved, because the more
people that come to this program, the more people that we can
help.
Whether they're in servedcommunities or underserved

(01:29:35):
communities, they need a littlehelping hand with their careers,
and that's what we aim to dohere.
Thank you everybody.
Have a wonderful, wonderfulweek.