SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome! You are listening to the CRM Success Show, where you will hear from CRM executives who have overseen some of the most interesting and complex CRM implementations. Your hosts, David Mossri and Kira Whitey, will be bringing you real stories, real insight. Follow along on social media for updates on new episode releases, exclusive content, and much more. Enjoy the show and thanks for listening.

SPEAKER_03 0:29

Hey, welcome to the CRM Success Show. Today we're talking with Tiffany Spencer, IT manager at Giving Kitchen. So welcome, Tiffany.

SPEAKER_01 0:36

Thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_02 0:39

Welcome, Tiffany. So, Tiffany, just start by giving our listeners uh background about yourself. Who is Tiffany Spencer and what does Giving Kitchen do?

SPEAKER_01 0:49

So, my name is Tiffany Spencer. I've been in the Salesforce ecosystem for over 15 years. I'm a Salesforce MVP and I have been leading digital transformations from small large corporations for over 15 years. I do several things across the Salesforce ecosystem, one of them being an MVP, I've been a user group leader, I lead a community conference, I have my own nonprofit Tech Forward. I'm also the IT manager at the Giving Kitchen. The Giving Kitchen is a nonprofit based here in Atlanta, Georgia, where I am, and we help food service workers that are in crisis. So we provide lots of different resources, financial assistance, we try to help with wraparound services for food service workers that are in crisis. And when people hear food service workers, sometimes that rings a bell and sometimes it doesn't. But if you think about like your different types of hospitality workers, specifically those that work in like a restaurant and food service, those workers don't always have, you know, PTO. And when a crisis comes up, and if they're hourly, they rely on tips, they sometimes need some support. And that industry can be difficult depending on what type of establishment you work at to get the support you need. Those restaurants may or may not have, you know, employee resource programs, the way bigger organizations that we're used to working at, they may not have that.

SPEAKER_02 2:13

I read that over 30,000 food service workers uh benefited from uh from the organization, which equates to over $15 million worth of funds. So if any of our listeners would like to uh get involved and participate, how how would they go about learning more about Giving Kitchen and potentially donating?

SPEAKER_01 2:31

Yeah, you can go to givingkitchen.org. There you can donate, you can sign up to volunteer.

SPEAKER_02 2:37

So, Tiffany, you started out your career. Uh you you did a little bit of consulting. Uh I I saw you had three or four roles in the consulting space. And then is it fair to say you found your passion in the nonprofit industry vertical thereafter?

SPEAKER_01 2:51

I would say maybe around 2019, when I started my nonprofit tech forward, is when I started getting into the nonprofit space. Back during that time, one of the initiatives that Salesforce had, of course, was you know, if you want to volunteer, you should help a nonprofit. Or if you're looking to get experience, you should work with a nonprofit. And I started to, as I was training people, I went out and found some nonprofits that wanted to use Salesforce, were currently using Salesforce, and I led the project so that individuals that I was training could get some hands-on experience. And so that's how I started working with nonprofits and creating templates or quick starts that the individuals that I was working with could uh follow. And that is how I get started nonprofit work.

SPEAKER_02 3:43

We're gonna cover later on in the podcast a little bit about training and training and development. So this is just a quick question. Do you still think the nonprofit route is a viable option for admins, developers, etc., that are looking to get hands-on Salesforce experience for the first time? Um, or do you think that kind of shipsailed somewhat?

SPEAKER_01 4:04

Well, I would say I don't rec I don't recommend for any org that someone use any org as practice. I think whether if it's a small business or a nonprofit, you should always go into those projects with an experienced professional that you're partnered with. I again, if it's a nonprofit, a small business, I think it's great exposure to be able to help those types of businesses. I do not think you should go at it alone. I highly encourage people to partner with someone on any type of project like that. Or what I think is better is to even come up with a use case, even a real example, and do a project that maybe is not for someone, but you treat it like it is. And again, still have a Salesforce professional that you are mentored by or coached by that can look over your work because it's not just about the knowing how to do the configuration work, right? Sometimes when you're learning Salesforce, you focus so much on a config. When as a consultant, that's like the I would say consultants would say that's the least of your worries. It's part of it, but getting the requirements, a client management skills, the actual consulting part of the consulting project is really what's a little bit more important than just the configuration and knowing the best practices, knowing how to make those decisions. And if you're new, you don't know that. And so you definitely need someone to work with you.

SPEAKER_02 5:33

Yeah, I think that's a good point. Identifying a mentor at the very least, uh, that can support you on that journey if you are newer yourself into the Salesforce ecosystem. Uh seven seven times Salesforce certified. I see you're keeping up to date with your certs. Is there any any certs at the moment that you're working on? On, you know, I always like to uh we none of us are a finished article, so anything you're working on at the moment?

SPEAKER_01 5:55

Yeah, so I'm looking at some of the AI certs that I want to do, data cloud. Uh so I'm really focusing on those right now. I'm also looking at uh I use ClickUp a lot, so ClickUp, Microsoft, because of the work that I do, McGiving Kitchen. So I have a list of the other systems that I'm responsible for getting some additional certifications there.

SPEAKER_03 6:18

Yeah, I think Salesforce already retired the AI.

SPEAKER_01 6:23

Yeah, the first one, the AI Associate, they retired and they they replaced that with the uh the Agent Blazer champion, uh the consultant level certifications they still have.

SPEAKER_03 6:34

I haven't gotten a new cert in like five years since I started one.

SPEAKER_01 6:39

Yeah, I've definitely had behind well, you know, there's like 30 certs, so I'm definitely behind on certifications.

SPEAKER_03 6:50

Hey Kiro, what's the most you've come across? Because I know you talk to a lot of people. You've seen people in 50.

SPEAKER_02 6:55

No, I well, I think there's over 48 certifications now. Um high 30s. I've definitely seen a couple in the high 30s. Um I think at that point it's like uh it's like Pokemon, right? You gotta you know you gotta catch them all, kind of thing. But but but look, I think continuous improvement, development, learning is is important and should be encouraged, and that's something we're gonna cover later on, whether that's sales for certain other skill sets.

SPEAKER_03 7:19

Stephanie, why don't you tell us a bit more about the Giving Kitchens uh Salesforce training and how you got involved or how you started, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 7:25

So I've been with the Giving Kitchen for over a year now, and when I started, Salesforce is one of the main systems that I'm responsible for. I did a bit of a um exploration of our Salesforce org. So doing that assessment of not only Salesforce, but all of our systems, where we're keeping data, uh, you know, what were the current processes, I realized that the organization's needs grew beyond kind of how we were using Salesforce and using it in PSP. And so if you think about the work that we do as an organization as a smaller nonprofit, right? And so in our Support of Food Service Workers, which is really critical, that is where our program management and case management features come in. And then the other side is our development team, right? So all of our fundraising efforts, and then we have an amazing marketing team as well, where we run many email campaigns and newsletters, and so data like any nonprofit organization is super important, and our system reflected years of just evolving processes and different people that had worked in our org, and I could see just the different workarounds, I can tell you know the different consultants or team changes, and so it was causing some operational issues with our current Salesforce setup. When I did the assessment, NPC, which is the well, it's not called NPC anymore, the Agent Force Nonprofit Cloud, formerly just Salesforce Nonprofit Cloud, it was maybe about a year old. And um, you know, Salesforce is not pushing people to migrate, but in learning the features of it and looking at our processes and where we needed to go, I felt that instead of trying to fix all of the uh process, operational issues, uh tech debt that was in our current org, that it would actually be better for us to start in a new org. And so that's how I started looking at NPC and then going down a path of migrating us from NPSP to NPC.

SPEAKER_03 9:40

So, yeah, so tell us um a bit more about that. So, like, did you even consider moving to a new org with NPSP, nonprofit service pack? Or once you decided to move to a new org, it's like, no, I'm still gonna call it NPC, I don't care. A nonprofit cloud is the future, and you say, okay, we're just gonna keep going in that direction.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

Yeah, so when I did the evaluation of our org, I had to look at like what processes are working today, where we'll be creating workarounds, I looked at our reporting, I was thinking about our future programs, uh, I was looking at our data. So there were a few key things that made MPC better for us, the nonprofit cloud. One is in the in the Agent Force Nonprofit Cloud, instead of all of the money or transactions, donations, all being in opportunities, in NPC, there are several new objects in the data model. So you can still use opportunities for pipeline, but then you have these gift commitments. So there's a gift commitment object for like pledges, and then there's the gift transaction object for when money actually comes in. We actually needed that, and you could do some of that in MPSP, but we had created workarounds, particularly because we have a lot of pledges. And so looking at that data model was going to be much better for us. We do a lot of major giving, we have a lot of amazing partners and being able to really track who gave a pledge, what did they pledge, how much money has come in, how much we're waiting. We could have used MPSP, but it would have required a little bit more workarounds. And so MPC was a little bit better for that scenario. Also, with MPC, you get case management included. So in MPSP case management, those features is an add-on product. In MPC, it is not as included. And because we do a level of human services with our case managers, being able to have that functionality available was also a little bit better for us. And some of the marketing features, being able to tie marketing campaigns easier to donations and things that were coming in, that also made a difference. So there was a lot about the data model that would help me easily clean up some of the data issues that we were having and make a little bit more cleaner processes for our team.

SPEAKER_03 12:10

So it sounds like it's a real upgrade. Yeah. And I'm surprised they give you case management just out of nowhere. Is there a cost difference between MPC and MPSP?

SPEAKER_01 12:23

I think the license price might be a little bit higher, but I know that they're probably still discounting it.

SPEAKER_03 12:31

So I wish I'd more than enough to impact the decision, I guess. So it's negligible how Salesforce negotiates. We always tell everyone negotiate with Salesforce on their pricing. So I was more asking at the list price.

SPEAKER_01 12:42

I don't think it's that much more. It did increase, but I don't think it was that much more.

SPEAKER_03 12:49

So I'm not super familiar with the NPSP. It's actually one of the areas I've done a little bit of work in nonprofits, but not a tremendous the pledge, is that the opportunity, or did the custom so in NPSP, you do have the opportunity, so you have the opportunity object and then you have payments.

SPEAKER_01 13:05

And so you could have an opportunity for the pledge and then create, you know, payments for each part of it, but it gets a little bit messy because if you have outstanding payments and or you missed a payment, or uh just even having like pipeline opportunities and then your pledges, and then being able to see, so you could have, but the it just puts so much pressure in NPSP to have everything on the opportunity. Um, and so I really like the the difference in the objects, having a specific object for gift commitments that you can or can't, you don't have to use it in NPC, and then having that specific object for the actual money that comes in, those gift transactions.

SPEAKER_03 13:52

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, particularly when there's a lot of small objects.

SPEAKER_01 13:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:56

Sorry, a lot of small donations. I don't know if that's the case with you guys, right?

SPEAKER_01 14:00

Yeah, we do have a lot of good, we have a good amount of donations. We also have events, and so um it could just make again that opportunity object really do a lot of work when every time for every event, every ticket, then it's opportunity, and then there's the payment, and then being able to, you know, I gotta think of the team if they are trying to create pipeline opportunities for the next year, and so having to create all the different record types and making sure that they are you know picking the right type. Again, it it was very possible, but the uh the features that were available with NPC with being able to uh create a gift commitment schedule, right? So if someone pledges and they want to pay, you know, X amount of dollars over four years, you can create that schedule. It automatically creates a transaction again, things that I could do in NPC, but would have been custom. So there were a lot more features that came with NPC that I like. Now, there are some customizations that I still need to do to make it easier because a lot more objects means a lot more clicking, but the out-of-the-box features I I really do enjoy.

SPEAKER_03 15:08

Okay, awesome. So it's been a year, I think you said you've been there.

SPEAKER_01 15:14

Well, I have a week to do one team. So our development team is cutting over next week, and then our programs team is cutting over in a month.

SPEAKER_03 15:21

Oh wow, so you got a you got a big week coming up. I'm surprised you got time to record this.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

I'll be up extra.

SPEAKER_03 15:27

Yeah, I'm sure. Um so tell us about tell us about the change management, right? So, right, more clicks, more objects, different object model. Obviously, the reporting now has to be completely changed without to think about it. Um, you know, how do you go about you know getting your your user base up to speed and excited?

SPEAKER_01 15:46

Yeah, so when I did the assessment, what I did recognize the organization did need some updating of our processes and our documentation. And so this migration gave me a good opportunity to uh reevaluate processes with the team, be able to uh do some automation of manual processes. So I actually branded the whole project. So this is called one of our values for the giving kitchen is being audacious. And so I called this our audacious automation project. The idea behind that is that of course we nonprofits, like many organizations, have to do a lot with less. And so, how can we, what can we automate? How can we make things not so manual? And so that helped some with the change management because I needed a way to at least get people bought in and excited. And one of the things that I say is that this is happening, this is not happening to you. We're doing this together and this is for you. And so making sure that our team, you know, understood why we were doing this change, what would be coming up, what features would be better, what would be changing. Um, we also uh created a group of superusers from each department. So we wanted to make sure that because again, we're a smaller organization, that we had at a nonprofit, you have people that have uh you know knowledge just because they've been there for so long. And so being able to give all of those people just kind of a voice to speak for the different departments was really important, and especially if you know sometimes I can think of change as amazing, and someone else will be like, no, you know, we can't do this or we shouldn't do this, and we should think about this and that, and being able to one validate that, and then two say, hey, we did used to do that, but now we're not anymore, or you know what, that was a good catch. We should definitely include that. So being able to have our superusers really bring that um that historical knowledge as leaders of organizations, sometimes nobody wants to tell you when something's broken, right? So when you ask for a report and you know, somebody gives it to you a day later, the leader may not know how the effort it took to make that report, right? That somebody was manually updating data or manually entering data or manually, you know, jumping through hoops. And so being able to sit with our executive leadership team to say, hey, this is what I see happening, these are the challenges, and this is the opportunity. And so I wanted to be really clear around the risk and the rewards around this migration. Wanted to be clear on the effort and that this was something not just an IT project, but this really would impact the entire organization. And so that's something that I've really been working on is documenting how people use the system because we did not have that. So you can imagine, you know, a system with no clear documentation on how you're supposed to do a thing. The other part of our change management is the feedback loops, setting expectation, and really making sure the team knows. Like June 1st, I told the development team, I am yours for that week, right? I will sit in your area, you can ask me anything you can think of because this can be very uh challenging, right? It can make people anxious, it could be very annoying when you're just used to wanting to just get your job done. Um, and so being able to make sure I made the team feel supportive was really important.

SPEAKER_03 19:29

Have you ever had someone like not know how to do something and look it up in the docs and then do it? I've never had that happen.

SPEAKER_01 19:39

I mean, I've I've like I've looked up my own notes, and people will often take notes about how to do it for themselves, but like, yeah, read a manual and so I try not to create manuals, I try to create um what I call like little mini guides, and so instead of like one big manual, it's just this part of how do I put in a donation? How do I do this one little mini thing? And then when people ask me a question, I bring up that guide. So my goal is always to help, but also say, hey, it's also here, and then I'm looking at two, maybe people don't want to document, maybe they want to watch a video, right? Maybe they need screenshots. So I use Loom, I use Scribe, right? So I use different types of documentation in order to help people be more empowered. But I always bring the documentation. So even if they come and ask me, we're looking at the documentation together.

SPEAKER_03 20:36

Yeah, so it's really more training, I would think, which people do. I mean, before we look at talk about success metrics, did you did you get any pushback from like management, political hurdles, that kind of stuff?

SPEAKER_01 20:49

I think every organization recognizes when there are some areas which would need to be improved in order to grow and scale. And so I think the entire organization understands that we are doing incredible work. And in order to do more of that incredible work, to be able to better steward our donors, to be able to help more food service workers, we have to get our systems and our processes in place. So I think that the organization was very supportive. There are some individuals that maybe were more, I don't want to say not on board, but more hesitant, right? Because if you've ever been through any type of Salesforce project, you can imagine that a Salesforce project with the wrong partner or the wrong person could go very bad. And so you could be like, okay, I've been here before. So it's just like you know, going to the car dealership, you're like, oh, I'm gonna be here all day. There's no way you're better than all the other ones, right? And so being able to help build that trust to say, you know what, I know that some of our other projects have maybe not been the best. I wasn't the consultant, I'm so sorry, but we are gonna get. Through this together and being able to deliver, you know, little wins to try to build trust because it's not an easy way to help someone that has been burned by a Salesforce or technology project. I mean, there's no easy way around it besides trying to actually build trust by delivering a good project.

SPEAKER_03 22:20

Yeah, it's like uh Salesforce implementation PTSD.

unknown 22:23

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 22:24

You go through one project and that's it. You're scared, you're scared to do it again.

SPEAKER_01 22:27

Scarred for life.

SPEAKER_02 22:29

Unless it's done well. Um so on the topic of doing things well, I'm I'm curious, Tiffany. I believe I should have probably checked beforehand, but I believe you're hybrid in your current role at the moment, correct? Okay. So, in your opinion, having done Salesforce migrations in the past, particularly in the nonprofit space, uh how much easier, if at all? Uh I would assume it is, but you tell me, how much easier is it from a change management standpoint when you have the in-person presence to be able to go and meet and get people and leaders in a room, communicate those updates more in real time? It's less about flying people in, the logistics of that for training and kickoffs and go lives. What's your experience and opinion been on that with the current role?

SPEAKER_01 23:14

Oh, yeah. I prior to this role, you know, those of us that have been working in tech for a long time, I mean, I've worked remotely for years, well before COVID. And so for a while I was like, I'm not taking a role in the office. You can't pay me to go in. But I actually really enjoy going into the office a few days a week just for that reason. Being able to just do impromptu meetings, ask a quick question, get clarification, get some FaceTime with people. I think that has been extremely valuable and is needed, especially for a project of this importance. It's important for the success of the project, but also again, building that trust with the team. And so I think you do have to understand your audience, and you do have to be able to say, does this organization need more FaceTime with me? And so I think it's been extremely beneficial to be able to pull people into a room, to be able to do in-person working sessions. And then sometimes I go home and I, you know, I need to focus and I'll just, you know, come here and get work done. But I also will be in the office, put in my headphones and just work from there. And so I think the hybrid nature of my role has definitely been beneficial, especially for this type of a project.

SPEAKER_02 24:42

You mentioned earlier about making yourself available for the team for the whole week. Uh, was that as basic as, hey, I'm gonna be in this office or my desk, you know, at my desk, or you just come floor walk, come pop over as needed. Did you have office hours per se, or any other tips that you would give other individuals, whether they're executives or admins, change champions, etc., that might be facing resilience when it comes to adoption?

SPEAKER_01 25:11

Yeah, so specifically for my role, because as the IT manager, Salesforce is not the only system and it's not the only thing I do all day. And so one of the things that I have had to do from a change of management perspective in my role, because my role is a little new to the organization, is that I had to be able to set some boundaries a little bit to say, hey, you know, this percentage of my time is set to Salesforce, but then I need to spend another percentage of my time doing some other items for my role. And so with that mindset, because this is an important project and because I know that there may be some hiccups or questions, that is why I said, hey, for this week, I'm all yours, right? There's this is I'm 100% Salesforce this week because I want to be available for you if you have any questions, right? Versus having people say, Hey, do I need to submit your form? Are you available? Can you do this? Because I have to do a lot of saying, hey, not right now, not today. Let me look at this, let's schedule a meeting. But I want it to be very clear that this week it's 100% Salesforce, 100% for this team. I would say for a Go Live, you need that, some level of either office hours or dedicated support, either from the person that is the Salesforce administrator andor your superusers. So, again, like I said, we have identified superusers across our organization who should and will know how the system works. And so they will also be available for questions because no matter how available I am, sometimes people may not want to ask me, they may want to ask each other. And so being able to have at least one person that's part of their team that maybe they feel comfortable asking a question to, I think is important and being able to, for me, it's all about empowerment. I don't want people to have to come to me, right? I want to empower people, whether that's through a document or videos or a super user, right? I want people to be able to know how to get their questions answered in whatever way they're comfortable with. I do think having some superusers or having, again, some sort of a support plan in place is important.

SPEAKER_02 27:23

Do you think typically the best super users and change champions are the ones that volunteer or ones that individuals that you seek out for certain personality traits or a combination of the two?

SPEAKER_01 27:51

Either confirm or say, hey, what about this person, or can you add another person? So it was a little bit of both. So we looked at seniority, we looked at, you know, people that are vocal, that would love to improve processes, people that were excited about improving the systems and you know, were more optimistic about the project. Uh, and so those were some of the things. This is important when you're talking about a super user that you have someone that is comfortable with the system and that can, you know, think a little bit outside of the box and dream a little bit bigger because systems are all about making, you know, if you can think about what would make my job easier, you need somebody that can think not just this sucks or you know, it can't get any better. You really do want to identify some people that have the capacity that want to be like, you know what, my job could be better if the system could do this. Because again, I'm not in those roles. And so you should always reach out to those different user groups to identify those cheerleaders, those champions, and if you can make them a super user.

SPEAKER_02 29:02

How does this migration effort fit into your broader remit as IT manager and giving Kitchens broader digital transformation program?

SPEAKER_01 29:11

So, as part of our broader digital transformation, we're looking at all of our systems, all of our processes, all of our data, right? So, from a data perspective, how do we empower our leadership to be able to pull more accurate reports, be able to have more visibility into what's going on, right? We do major events. Um, so we have major events going on. How does someone know who's attending? Who bought tickets, who bought sponsorships, how do we allow our management to be able to clearly see how many people have we served this week, and you know, what's our caseload looking like? And so there's several layers of systems and data that are going to help us as an organization work more efficiently, but also, of course, you know, security perspective. So it's part of our secure of part of our data management, our data digital transformation, of course, me looking across all of our systems for security, for processes, make sure we're not having more licenses than we need in different systems. And so again, this is just one part of looking at overall how do we use all of our systems and how we make sure we're using the best system for the job, right? Because you can have there are a million applications. I tell people this all the time, that can name at least five project management tools, right? And they're all awesome, but which one meets your requirements? Which one is gonna be better for your team? Like I love ClickUp, but ClickUp is very much, it has a lot of customizations, it has a lot of options. Is that gonna be the best for your team, or do you need something that's a little bit more simple, a little bit of a more simple UI, right? And so these are things that you have to evaluate. Yes, we have tools. Are they the right tools? Are we using them effectively? Do we even need them at all? Any any of these systems integrated with Salesforce? Sorry, say that one more time.

SPEAKER_03 31:13

Any of these systems integrated with Salesforce? Or they're all standalone swivel chain?

SPEAKER_01 31:17

We have many of them. So we have uh Classy, our donation management tool that's integrated with Salesforce. We have FormAssembly that's integrated with Salesforce. Uh we have iWave integrated.

SPEAKER_03 31:31

Uh these are mostly apps, right? These are just like manage. I was thinking more of uh your accounting system, right? Uh great, because that's a big one, right?

SPEAKER_01 31:41

So that's the next phase of the migration. Um, because my finance team is definitely like, please get this integrated.

SPEAKER_02 31:49

So we want to talk a little bit about your involvement in the community because I think it really is a true reflection of what Salesforce, the Salesforce ecosystem is and can be. Uh, so going back to when Salesforce was founded, uh Ohana, obviously a Hawaiian word, yeah, Hawaiian for family. Uh I guess before we dive into your background, and I would just love for you to share kind of what the Ohana means to you and your personal opinion. Do you think that's changed over the years from 26, 27 years ago when Salesforce was created to 2016 May? Has that changed in your opinion and during your 15 years in the ecosystem?

SPEAKER_01 32:30

Yeah, I definitely think it's changed. I mean, when I first started in the Salesforce ecosystem and I learned about this term Ohana, I thought it was a good from a branding or even just aspirational, right? Like we're family and it really spoke to the community, right? So when I looked at Salesforce has an amazing, just super active uh customer community. And I really like the thought process. I mean, I'm assuming in the beginning, Ohana was meant internally, right? For Salesforce the Company. But then as they started to, as they started to do these different initiatives with, you know, the Salesforce user groups and the Salesforce community and the MVP program, things like that, I guess the idea was to be able to bring those values outward externally from Salesforce the Company. And I thought it was really great branding. I thought it was a great mindset to have around family and community. And I do think that that value is still in the Salesforce ecosystem. It just looks a little bit different today because the world looks different today. I mean, 15 years ago, I mean, there was internet, but it it wasn't the AI internet we have today. It wasn't all of the content creation the way we see it today, right? There were a lot more just tutorials and how-tos. I mean, those were the things that we went to the internet for, different blogs, more uh just different types of information than I think we have today. And when I look at the Salesforce ecosystem in a community, I mean, I can only speak from my perspective. Um it looked a lot different 15 years ago than I think it does today. I believe the community is more vocal, is more diverse. As the company, of course, has grown, the community has grown, and being able to see some different underrepresented groups be a lot more visible brings change to the community. And some of that change can be a little bit uncomfortable, but I think it's needed because the community had to grow and change along with the world and with the company.

SPEAKER_02 34:50

So one of the things you mentioned was the MVP program. So typically, this is uh recognized individuals are recognized based on uh their expertise, leadership, giving up time, generosity, things like that, right? And some of that is through forums like Leading the User Group and other initiatives, right, that are out there. So tell us a little bit about your personal role to becoming a Salesforce MVP and in addition to that, also uh Golden Hoodie recipient as well. When did you become aware of like these initiatives within the Salesforce ecosystem? And what does it mean to you to be recognized both personally and also professionally as well?

SPEAKER_01 35:29

Yeah, so I think around 2017, 2018 is when I became more aware of some of the other programs. So when I first started in the Salesforce ecosystem, I attended some events with the Orlando Salesforce User Group that at the time was led by Joshua Hoskins and uh Firestone, I think. I remember attending some of their events, and my very first community conference was Florida Dreaming, which I believe was the first community conference. Joshua Hoskins is the father of the community conferences. And then after that, I attended a world tour, and that is where I met and saw Leah McGowan Hare. And at that point in my time in the ecosystem, she was the first black woman I've ever seen Grace a Salesforce keynote stage. Um, and she had an initiative called BAM via multiplier. And I was the president at the time of the Black Orlando Tech organization in Orlando. I also put in my application and become the Orlando User Group Leader. And one of the very first big events I did was combining those two organizations and doing a big Salesforce presentation to introduce people to the platform. And we had about 90 people that showed up that night and tweeted about it, and got the attention of Leah. And I think that is what helped put me on the road to MVP because of the work that I was doing from that user group meeting that intro to Salesforce. I started a local uh Salesforce class that I did for free with individuals to help them get certified. And that kind of put me on the path to starting my nonprofit. I actually started the first HBCU initiative in the Salesforce space with my nonprofit that was originally called HBCU Force is now called Tech Forward. So me doing that work, and I didn't do this work thinking, oh my God, I want to do it so I could become an MVP. I tell people all the time that you do whatever is important and passionate to you. Like this space is wide open for you to be whoever you are. So I didn't have to become a new person to do these things. I've always volunteered, I've always mentored. And so I just did that in this space because I saw that there was an opportunity to do so. And I really enjoyed what I was doing in this space. I knew what income could be created, and I knew that people were not aware. And so that is how I started down this road to becoming an MVP and then golden hoodie. I received that honor because of the conference that I created called Dreaming in Color, which again, the the ecosystem is very welcoming, right? And it wasn't that it wasn't that I didn't feel welcome at conferences, community conferences, or even the Salesforce, you know, big conferences, Dream Force, Trailblazer DX. It was just that there weren't a lot of people that looked like me. And so I thought about why is that? And I wanted to create a space where people felt like, hmm, if I come there, maybe I will see more people that look like me. Um that maybe will feel less like another work event. And so that is kind of why I started dreaming in color as just thinking about what I wanted to see reflected in the ecosystem and being able to help people really see that, oh, there are more people that look like me that work in this space because it's not that they're not, it's just that they didn't know because when you show up to event, you don't see them. And so now we have a place where you can come see them. So I really, really enjoy the work that I do advocating for individuals being able to expose different communities to the tech ecosystem and to the tech space through Salesforce. And I always tell them Salesforce is not the only platform that you could do this with, it's just the one that I know. But there are a lot of SaaS applications, right? Workday, Service Now, HubSpot, there are all these applications that you can get certified with and create a great income. And that's really the point of the work that I'm doing.

SPEAKER_02 40:10

In terms of Dreaming in Color, so if there's perhaps listeners who have not heard of Dreaming in Color, what is the elevator pitch on what it is? And is it a quarterly or yearly event and you know, in person, virtual? Give us the uh, I guess the advertisement for what dream dreaming in color is.

SPEAKER_01 40:29

Dreaming in Color is a community conference for uh at the time it was uh when I started, it was geared toward empowering black Salesforce professionals. We've since also created a space to uplift and empower uh Hispanic and Latin individuals, and of course, anybody that supports those audiences. And we focus on Salesforce, MuleSoft, Tableau, Slack. It's normally two days. This year, the one and a half days of programming is going to be in Atlanta on August the 14th, and it is an amazing people like to refer to it as like a family reunion. We do a cookout on the very first night to kind of set the scene for the for the event. We have an opening keynote and a day full of sessions, and we end with our awards dinner, an after party, and it is an amazing just day full of leadership talks. We talk about career planning. This year we're going to talk a lot about AI and how AI is impacting people's career journeys and what you should be looking toward as far as your career and things in the Salesforce ecosystem. We have amazing speakers. Again, people that may not be very visible in the space today, maybe people that are not super active. We give people the chance, amazing, qualified people the chance to speak and meet others. So it's it's a really amazing event.

SPEAKER_02 42:05

How many years has this been ongoing? What number of conferences is this year?

SPEAKER_01 42:09

This is going to be our fifth year.

SPEAKER_02 42:11

Well, we'll include the link in your episode podcast as well. So uh, you know, if anyone has any questions about it, then obviously reach out to Tiffany directly. Uh, hopefully, we'll have a few uh listeners of this episode there to meet you in person. Uh so you know, keep us posted on that, wishing you the best after this year. And then and then also wanted to tell tell us a little bit about your or I guess the community advisory board and your participant within that or on that. What does that look like? I mean, what is the community advisory board and how how did you get nominated for that? And uh what what what is your role as part of that?

SPEAKER_01 42:47

So I believe we had to apply to be on the community advisory board, and then I believe we were selected. Um so the advisory board is really an opportunity to represent community voices and to contribute to how Salesforce engages in the ecosystem, right? So being on the advisory board really gives me a chance to shape how Salesforce listens to and recognizes the community. We get to work on some really amazing initiatives with leadership across Salesforce and really help to get answers and just be the voice. And I think for a little while here, I think one of the main critiques coming from the community was that they felt that Salesforce wasn't listening and it's been harder for people to understand how to get their questions answered, how to get their concerns heard. I think again, as the community grows, those of us that have been in the ecosystem for a long time, it's like we we kind of understand how Salesforce works and how as much as they're a big company, that doesn't mean everybody knows what everybody's doing. And so there's a lot of times I'm talking to Salesforce employees and I know more than they do. And so being able to, and that can be frustrating. Right, when you're talking to somebody, you feel like they should be able to help you with your AE, or you know, they should be able to help you with this product feature that you don't like, or anything around that, right? It could be very frustrating as a new person, or even somebody that again just doesn't understand how to connect and get connected to the Salesforce ecosystem. So I really like the opportunity to be on the community advisory board and to be able to help with some semi-structured feedback to be able to help be the voice, uh, to help reinforce uh programs, the intentionality, uh the transparency, as much as we can be transparent, being involved in different conversations. To me, my voice has always been it's official, but it's a little bit unofficial. And so the advisory board makes it a little bit more official, right? To be able to say that yes, we are on this board with Salesforce, and you know, we're here so that people understand that you know, the community is not just for marketing, it's not just for celebrations, but you know, the community wants to be heard, we need resources, and we would like to have some say in some decision making. So we try to to be the beacon of of that.

SPEAKER_03 45:25

How often do you guys you guys meet? It's like just I guess it's like set of I don't know, community representatives and and sales force.

SPEAKER_01 45:36

So we have different working groups, so we meet monthly. Um we were meeting more often, but we just switched to monthly for your different working group, and then as a whole board, I believe we meet quarterly as a board. I don't know the schedules. I think we have a year and a half term.

SPEAKER_03 45:57

So I I apologize if this question's a little a little out of line, but uh uh so if you can't answer, that's fine. This year particularly, there've been a lot of like griping about the direction Salesforce has been going. It's a little bit with headless. A lot of people feel like you know a lot of people feel like they're just not happy with the direction of the company, it's reflected in the stock price, which has been let's say very volatile. Uh has that been something that they're talking about?

SPEAKER_01 46:25

I think uh Salesforce is a company is is moving very fast. And from a company perspective, I guess I understand that, right? So is this great AI race, and I think every platform that any of us are on have uh have rolled out one or more AI features, and so I think some of the criticism or concern around specifically the Salesforce space has just been the fast-paced rollout because that's not something that we're used to, right? We're we're used to four releases a year, and so we know the release is coming, we get the release notes, we can test it, we can play with it, we can prepare for it. And now all of a sudden we're getting you know new things every month and product renames. And so I think that the the rapid change really caused concern as well as not, I mean, if you think about headless, for example, I don't know what that means. It's not a new concept though, and so a lot of these things are not new concepts. If you're more technical or if you're maybe more of a developer, then maybe you have more understanding about some of these concepts. But for the rest of us, right, for a long time, Salesforce was the place you could be where you didn't have to be so technical, and I think that for me at least, it can feel and it does feel like a lot changing all at once. And I don't know what's working, how much does this cost? Why are you doing this? I don't want to use it, who's gonna use it? I mean, there's all these questions. Whether that's true or not, I don't know. I don't run Salesforce from my standpoint. I try to separate the two, right? I don't run Salesforce, I don't know why they do what they do. However, I can recognize that the community that I serve may not understand all of these new features and technology because I don't. And so my role in the community is to say, okay, how can I make these things more understandable, more accessible? How can I get people up to speed? How can I fill that gap? Because to me, that's the role that I play. That was the whole purpose, right? It was fun when you knew it was coming, you could be prepared, you could be the expert on it. Now it doesn't feel so much fun because you're learning with everyone else. I just think that there's a lot of angst and confusion, and and rightfully so, because Salesforce and they have admitted this, they haven't done the best job with communicating, right? Because that everybody's been moving so fast, right? Their employees, their people too. And so they got the email like we got the email. I think we assumed that they got the email months before, and I don't think everybody did. And so, because I just so happen to have the privilege to be able to talk to Salesforce employees a little bit more often, I think I I have a little bit of a different viewpoint and a different perspective that I think might help with people that are just very frustrated with the company overall. And I think it's more just questions, it's more communication, is more clarity, is more transparency, more information, because that's what we're used to.

SPEAKER_03 49:42

I think a lot of it is uncertainty on what's gonna happen, and even Salesforce doesn't know they're trying to pivot in an uncertain world, and everyone else is trying to pivot as fast as they're pivoting. Um, and there's a level of there's a level of uh of frustration there um because of the uncertainty, and then you know, all of the Salesforce, Salesforce intentionally tries not to be super forward-looking because you you know you make promises. So yeah. So leading on that, right? You know, obviously you do a lot of work in the community and you know, advising, at least in the broader level, you know, how people should move forward with their tech career, you know, particularly in Salesforce. So, what would be your advice nowadays in 2026, either for someone trying to break into the ecosystem or even someone who's inexperienced, you've been doing this for a few years, where do you think they should push their skill set? Should it be on platform or Salesforce-specific AI skills or generic AI skills or all of the above, or pivot back to core Salesforce? Like there's so much.

SPEAKER_01 50:51

There is so much. Um, I think if you're trying to break into the ecosystem, being really specific and strategic is what's important. So I don't think being a CRM generalist or an admin generalist is the right goal. I think that you should have a technical skill or strategy or industry skill, right? Meaning, do you know nonprofits really well? Do you know healthcare really well? Understanding how healthcare works with Salesforce, understanding health cloud. I think you have to be a little bit more strategic today to really get your footing in a Salesforce space. Uh, the platform is just much more complex. And so I tell people all the time, I've worked with this platform for a really long time, and I'm in a Slack channel with people that have been doing this for 20 years, and we ask questions all day. So there's no one that knows everything, but most people know a part of a product or some area really well. Um when I'm looking at job descriptions now, uh, when I'm looking at the way Salesforce is moving, I just think that being very strategic in the side of a product, some sort of technical skill or an area is going to be super important. In general, I think people should know CRM fundamentals, right? How does Salesforce work? How does any CRM work? Why does the company want to use it? I think data is super important because we're talking about data quality or talking about all the data models. We're collecting, everybody's collecting a lot of data. And so somebody has to know what to do with it. I think business process mapping is super important right now, those VA skills, because somebody has to tell the AI what to do. And it's not even just the AI, right? When you were building any type of automation, you needed to be able to map out the processes. And so I think that's more important now than it ever has been. I talked a little bit about reporting and dashboards. So again, going back to a specific technical skill, right? Knowing Tableau is a great strategy, knowing MuleSaw for integrations, knowing how to automate, even if it's not in Salesforce, there are a lot of organizations that are using things like Zapier. So knowing how to make again, this goes back to business process mapping. If you map out the process, you can see where there's some manual steps where automation could be helpful. And automation is not just AI, but there are a lot of automation tools, and just again, when you're mapping out the process, you can see where there are some gaps in in the systems. Um, I do think AI literacy is super important, uh, knowing how to use AI tools, understanding how they work, because they're, I don't want to say they're basically, but they're basically the same AI features in every single app. And so if you don't know how to use them, you don't know how to I think for both people that are entering the space and people that are experienced, I think today, again, with so much, I don't want to call it noise, but it's just an overwhelming amount of content, information. I think that relationships are important. So getting in front of people, really getting out of networking, which some people, some of us need practice, right? Coming from COVID, this is new because for a while everything was virtual. And now everything's not virtual because I think people are over virtual a little bit. And so being able to really get back to relationships, making sure you have a mentor. I think experienced Salesforce professionals really need to work on their visibility. Have you branded yourself? Do you know where your career is going? Have you looked at any speaker opportunities? Have you been getting leadership practice? So I really think that showing up, joining user groups, going to different events, sharing what you're learning, volunteering. I think those are all great ways today to really brand yourself. And I think your community and your network is so important. Again, it's one of the reasons why I'm still doing my conference, Dreaming in Color. And again, it's the work that I do year round, right? Because Dreaming in Color is meant to be a fundraiser to eventually help to support the work that Tech Ford does year-round. And so, year-round, as I am coaching people in their careers, as I'm helping people get started, as I'm helping college students figure out their next move, relationships are really important. In this job market, relationships are everything, knowing the right people. Community is just one of the most powerful career accelerators. And so I think that for both beginning and experienced professionals, I think we have to get back to some of those core basics that I think we all learned when we were going through college, is now just kind of going back to some of that.

SPEAKER_02 55:52

I think great advice there, Tiffany. I think if I'm not doing you a disservice to summarize, I think it's the T-shaped funnel approach. So broad job responsibilities. So no longer is it just a defined admin, it's now admin, BA, QA, all in one kind of role with the skills of other CRM, adjacent ERP integrations, your other platforms at Salesforce Offer, maybe it's a Tableau, maybe it's a Slack, right? That's the T the T. And then the narrowing it down on the industry. Knowing that industry inside out, the use cases, specializing in that industry. I think that skill set, certainly from what we're seeing, and what I'm also advising people is absolutely spot on in terms of aligning with what you talked about there. I think your advice as well around relationships is something we've both preached on our past uh podcast that we did for the show as well. Um, you have to get you're comfortable with the uncomfortable, as someone coined it. So I think we're all guilty of uh maybe saying, ah, you know what, next time. But the reality is that next time's here. So you know you have to focus on what you can control, and networking is part of that. So a fantastic episode, Tiffany. Thank you. I thank you so much for your time, and I'm sure you'll probably field some questions once this airs from our network. So I thank you for your time today. It's been a blast.

SPEAKER_01 57:17

Thank you so much.