SF SOCIETY Magazine

SFSociety Society

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QUARTERLY

MAGAZINE

C OTNHNEE CI N TD I NE G SA YC SO TS EY MS W P ETNHDEE N T LVEOS IFCOER C O EF E T CHOE S E T EOMR L D W I D E

September Autumn | 2018

Partnering up to put poverty down Welcome Keith Block:...CONGA Meet the ISV partner PAGE 18 the new co-ceo PAGE 6 facebook.com/SFMediaPartners

about Conga Let’s talks talk about digital PEP PAGE 28 transformation PAGE 12

@SFMediaPartners

instagram.com/sf_media_partners

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Spotlight: R’s Education Mason3Frank latest

salary survey

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linkedin.com/company/sf-media-partners

ACCELERATE YOUR BUSINESS WITH CONGA’S DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION SUITE The only end-to-end document and contract management solution you’ll ever need, built for Salesforce

To learn more about Conga and Digital Transformation, scan here

getconga.com

With over 200 submissions, the annual Salesforce Innovation awards are a highly desired and revered prize.

It shouts out to the Salesforce world and beyond just how amazing and creative their customers and partners are. They drive the most innovative solutions on the platform, and they do it extremely well.

It takes more than just coming up with a clever blueprint for success, academia is good at this. It takes commitment, drive & purpose to achieve the highest accolade of global innovation award winner.

Here are the winners of the 2018 Salesforce Innovation Awards. The details will be provided in the next edition but a hearty congratulations to these worthy Partners and Customers who have been the pick of the pioneers this year!

Philanthropic/Foundation Award / PwC Ecosystem Award / Accenture Science

The Connected Partner

Lightning Leadership / CRM

Financial Services / Accenture

Sciences (HLS) / Appirio Services

Communications / Tata Consultancy

Retail / Bluewolf, an IBM Company

Deloitte Digital, Deloitte Consulting Sector) / Acumen Solutions Automotive / Kolekto

Healthcare & Life

Government (Public

Manufacturing (CG) / Sundog

Higher Education / HigherEchelon

Nonprofit / Giveclarity.org

Sales Cloud / Silverline

Service Cloud / Deloitte

Cloud / PwC

Media /

Travel & Transportation / PwC

Einstein Analytics / Capgemini

Cloud / Cognizant Technology Solutions Pierry Inc., A Wunderman Company

Marketing

Community

Commerce Cloud /

Salesforce Platform / Slalom

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Foreword Welcome to the first edition of SF Society … the first ever magazine focused on the Salesforce ecosystem with thoughts, opinion and stories from around the world. It is rare to have a world first and we are passionate about Salesforce and Salesforce.org. We are dedicated to promoting the ISV and SI partner network within the global Salesforce ecosystem for the benefit of its customers.

The aim of the magazine is to share the amazing stories of the Salesforce world. We are hoping to inspire, inform and get you involved as we seek contributors globally … you too can be a passive reader or maybe a regular contributor!

With this in mind, choosing what to include was a challenge … a magazine which talks about some of the most innovative companies in one of the fastest growing ecosystems in the world, is especially challenging.

We are a registered 1-1-1 company and promoting amazing acts of charity will be a prominent feature in our magazine. So, we include a review of the biggest sports and social event ever in the EMEA region. Delivered

by Partner Event Promotions, a NFP with a charitable mission, the brilliant #PartnerBoxing event held at the world-famous Troxy theatre in London UK. Bringing together Salesforce, Salesfoce.org & partners in a massive fundraising campaign.

Coming up next will be the global campaign, Partner Strictly Dancing where their aim is to raise $500k for charity by once again bringing the partner ecosystem together!

As we are launching at Dreamforce, we must cover some of the exciting news & events taking place over the week including the awesome Ladies Be Architects, thought leadership pieces form some of the world’s top ISV’s. Great news recently was

the promotion to co-CEO of Keith Block which is also featured. We take a look at the opening of the amazing Salesforce Tower in central San Francisco, as well as an introduction to some of our favourite MVP’s, apps on the Salesforce ever growing App Exchange and other topical items.

Look out too for the Thought Leadership pieces from our sponsors as we delve into some of the talking points driving this incredible industry forward at a relentless pace. Whether you read us in print or online, you represent our readership, we know you are passionate about Salesforce and like us, share a deep, abiding curiosity for the Salesforce world around you. With every article we present, with every issue, we’re c o m m i t te d to s a t i s f y i n g t h a t curiosity.

Feel free to give us your feedback and we look forward to delivering our best to you in the months to come!

SOCIETY MAGAZINE Publisher Statement-The views expressed by the contributors are not necessarily those held by the publishers or collaborators and therefore no responsibility can be held by SF Media Partners Limited for misinterpretation.

Reproduction of this magazine without the express permission of the publisher is prohibited. Whilst every care is taken in the production of this magazine, the publisher/editor and staff cannot accept any responsibility for errors in articles, advertisements or programme schedules. To subscribe to this magazine, in the first instance email: info@sfmediapartners. com. Published by SF Media Partners Limited, Registered Office: Abacus House, Pennine Business Park, HD2 1GQ SF Society: Searching for Society is a publication by SF Media Partners Limited.

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Contributions

Contents

Parker Bradford Emily Mee James Collett Gemma Emmett Peter Breusch David Sumner Smith Simon Peel Rex Langton Scott Breswick Kerry Townsend Daniel Peter Nadio Granata Ciaran McCullagh Jodie Wagner Louise Lockie John M Baker Dr John Lever Gemma Emmis

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To read about how Salesforce is leading the digital revolution in theMiddle East and other news, go to www.sfsocietymagazine.com

KEITH BLOCK ANNOUNCED AS CO-CEO

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WOMEN IN TECH

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REACHING NEW HEIGHTS

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THE CONGA DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION

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Companies Conga Mason Frank FRG makepositive Natterbox Mirum Jitterbit Ram Tracking FullCRM Sports Traider University of Huddersfield Veeva Bluewolf

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THE NEW 3R’S OF EDUCATION

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EDUCATION PROGRAMME LAUNCHES

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KNOCKOUT SUCCESS

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Q&A WITH RAM TRACKING

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Image: LinkedIn

Benioff announces Keith Block as co-CEO ON AUGUST 7TH, SALESFORCE ANNOUNCED THAT KEITH BLOCK, MOST RECENTLY THE SALESFORCE COO, WOULD BE MADE CO-CEO ALONGSIDE SALESFORCE FOUNDER, CHAIRMAN AND CEO MARC BENIOFF. been a leader within the tech industry for championing LGBT rights. This partnership may allow Benioff to further focus and promote the growth of Salesforce’s inclusive and progressive culture.

By contrast, Salesforce’s annualized five-year revenue growth is more than four times that of its competitors, including SAP, Oracle and Microsoft.

Block, previously of Oracle, joined Salesforce in 2013. He has served as the Salesforce Vice Chairman, Director and President. Benioff has described him as “the best sales executive the enterprise software industry has ever seen.”

Block and Benioff will work together to guide Salesforce’s vision and growth strategy.

Benioff’s focus will remain on company innovation in the areas of technology, stakeholder engagement, marketing and culture while Block’s focus will be on growth strategy, operations and execution.

“Keith has outstanding operational expertise and corporate leadership experience,” said Benioff, “and I could not be happier for his promotion and this next level of our partnership.”

Image: LinkedIn

Few top companies have tried the co-CEO structure, and a number of those who have attempted it have experienced limited success. Oracle, where Mark Hurd and Safra Catz operate as co-CEOs have overseen the company’s 1.4% growth over the past five years.

Keith Block With Benioff’s lofty goal of reaching $23 billion in revenue by fiscal year 2022, it is hoped this new management style will allow Salesforce to continue its exceptional business growth. Salesforce’s Q1 FY 2019 generated $3.01 billion in revenue, a 25% increase, putting them on a $12 billion dollar run rate and the company shows no signs of slowing down.

The division of their roles may allow Benioff to focus even more on the Salesforce culture, something that has been a major focus of the company in recent years. The focus on company culture has become a real corner stone for the company in recent years.

Benioff, for example, has invested over $8 million to address the wage gaps related to race and gender. Additionally, Salesforce has

Their clearly defined roles within the company may help Salesforce transition smoothly to this new management structure.

Benioff is known to prioritise setting targets, and it is clear Block has been successful at hitting them. Upon his appointment as COO in 2016, Block was pushed to bring the company to $10 billion in revenue, a massive accomplishment that he achieved in November 2017.

Since then Benioff has announced his goals of reaching $23 billion by 2020 and $60 billion in revenue by 2034. The co-CEO strategy is meant to both strengthen and be an integral part of the growth target.

“We’ve said we’ll do $23 billion in fiscal year 2022 and we can now just see tremendous trajectory beyond that,” Benioff told Fortune in a recent interview. “Cementing Keith and I together as the leadership is really the key to accelerating future growth.”

Would you like to tell us of significant appointments in your organisation? Send details to: editorial@sfmediapartners.com

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WOMEN IN TECH

LADIES BE ARCHITECTS

AN INDEPENDENT COMMUNITY, FOUNDED LATE 2017 BY GEMMA EMMETT, A SOLUTION ARCHITECT AT BLUEWOLF UK. GEMMA WAS WORKING THROUGH THE SALESFORCE ARCHITECT CERTIFICATIONS AND WANTED SOME STUDY BUDDIES. SCOURING THE COMMUNITY FORUMS, IT BECAME CLEAR THAT WHILST INTEREST WAS HIGH, WOMEN WERE SCATTERED AND SIGNIFICANTLY UNDER-REPRESENTED IN THIS AREA OF THE SALESFORCE ECOSYSTEM. Gemma set out to explore why and create a place for women seeking to establish themselves in technical leadership roles. Ladies Be Architects was born, with its first online study group held in December 2017.

By the end of 2017 Gemma had gone from 5 to 15 certifications and planned to tackle the mighty Certified Technical Architect (CTA) credential.

The CTA review board process seemed a mystery – it’s notoriously difficult with little publicised content. She also discovered that with 250+ CTAs worldwide, less than 20 of these are women.

“This is hardly surprising, since we’re our own biggest critics,” Gemma says. “we’re good at talking ourselves out of going for the big things.

It’s with constant self-criticism that we’re holding ourselves back.”

Meeting Deloitte’s Charly Prinsloo was a defining point for Gemma. As both women worked towards their CTA credential, the two bonded virtually between the UK and Texas and Gemma invited Charly to join as co-leader. The right encouragement from Salesforce, along with a constant stream of new certification content helped the community grow from 24 original members to 750+ in nine months. Since then,

study groups have continued, a website was born and it even has a swag store!

This community empowers men and women.

Since starting, three women have run their own study group courses on data integration and platform development. Susannah St-Germain, inspired at TrailheadDX, began an equality research project to establish a baseline for the Salesforce architect community. Now Gemma, Charly and Susannah support each other both personally and professionally. They speak at events like Salesforce Connections, user groups and community-led events like Forcelandia and WiTness Success.

Men are watching eagerly as they suddenly find a whole host of new content to work with. Their support adds to the community’s strength.

At Dreamforce, Ladies Be Architects is proud to be running three sessions focused on de-mystifying the Certified Technical Architect journey. The first, on Tuesday, is an introduction to the community, with Gemma, Charly and Susannah sharing what inspired them to start.

Gemma Emmett

Charly Prinsloo

On Wednesday Ladies Be Architects takes you through the Ultimate Hiking Guide for Mt. CTA, joined by some very special guests from the architect community. On Thursday – grab your magic markers and have a go at the review board yourself! Design an Amazing, Enterprising, Rockstar Solution based on a home-made hypothetical scenario.

Gemma will meet Charly and Susannah for the first time in person at Dreamforce this year, so you can expect many hugs, possibly some tears – but much more of the support and friendship Ladies Be Architects has spent nearly a year building together and will continue to do so beyond Dreamforce.

Susannah St-Germain

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Women in Tech SALESFORCE WORLD TOUR, LONDON 2018 The founders of the Women in Tech London chapter discuss their group’s goals and history at World Tour. Jodi Wagner, a Salesforce MVP and Engagement Manager at Bluewolf and Lousie Lockie, a Salesforce Solution Architech and Head of CRM, led a Trailblazer Community Campfire session entitled “Better Together- Discover Women in Tech Groups” at this year’s Salesforce World Tour London.

JODIE WAGNER & LOUISE LOCKIE Ms Wagner and Ms Lockie are two of the group leaders for the ‘Salesforce Women in Tech’ London chapter. The informal group organizes regular events during which group members can participate in collaborative activities and discuss topics like networking, mentoring and the unique challenges women face in the tech industry. The group is open to both men and women across the Salesforce ecosystem.

Current statistics on women in tech paint a discouraging picture. Recent research reveals that women make up a paltry 17% of UK tech sector employees. Only one out of every six tech specialists in the UK is a woman and only one out of every ten tech industry leaders is a woman. Despite the fact that there has been impressive growth in the numbers of women who are working in the tech sector, female representation has largely stalled over the past decade, making groups that strive to promote female participation in the industry increasingly relevant.

The London Women in Tech group is one of over thirty chapters around the world. Originally dubbed “Girly Geeks,” Women in Tech was founded in 2010 by Geraldine Gray, another Salesforce MVP. After attending Dreamforce, Ms Gray recognized that women at the conference could benefit from a group that enabled

them to easily connect with other female attendees at the conference. What started out as a group of 20 likeminded women who wanted to network and collaborate with one another has now grown in to a global collaborative (how big?) that provides both real and virtual venues where women in tech can connect with one another.

After transitioning from finance in to tech, Ms Wagner decided she wanted to do something to change the fact that women were often a significant minority in the room at networking events.

“In the summer of 2016 I started the London chapter of Women in Tech, and I decided I couldn’t do this alone so I brought Louise [Lockie]… along for this crazy ride,” said Ms Wagner when discussing the group’s foundation “It was something I wanted to be involvedF

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with,” Ms Lockie explained, “because when I joined Salesforce and started attending user groups and networking events, like many women I found it was mostly men. Often times there would only be one other woman in the room.”

The London chapter organises regular events for its 374 members, which include documentary screenings, talks from industry leaders, and activities that encourage members to bond and confront challenges that reflect the obstacles women face in the workplace.

The well attended World Tour London Community Campfire session focused on the group’s development and the ways in which they’re working to help women in the Salesforce

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ecosystem feel included, empowered, and visible.

“I never want a woman to feel like she needs to fight for her place in the room,” said Ms Wagner. “I want women to know there’s room here for all of us.”

The founders of the Women in Tech London chapter inspire others at World Tour.

Do you run any specialist groups? Would you like to share your story with us? Tell us what drives you and how we can help to get your message out there. Email: editorial@ sfmediapartners.com

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2 0 1 8 The tower was designed to promote the health and wellbeing of its occupants, with outside air intakes on every floor allowing workers to breathe in fresh air. The space has three ‘vertical villages’ linked by staircases, encouraging movement and collaboration. Employees can relax in the various mindfulness zones, kitchens and lounges, or take in the panoramic views from the 61st floor. Project architect Fred Clark of Pelli Clark Pelli called the build “a new city within a city”, saying that its design is looking towards the future.

Reaching new heights Salesforce Tower, San Francisco ... iconic for all the right reasons. Find out why ...

It can be seen from almost anywhere in the Bay: a looming testament to what can be achieved in terms of sustainable, modern, earthquakeproof architecture.

At its unveiling, the Salesforce Tower was called a ‘magnificent edifice’, a ‘pinnacle of hope’ and ‘immense but elegant’. It represented the changing face of San Francisco, becoming the first in a new generation of

skyscrapers. For the last 40 years, city authorities had imposed height restrictions on buildings - but it relaxed these laws recently, paving the way for bigger structures than ever before. Now, the Salesforce Tower stands at more than 200ft taller than the famous Transamerica Pyramid.

DESIGN STAGE Building the 1,070ft tower in one of the most seismically-active areas

of North America was no easy task - especially when you look at its neighbour, the sinking Millennium Tower. During its design, the model was put through rigorous testing, enduring 22 different earthquake simulations. It has a ‘spine’ running up its core with walls up to 48 inches thick, and its foundation slab has 2,200 tonnes of steel reinforcements and 9,000km of concrete. At the height of its construction, it took 800 workers a day to build what is now the tallest building in San Francisco.

On top of this, the building is certified LEED platinum - meaning that it is both energy and resource-efficient.

LEED stands for ‘Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design’, and the tower’s status as the highestrated commercial project in the US certainly earns it its title as a ‘leader’.

STRENGTHENING RELATIONSHIPS Around 87% of the space is being leased to other companies, including co-working giant WeWork, which at a value of $20billion is the most valuable start-up in New York.

Founded by an architect and a serial entrepreneur, the company received a $4billion funding infusion from SoftBank. According to Recode, WeWork will be leasing three floors of the Salesforce Tower to start-ups and Fortune 500 companies. Space in the tower is also being leased to other companies including Bain & Company, Accenture and CBRE. On the top floor, 61 stories high, is a space open to everyone known as the ‘Ohana floor’. With 360-degree views over the city, including the Golden Gate bridge, Presidio national park and the Bay, and floor-to-ceiling windows, it’s certainly a one-of-akind hang-out. Not only is it open

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to anyone within the building, but it is also hired out to non-profits outside business hours. Benioff told the Financial Times that as a child he remembers a similar room at the top of the Bank of America building, but it was hard to access - he says of the 61st story that “it can’t just be one person’s experience, everyone needs to be able to come here”.

Despite the immense wealth of the San Francisco Bay, which contains four of the ten most expensive counties in the United States, there are around 7,000 homeless people in the city (San Francisco Homeless Count and Survey, 2017). “We all know this is the tallest tower in San Francisco, but what does that really mean?” said Benioff.

HELPING TO END HOMELESSNESS

For the CEO, this means a sense of responsibility to the city which he calls home. He reminded attendees of the tower’s opening that it was “an opportunity for deep reflection about who we are in the city and where we need to go as a community.” Benioff added that the city is “home to more than 70 billionaires but also grinding

While the Salesforce Tower became the new jewel in the crown of Silicon Valley, synonymous with the rich and successful, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff was keen to ensure that the less fortunate were not forgotten.

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After leaving the Royal Navy, Mr Shutts became a director of UK government engagement at Inchcape Shipping Services and went on to work as a regional director for the Confederation of British Industry. In addition to his work with

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he hopes to expand the model to individual homeless in the future.

Of course, actions speak louder than words - Benioff announced that the Salesforce Foundation would be making a $1.5million donation towards ending family homelessness, which he and his wife Lynne would match, bringing the total to $3million. The money went to the Heading Home Initiative, a non-profit that houses families which the Benioffs helped create in 2016. The initiative has already raised $30million and has housed 235 families through rent subsidies.

Benioff says that every homeless family in San Francisco will be in their own home by 2021, and

With two hospitals in his name and millions of dollars donated to community causes throughout the years, it seems that the Salesforce Tower will not be Benioff ’s only lasting legacy in the city.

“David was an inspirational leader,” Rick Blackmore, the Confederation of British Industry East Midlands director, told Lincolnshire Live. “ [He was] making a fantastic contribution without letting cancer diminish his ambition.”

David Shutts, the founder and CEO of ASTRiiD, lost his three year long battle with cancer on May 24th. Mr Shutts, who was an ex-Royal Navy engineer, had been diagnosed with stage four renal cancer ten days after his 50th birthday.

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poverty that exists in the shadow of this very building”.

CBI, Mr Shutts found time to write a novel and teach GCSE Maths at Boston College.

ASTRiiD Founder loses three-year battle with cancer

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Following his cancer diagnosis Mr Shutts conceptualized and founded ASTRiiD. The charity works to enable the chronically ill to find employment and volunteer opportunities with companies that need their skill sets but can also work flexibly around their schedules.

“By founding his charity ASTRiiD, he helped people whose lives are affected by chronic longterm illness remain in the workforce,” said Mr Blackmore, “highlighting the value and importance of the invisible talent pool.”

ASTRiiD paid tribute to their founder with a message on their Facebook page.

“With sadness, we share the news that ASTRiiD founder David Shutts has passed away, almost exactly 3 years after his cancer diagnosis,” the post states. “His commitment to helping those with chronic illness access employment was

It is said that anyone is only three steps away from homelessnes. Do you have some inspiring news to share with us ... we’d love to hear how you have played your part in helping others turn their lives around. Email editorial@ sfmediapartners.com

unwavering and inspirational. David’s legacy – to provide a way for business to tap in to the ‘invisible talent pool’ – will survive and thrive, under the leadership of David’s brother and company chairman, Steve Shutts.”

ASTRiiD was one the customers showcased at Salesforce’s World Tour London on May 17th.

Mr Shutts was unable to attend because of his declining health. His brother, Steve, spoke on his behalf about the charity’s mission and collaboration with Saleforce.org during the day’s Keynote speech.

Following the news of his passing, the ASTRiiD Facebook page was flooded with tributes to Mr Shutts’ positivity, legacy and inspirational response to his cancer diagnosis.

“I will forever be in awe of David’s tremendous power to turn adversity into a force for positive change and huge impact,” said one commenter, Adelina Rusu. “He leaves a beautiful legacy, which is something most of us aspire to, but few will actually achieve. One of the most inspirational people I have ever met.”

Mr Shutts is survived by his wife Jo and her son Zachary.

More info on the Salesforce website: https://www. salesforce.com/uk/customer-success-stories/astriid

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The Conga Digital Transformation Suite

By Ciaran McCullagh Director of Strategic Alliances EMEA

Organizations generally rely on multiple vendors for the creation of proposals, negotiations, redlining, signing contracts, and various other post-sales processes, which often generates friction between sales, legal and accounting.

This not only slows down the solution’s deployment but also complicates the task of successfully maintaining disparate solutions as well as managing multiple contracts and relationships with different vendors. As a comprehensive answer to these

problems, Conga presents a Digital Transformation Suite that accelerates sales, addresses compliance regulations along with taking into consideration the needs of an entire business lifecycle. The all-encompassing nature of Conga’s solution eradicates the integration issues associated with consolidating a solution from multiple vendors.

Apart from being trusted to overcome business challenges of all kinds by more than 10,500 customers worldwide, the key factor that differentiates Conga from our competitors is the ability to allow clients to work with a single vendor.

The features of this advanced solution include document creation, negotiation, contract lifecycle management, electronic signature, workflow automation along with input and management of data in a CRM system.

These features enable our end-to-end solution to bind all the procurement-centric and crossdepartmental business processes together, reducing errors as well as the number of people required to maintain these processes. Thus, Conga’s solution allows organizations to expand their business offerings without the necessity of bringing additional people on board.

world. Clarins UK work with system integrator John Backhouse Associates to configure and optimize their Salesforce instance, streamlining training documents management, reporting, and data management organization-wide, resulting in significant time and cost savings across the board.

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THE CHALLENGE

An Emphasis on Artificial Intelligence Not only is Conga developing and refining the market’s leading digital transformation suite, but we are also focused on bringing cuttingedge technology such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to business documents and contracts. Conga is delivering key AI technologies to help companies overcome many of the challenges encountered throughout the contracting process. We have devised an innovative approach to AI, dealing successfully with the tendency of AI to fall apart when paired with irrelevant or insufficient data. Taking this into consideration, Conga first converts the unstructured data in contracts and documents into structured data that can be read using AI technology, and further delivers accurate insights into risk assessment and clause recommendations.

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the course record, attendee badges can be TheOnConga Promise

Going Green with Conga

printed with the click of a button, and branded, official certificates of course completion can be sent Allout. of this research going upholding the Conga solutionsisare usedinto approximately 30 times during the course registration process for data, ‘Conga Promise’ - our commitment to providing documents, and record management throughout.

five-star value. This includes seamless access to With Conga, all communications are automated, ourvirtual, enterprise-grade resources, highly skilled instantly recorded, savingatime, money and lessening theirand environmental impact. technical support, onboarding services to get answers quickly along with the consultative expertise for deployment of solutions within weeks instead of months. Furthermore, Conga adopts a productized approach focused on world-

0.75 TONS office

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class development through the acquisition of key technologies. This gives a major boost to our digital transformation suite while also ensuring faster deployment. Amassing a plethora of business experiences based on best practices of 10,500 customers and 400 million documents for more than a decade, Conga’s technology offers a better way to do business

One of our clients has used Conga Grid and Conga Composer to switch from paper communications to digital throughout their UK training department. By doing so, they will annually save:

2 18.75m of water equal to showers 335 average

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By infusing this cutting-edge AI technology into our entire suite of solutions, Conga is intelligently Clarins sends up to 20,000 training course invitations unlocking theevery datayear. thatEach resides in documents across the UK employee invitation wascontracts sent out with self-addressed and toanot only makeresponse it actionable, envelope, followed by a reminder, and eventually but to help users deliver more accurate contract a certificate of completion - all sent via mail, as well asdiscover information mailed to training venues. reviews, relevant insights, and drive speed to revenue thereby making organizations more efficient, effective, and compliant.

GOING GREEN WITH CONGA

Along with

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£37,700 £43,550 in postal costs

Conga’s effectiveness can be further illustrated through a recent project wherein one of our clients has used Conga Grid and Conga Composer to switch from paper communications to digital throughout their UK training department. By doing so, they have reduced their carbon footprint, made significant cost savings, as well as reducing human error and reducing the man hours required to collect & record information from paper sources.

With Conga, all communications are automated, virtual, instantly recorded, saving time, money and lessening their environmental impact.

If you want to find out more about this and other case studies, see the section on our website at getconga.com Our company’s primary objective is to meet the needs of our clients as quickly and efficiently as possible, and the Conga team has been assuring the same in all the client associations so far.

With global headquarters in Colorado in the U.S., Conga is growing rapidly in EMEA as well as APAC markets and now plans to expand our international presence to accommodate the escalating demands of clients. We keep learning from the best practices of our 10,500 clients, which leads us to build features and functionalities that are most necessary to today’s market. We look forward to providing new, transformative ways to approach business problems that clients never knew even existed, and driving businesses to greater heights of productivity.

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“The biggest growth constraint to Salesforce is people.”

Regional VP EMEA / Alliance & Channels, Salesforce

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t’s no secret—Salesforce is one of the fastest-growing technologies in the world, and continues to dominate the CRM market. But with an estimated demand for 3.3 million new job roles in the ecosystem by 2022, Salesforce’s meteoric growth could create an acute shortage of skilled professionals.

As a specialist Salesforce recruiter, we’ve witnessed this insatiable demand for Salesforce experts first hand. While the overall talent pool has undeniably increased, the demand for Salesforce technology has grown at an even greater rate.

Salesforce

Companies regularly approach us to assist in staffing their Salesforce implementation or expansion, and while our established recruitment network allows us to connect them with the experts they’re looking for, often these professionals are not local or have a long list of projects already on their agenda. The impact of this on the client is that their build can be delayed, and they will almost certainly have to pay a premium for staff relocation and daily contract rates.

This will always be the case for the more technical roles in Salesforce—the level of

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Mason Frank LAUNCHES PIONEERING SALESFORCE EDUCATION PROGRAM James Lloyd-Townshend is CEO of Mason Frank International, the largest Salesforcespecific recruiter in the world. Here, James takes us through the inception of the company’s revolutionary Salesforce education program, the Mason Frank Tech Academy, explains why it’s essential to get new talent into the ecosystem, and details how you can start to take advantage of this new batch of certified professionals.

Salesforce also has the advantage of having free, accessible educational materials.

Trailhead is a fantastic open learning system, and its structure allows professionals to gradually progress towards more technical roles, as they enrich their understanding of the technology and its widespread application in businesses worldwide. The issue new professionals are facing, however, is a lack of practical experience.

Experienced While Trailhead will introduce you to all the concepts and frameworks you’re expected to work with as a Salesforce professional, and give you the opportunity to tinker with your developer edition to begin building basic projects, new talent will still struggle to find employment due to this lack of real-life work experience. It’s a paradox that many young tech professionals face—how can they get the experience when employers won’t give them it?

The Mason Frank Tech Academy experience it takes to carve yourself out as a Technical Architect or Senior Developer cannot be underestimated. This talent shortage extends to even the entry-level roles in Salesforce, however, which suggests a disconnect between young tech professionals leaving University and choosing Salesforce as a specialist technology.

Introducing new talent into the Salesforce ecosystem For a young professional with a background in IT or Computing, Salesforce as a focus technology isn’t a hard sell. It remains one of the most innovative companies in the world, and its commitment to cloud technology from the early stages has helped establish its status as the world’s leading CRM provider.

What’s more, starting salaries in Salesforce are relatively high compared to competing technologies, meaning those new to the ecosystem will be working with industryleading technology, and will be paid well from the outset.

Given our position in the ecosystem, we can appreciate this problem from both sides.

Salesforce Partners and customers are in need of experienced professionals, but new talent cannot get a foot on the ladder to get this experience. This presented an interesting opportunity for Mason Frank, as given the connections we have with Salesforce Partners and customers around the world, we could take steps to mend that disconnect between education and employment.

The Mason Frank Tech Academy is a twoyear program, operating out of New York and London, which combines fully funded Salesforce training and certifications with practical experience in the Salesforce ecosystem. We utilize our team of expert recruiters to source the brightest IT professionals looking to carve a career in Salesforce consulting, and offer them a unique scholarship that guarantees

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employment at the end of the program.

Starting with an intensive eight-week training course, designed and delivered by Salesforce Trainers, we transform talented tech professionals into certified Salesforce Administrators, and develop their business skills to make them a valuable asset for Salesforce organizations across a diverse range of industries. Once certified, we support our staff towards two additional certifications, and give them vital hands-on experience by placing them with some of the industry’s leading Salesforce Partners and customers in a practical environment.

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a recruitment drive can detract from other tasks, not to mention the fact that skilled and enthusiastic staff can be hard to come by.

When you work with us, there is no need for a recruitment strategy.

Of the 300 applications we receive for each wave, 50% are earmarked for a 20-minute telephone interview. If they pass this initial pre-screen, we invite them for face-to-face interviews with our Tech Academy selection panel. From these interviews, we select just 10 of the most-promising individuals to join the academy every six weeks.

Promising The program is designed to create our own stable of certified Salesforce Administrators and Consultants, who can be utilized as a valuable member of staff for customers, or even as a billable asset for partners.

The merits of working with our Salesforce professionals Recruitment has always been a stumbling block for our long-term clients, as the dedication of time and effort required for

After our rigorous selection process, professionals are guided through our intensive Salesforce education program. This saves businesses the time, expense, and hassle of designing and building a training course, ensuring the course is up to date, funding certification exams, paying market-rate salaries to trainees, and finding, hiring, and paying for a multitude of skilled trainers (Salesforce and soft skills) to deliver the program.

Our professionals are already certified and

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working towards a specialist route—they possess a far greater level of expertize than the average entry-level hire.

Academy Taking on a Mason Frank Tech Academy graduate is a more convenient route than a traditional hire, but ultimately we’re also aiming to boost your bottom line. Our consultants are available at reduced rates, as an affordable and flexible staffing solution that is designed to solve your talent shortage while giving these bright professionals some valuable experience.

Many of our partners utilize our academy as a cost-effective way of procuring Salesforce skills below market rates.

Since 2010, we’ve worked with over 6,000 organizations in 87 countries to deliver the very best talent in the Salesforce ecosystem, finding jobs for over 4,750 Salesforce professionals.

Now, we are investing in the future of Salesforce by introducing the next generation of talent, and we’d love to speak to organizations that are interested in helping these professionals flourish.

If you’d like to speak to our team, visit https:// www.masonfrank.com/tech-academy or call 212 731 8272 (New York) or 0191 594 9732 (London).

Download Mason Frank’s 2018/19 Salary Survey to explore the latest insights into Salesforce salaries, products, implementations, job satisfaction, diversity issues, and market trends across the worldwide Salesforce community.

• The views of over 2,200 Salesforce professionals • Find out your earning potential • Benchmark salaries and benefits for

your team and organization • Discover trends and benefits that can

advance both earning potential and job satisfaction

This is the report for Salesforce professionals, by Salesforce professionals.

D O W N LO A D YO U R C O P Y F R O M W W W. M A S O N F R A N K . C O M / S A L E S FO R C E - S A L A R Y- S U R V E Y Download Mason Frank’s 2018/19 Salary Survey to explore the latest insights into Salesforce salaries, products, implementations, job satisfaction, diversity issues, and market trends across t worldwide Salesforce community.

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The views of over 2,200 Salesforce professionals

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THE SKY’S NO LIMIT MAKEPOSITIVE IN THE STRATOSPHERE

Image:Makepositive

By Dave Sumner Smith

Above : Mark Richards Award

Looking beyond the EU is driving exponential growth for happy British IT company ‘makepositive’, whose recent success has taken their work quite literally into space.

norm of more than 20% in the IT consulting sector.

Salesforce, which it has done for the past two years.

“In makepositive we have an overarching value which is called ‘happiness’,” explains James Collett, SVP for Marketing & Alliances. “The happiness of our employees, the people we work with and the community we serve.”

A ‘laser focus’ on a happy company culture has played a key role in driving a ‘rapid trajectory of growth’ for London-based ‘makepositive’, according to CEO and company founder Mark Richards. All staff are given options on shares after six months with the company and enjoy a biannual profit-related bonus that lifts their target earnings by 10% each year.

EMBRACED

The policy is embraced in the company name, and no end is in sight for the positive, happy culture.

Growth for the London-based firm, which now has almost 90 staff in the UK and 50 in India, will not be hampered by Brexit, Richards maintains. “Investing in leading edge technology and responding quickly to business change is the way to get through any uncertainties caused by Brexit,” he says.

The most recent award was for ‘transformational’ work for a firm that uses satellites for global connectivity. The business had originally been created in the USA under the name O3b Networks to provide connectivity to the ‘Other 3 Billion’ people who live in parts of the world where landbased services are difficult, or even impossible, to deploy.

The benefits are evident in the firm’s rapid expansion, with sales growing by 48% in the current financial year from £7m to more than £11m, and staff turnover being ‘significantly lower’ than the

This happy mindset and innovative approach has helped makepositive become the only business in Europe to win the prestigious Partner Innovation Award from

After its acquisition by Luxembourg-based firm SES in 2016, it was renamed SES Networks and staff numbers boosted from 250 to more than 600. It now sells connectivity to business and government clients operating in remote and underserved areas of the world with customers in the maritime market such as Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, energy firms like MODEC, Internet Service Providers such as Digicel Pacific, American Samoa Telecom,

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Speedcast, CNT Ecuador and Entel Chile, together with government clients such as the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

With the 12 Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellites originally owned

by O3b, to be joined by another 4 in early 2018, together with the 55 higher altitude geostationary earth orbit (GEO) satellites owned by SES, the firm offers connectivity to 99% of the world’s population.

But SES Networks faced a challenge in scaling up their sales and account management activity to deal with rapid expansion that saw business doubling every year. Having spent the second half of 2016 reconfiguring the front-end sales aspects of its Salesforce Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, it then needed to upgrade the ‘back office’ elements too.

At the time, the firm used a massive spreadsheet with 52 columns and five thousand rows to track its legal contracts, billing and admin with customers. With plans to grow the business ten-fold in five years, fundamental change to O3b’s ‘Quote to Cash’ workflow system was clearly essential.

RELATIONSHIP

Salesforce advocates subcontracting client-specific development work such as this to a small number of companies. “We don’t do the innovating,” explains Leon Mangan, VP for EMEA Alliance and Channels.

“That’s done by our partners working with our customers.”

Salesforce recommended SES should consider makepositive,” he continues, because “we trust them. They are agile, dependable

and fast to react – and fun to work with, too.”

The reason SES Networks warmed so quickly to makepositive was more serious, however. “They quoted us what was – in relative terms – a ‘focused cost budget’ to transform our business,” concedes IT Director Bernard Jupe. “Other potential suppliers wanted that much money simply for a ‘discovery phase’.”

The partnership quickly developed into a close relationship, explains Mary Hooft, director of Salesforce Lifecycle at SES Networks. “They made us look at what our capabilities were and said ‘you know what: Actually you can do it even better’.”

The two firms worked “as a team” throughout 2017 to customise the Salesforce system. Not only was it possible to quote, contract and invoice increasingly complex, tailored services for a more diverse range of customers. It also drove major improvements in internal efficiency for SES Networks.

“At the risk of sounding like a cliché,” she says, “we have achieved in ten months what some companies don’t get to do in three or four years.

It’s been incredible. It really has. makepositive was constantly helping us find better ways to modify our business.”

The success of makepositive in the Salesforce Partner Innovation Awards came as no surprise to Hooft.

“We’d give them 100 awards if we could,” she says, “because that’s what they deserve!”

Do you have an award-winning story to tell? Send your submission to editorial@sfmediapartners.com

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Salesforce acquires Datorama for $880 mil

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RARELY IS THERE A PERIOD WITHOUT A MERGER OR ACQUISITION IN THIS TRAILBLAZING ECOSYSTEM AND THIS QUARTER WAS NO DIFFERENT. HERE’S TWO THAT CAUGHT OUR EYE! What Salesforce had to say: Exciting news! Salesforce has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Datorama, the leading cloud-based, AI-powered marketing intelligence and analytics platform for enterprises, agencies and publishers. Salesforce is excited to welcome Datorama’s incredible team to the Salesforce family.

Salesforce’s acquisition of Datorama will enhance the power of Marketing Cloud with expanded data integration and intelligence, enabling marketers to unlock insights across all of their marketing channels and data sources. With one unified view of data and insights, companies can make smarter decisions across the entire customer journey and optimize engagement at scale.

Datorama customers will be able to leverage the power of the world’s #1 CRM to take action on data and insights, delivering smarter engagement across the entire customer journey.

Source: Salesforce.com newsroom

What Datorama had to say: This is great news for Datorama and Salesforce customers, as well as marketers everywhere.

Datorama will enhance the power of Salesforce Marketing Cloud with expanded data integration, intelligence and analytics, enabling marketers to unlock insights across all of their marketing channels and data sources.

Datorama enables more than 3,000 leading global agencies and brands–including PepsiCo, Ticketmaster, Trivago, Unilever, Pernod Ricard and Foursquare–to optimize marketing campaigns, automate reporting and make data-driven decisions faster.

Datorama is also the standard for marketing intelligence within agencies. Customers like Havas Media Group leverage Datorama to drive greater strategic value from their data across all clients. “Datorama helps us create at scale for our

clients, one unified view of their spend, campaign performance and impact across all brands, markets and technologies. Datorama is a key element to streamlining our operational activities around data ingestion and reporting, so our teams can spend less time building reports and dealing with data preparation, and spend more time analyzing information and recommending value driving decisions to our clients. We are excited about an even brighter future together with Datorama and Salesforce to support our strategic relationships with our clients,” said Sylvain Le Borgne, EVP

Global Head of Technology at Havas Group Media.

Ran Sarig, Datorama CEO and Co-Founder

What we Say: We like! This is once again an impressive move to strengthen the Marketing Cloud offering and in line with the AI analytics for marketing approach that has seen Datorama’s current customers enjoy great success. Salesforce will also strengthen its position its against competitor offerings, most notably Oracle and Adobe.

Docusign Acquires CMSpring for$220mil What Docusign said With the addition of SpringCM’s capabilities in document generation, redlining, advanced document management, and end-to-end agreement workflow, the deal fur ther accelerates DocuSign’s broadening of its solution beyond e-signature to the rest of the agreement process—from preparing to sign, acting-on, and managing agreements.

“DocuSign pioneered the e-signature category, and has built a strong SaaS business around that capability. We’ve also started to offer solutions that connect and automate the entire agreement lifecycle,” said Dan Springer, CEO of DocuSign. “We’ve done this with SpringCM as a partner across hundreds of joint commercial and enterprise customers. And we have many more DocuSign customers asking us to provide these capabilities natively as part of our platform.

That’s why we believe today’s announcement makes such great business sense.”

“SpringCM shares DocuSign’s passion for transforming and automating the foundation of doing business—the agreement process,” said Dan Dal Degan, CEO of SpringCM. “That’s what we’ve been focused on since inception,

and it’s why we power the contract lifecycle management processes for more than 600 of the world’s leading companies—including ADP, Aetna, Facebook, Hilton, Lenovo, Spotify, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. By joining forces with the market leader, we can continue to simplify and accelerate the process of doing business, and drive innovation both before and after agreements have been DocuSigned.”

Under the terms of the agreement, DocuSign will acquire SpringCM for approximately $220 million in cash. Subject to customary closing conditions, including U.S. regulatory approval, the acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter of DocuSign’s fiscal year.

What We Say: We like!

This space is hotting up and this acquisition really does make business sense! Docusign and SpringCM can be seen shoulder to shoulder in many deals and customers like that synergy.

Do you write for tech media? Contact our editorial team who will be happy to receive your releases. Email: editorial@sfmediapartners.com

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director to be twice as creative every 18 months?

Creating the agency of the future One of the challenges every company faces is how to be different.

How to be better.

Guest author John M Baker, Global CMO Mirum gives his opinion as to the force within Salesforce when it is embedded at the core of the business

For marketing agencies, this is doubly difficult. Our biggest asset is our people, and while we invest heavily in culture, people routinely move between agencies. They move because they can be productive quickly, and they can be productive because despite all of the branding we put on our methodologies, what we do and how we do it is pretty commoditized.

And no one wants to be competing as a commodity.

We also have the challenge of client expectations. Moore’s Law has set the bar high. Every business is under pressure to make its product twice as good every 18 months, and to sell it at the same price.

Can we really expect our creative

The answer is obviously no, but the systems they use can. The tools we create to support the teams and to manage clients can improve year over year. It is the tools we adopt that will make us the agency of the future.

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It is why most of our competitors have implemented Salesforce. A team that knows its client well, and has the client’s trust, does the best work.

• SALESFORCE AS A FOUNDATION Knowing your client’s business -- key contacts, reporting relationships, tech and agency partners, history of work completed, background on pricing, knowledge of what worked – builds trust. Being organized and having easy access to information helps delivery.

But again, most of our competitors are using Salesforce to drive CRM so we can’t assume “implementing Salesforce” will be the answer.

Salesforce is the foundation.

To be different and be better we have to drive adoption and to be creative in finding better ways of using it.

The real opportunity is to stop thinking of these systems as a background play focused on cost saving and efficiency, and instead put them center stage by creating new revenue services and dramatically different service models.

This is business transformation.

IMPLEMENTATION TIPS How do you get there? There is no single answer, but there are some lessons we can share.

• Integration – Salesforce’s biggest strength is how open

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it is to integration with other systems. It is also how it becomes the “system of record” and “single source of truth” because updates anywhere in the platform are synchronized.

App Store – The application stores that swept the industry are not getting as much attention now, but there is real value there. If there is a business need you want to address, there is likely an app for that.

Simplification – Because Salesforce is so customizable, it is easy to turn it into a Frankenstein of required fields and modal boxes. Think Apple.

Channel your inner Jony Ive. Simpler is better.

Adoption – When we cross the line and launch new functionality we hit send on our email and revel in that success, but it is only the beginning.

Routine doesn’t happen unless it is habit and habit takes a lot of marketing.

Marc Andreessen famously said “software is eating the world” back in 2010. There is no need to fight it, embrace it. Your tools can be as innovative and creative as you are if you treat them right. And nothing brings you into the future like technology.

John M. Baker Global CMO, Mirum Happy Team

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Excitement and growth for the value of integration

By Simon Peel - Chief Strategy Officer at Jitterbit

When a large deal — like Salesforce acquiring MuleSoft — occurs, it often signals a market shift.

And when the goal of the acquisition is to accelerate digital transformation through access to data across nearly any system, all modern organizations need to pay attention.

Congratulations to both Salesforce and MuleSoft on a $6.5 billion acquisition and 54% growth for the Salesforce Platform business in the quarter following the acquisition news. This shines a bright light on the gamechanging value of connecting systems, helping companies to tap into new ecosystems and new revenue sources.

The acquisition has prompted industry watchers to take a closer look at the different ways organizations can approach integration, as the nature of the problems they need to solve has shifted over time.

Companies have many types of integration projects they need to address, but they fall into two broad categories: large backend infrastructure modernization projects, and day-to-day projects spawned by an everchanging tapestry of apps and data that companies need to quickly orchestrate to drive agility. For larger enterprise sized projects where in-house integration developers are available, Mulesoft is an ideal solution.

Essentially, it acts as a common connectivity hub for all enterprise IT and enterprise-wide projects involving larger systems require this style of integration.

For companies with minimal to no in-house integration developers available … and

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from developers all the way to employees with no coding expertise — so-called “citizen integrators” — want to tailor connections across these cloud apps and the systems with which they interact, without having to burden their core IT staff with every request.

Enter the cloud-based API Integration Platform from Jitterbit - allowing anyone from developers to non-technical “citizen integrators” to rapidly connect SaaS, onpremise and cloud applications and instantly infuse Artificial Intelligence into any business process. Additionally, Jitterbit’s intuitive API creation technology enables companies to reuse data from existing business-critical applications by connecting on-premise applications with multiple SaaS apps and data sources to bring new offerings to market in days, not months.

Combining the power of more traditional integration solutions (where available) with Jitterbit’s nimble, rapid integration platform best suited for driving business agility, brings about a new era where developers and citizen integrators collectively serve as a powerful force in today’s modern enterprise.

projects requiring a quick 30-60 day go-live, a complementary approach has emerged.

This new approach, pioneered by Jitterbit, has been driven by the explosion of cloudbased applications: more than 150,000 apps exist today — a number that represents 30x growth in the past two years alone. Users

In short, the MuleSoft acquisition represents an exciting development for the industry. The future of innovation and digital transformation looks bright thanks to a renewed emphasis on integration.

Learn more about Jitterbit at Dreamforce GIGA Sponsor of the Trailhead Zone

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Ram Tracking Q&A:

An indepth Q and A with an established leading logistics company operating almost entirely on the Salesforce platform

What’s your job title?

Scott: I’m now the Operations Director having been fortunate enough to have been promoted from within. One of the company’s key principles is to nurture skillsets internally and the majority of our current management team are evidence of this strategy working. It is Scott Cheswick, great to see the ambition this ethos generates.

Operations Director at RAM Tracking with Q What are your specific areas of responsibility for responsibility? the implementation and roll out of Scott: My focus is primarily on the UK & Salesforce across the CA internal operations of the company and organisation. ensuring we’re as efficiently optimised as possible in all areas. From marketing to sales, accounts, support, renewals and development my role is truly varied and I’m privileged to have a helicopter view of the whole. It’s from that view point that we are able to string a thread through the whole of our processes from beginning to end and breakdown departmental walls with the aid of Salesforce.com.

Q How long have you been with the company?

Scott: I have been with RAM for 7 years.

Q Ram Tracking …. who is Ram Tracking and what do you do?

Scott: RAM Tracking (or Remote Asset Management) are a leading supplier of fleet management technologies in the UK & Canada.

RAM provides solutions for fleet managers and business owners, which are designed to cater to all aspects of running a commercial fleet of vehicles, large or small.

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Our cloud-based product offering includes:

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RAM Tracking: A Feature rich GPS vehicle monitoring platform with reporting & event-based alerts.

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RAM Live: A Connected live-streaming dashcam platform with driving style and impact alerts.

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RAM Fleet Assist: Driver and Fleet Manager productivity based mobile apps.

Each of our products are built to support businesses within all industries. We support our customers with tools designed to help increase staff productivity and improve customer service whilst adhering to industry compliance and reducing operational costs.

Q Am I right in saying that the company started in the UK? Why the extension into Canada of all places … it seems diametrically different to the UK in terms of its geography, driving experiences etc Scott: The company started in the UK. Shortly after which our directors and CEO at the time began to look for opportunities to geo-clone the offering in other territories. North America had been selected due to a few key distinguishing factors for a successful venture, namely language, market penetration potential and time zones. The successful Geo-Cloning from the UK to Canada has allowed RAM to broaden the company’s reach and establish the brand as one of Canada’s leading suppliers in our field.

Q How big is the company?

Scott: RAM has experienced significant

ARE YOU PREPARED TO BE INTERROGATED

BY OUR REPORTERS? If so, drop us a line. Tell us what makes you unique and why others in the Salesforce partner ecosystem should learn from you.

Email: editorial@ sfmediapartners. com P.S We don’t really interrogate you

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products are fluid and adaptive in this way.

The higher proportion of our customer base would be SME with a typical fleet size being in the 8-15 vehicles range. However, we do have a substantial percentage of customers with fleet sizes of 50+.

Take us back to the beginning … what was your core offering when you first set up in Canada and how has it developed from there?

Scott: ɐɐ The product offered in Canada has always been a direct replica to that of the UK’s. Being a cloud based solution, we simply dedicated server resource to a Canadian version and set up designated sales and support channels out of Ontario. Taking direction and a proven successful model from the UK, the Canadian operation was highly productive in the first QTR. ɐɐ We initially started with a team of 4, and now employ over 30 staff to run the Canadian operation.

growth in recent years. Our headcount now exceeds 100 members of staff. As a result, we have recently relocated both our UK and Canadian operations into larger offices to accommodate our current and future growth. In terms of customer base, we currently supply over 9000 customers in to the UK and Canada and have over 60,000 vehicles equipped with our GPS tracking solution.

Q What are your USP’s?

Scott: Our differentiator is around product usability and customer adoption.

We aim to create disruptive and powerful business tools which leverage the very latest in industry technologies whilst ensuring at all times that our customers are fully enabled to utilise our product’s capabilities from day one. We actually allow our customer base to dictate which items are prioritised on our product development roadmap. This approach ensures we always

supply a demand and not the other way around. We expect our customers to hit the ground running with our solutions. This can be said not just for our product user interfaces but also our self-service portal and communication channels with RAM. As a result our service levels, support and customer engagement strategy have led to RAM achieving a gold standard customer satisfaction award for three consecutive years in both the UK and Canada.

Q Your website refers to some significant brands … can you define your target market please?

Scott: We’re fortunate enough to have attracted a variety of household named companies. Due to our product lending itself so well to the both larger enterprises and SME’s.

Its great to offer a solution that produces significant results regardless of company size and it is important to us that our

Assuming you have similar skill requirements in Canada as in the UK, but are there any variances in the technologies you employ to run the business

Scott: Prior to opening our Canadian operation, RAM UK had already fully implemented Salesforce.com. As we had already built our entire UK marketing channels, sales process, customer onboarding and customer support workflows on Salesforce, to begin in operations in CA was somewhat seamless.

As Salesforce allows us to monitor each step of all Canadian processes and activity in detail, we had complete visibility from day one. Without Salesforce and the ability to keep our finger on the pulse via the cloud, we wouldn’t have carried the risk of replicating our business model overseas. Salesforce.com’s ability to deploy and sustain operation rigor in this scenario was invaluable.

Specifically referring to Salesforce now, what was your starting point with Sales force and why?

Scott: Prior to Salesforce.com being

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implemented, RAM tracking relied on various stand-alone software applications which performed very distinct departmental roles with no clear internal connectivity or department integrations. Our CEO made the decision to roll out Salesforce.com as a sales solution initially, then department by department we began a hard roll-out to become a fully automated, organic and connected company. Productivity, profitability and customer satisfaction results increased significantly in direct correlation to our full salesforce integration. We made Salesforce the only way to work and removed access to outdated legacy systems.

2 0 1 8 such moves, however Salesforce had already had that covered. We were able to download and upload our existing data then configure Salesforce’s processes around our existing workflow to minimise if not eradicate any such downtime.

c. Product knowledge

If you were to start again, would you invest in the same Salesforce products and in the same order of roll out or with the benefit of hindsight, would you implement Salesforce differently?

Scott: Salesforce recommended us to a local Salesforce implementation partner once we’d made the decision to go ahead. Nimbus Point Consulting were ideal for us as we didn’t want to go for a turnkey implementation, but rather learn and understand the structure of Salesforce and how we could become independent with our own configurations in time. Both Nimbus Point and Salesforce were able to deliver on this request and provided onsite training, walkthroughs and colleague engagement workshops during and after implementation.

Scott: I’d say with confidence our approach

d. Aftercare

with a soft role out initially and growing outwards was the best strategy in terms of staff adoption.

During this process we were able to understand, learn and grow confident in deploying into other areas of the business. Salesforce boast an extremely user-friendly & customisable configuration features, which empowers the user to learn quickly and get creative! As a result, we now have a fulltime onsite Salesforce team who are responsible for new developments & configurations on the platform to support the wider business.

Scott: Our account manager was on hand to pick up any queries and liase with the support team on our behalf. Turnaround time on bespoke requests was extremely efficient. We then opted to utile salesforce’s premier support package for the first 12months in term. The support team are knowledgeable, attentive and patience with new users who are finding their feet with the new platform.

I’m assuming you have utilised different SI’s over the years, how would you describe your experiences:

a. Selecting an SI : Scott: Our CEO landed on Salesforce following other demonstrations of various CRM’s. Since our initial conversations with Salesforce, we are still in touch to this day with the initial account manager who consulted us on the platform.

This is a testament to the service principles Salesforce adopt.

b. Briefings Scott: Moving a full sales function onto one platform sounded somewhat of a daunting task. But during our consultations on how Salesforce could easily merge and replace our existing workflows, we soon gained the confidence we needed to make the switch. We had initial concerns around the potential impact on productivity that seemed to be inherent with

e. Any other observations?

Scott: I’ve found many user groups and Q&A’s on the web during my time as an admin for our Salesforce instance. Because Salesforce has such a vast and growing community, finding answers to a question is always just a quick search away.

There’s an abundance of resource online that has assisted me and also sparked new ideas in recent years. And that’s the difference with Salesforce. Because its users create and build out around their businesses, no two Salesforce orgs are the same, and now and again I stumble across a gem of an idea that can be utilised effectivity in our business.

Running through the list of products you currently use to run the business; can you provide a short description of these and how they impact on your business?

Scott: ɐɐ One of Salesforce unique propositions is their App Exchange. The app exchange provides an array of business tools that are purpose built

on the Salesforce.com platform. So, if there’s a requirement in the business and we don’t have the resource to build out ourselves, we can find a solution on the App exchange.

To date, our key 3rd party applications which sit on our Salesforce instance include: Pardot : Email Marketing Automation Adobe EchoSign: Electronic Signature and agreement management solution New Voice Media: VOIP telephony integration form inbound and outbound calling Sage Live: Accounts & Payments Ledger Hoopla: Employee gamification and motivation Customer Built CPQ Native: (Quoting system and compensation management) i.MAP IT: Custom Build Visual Geo Location of Salesforce records Various integrations to our existing product apps and fleet management softwareMany more boutique apps for distinct tasks and internal operation efficiency.

And finally, having been using Salesforce for so long, no doubt you have amassed an incredible amount of data … can you elaborate on this and explain what value this is now having on the business?

Scott: As we are a Salesforce centric organisation, it means every data point in our business can be instantly reported on. Every step of the sales cycle can be monitored and finely tuned for optimal gain. Without Salesforce and the ability to instantly spin up a report on any metric we demand, we would previously have had to manually retract information from various excel documents and compile before producing a meaningful result. The ultimate power of Salesforce comes from our ability to measure and change on demand. We now have access to an abundance of data points as well as the tools we need to extrapolate that data into meaningful management information.

And finally …. each and every department and user in the company now work from various dashboards, which Salesforce populates in Realtime to allow every employee to know where they are and what’s next to do. The productivity this produces has provided a geometric uplift in our company’s growth since our initial Salesforce inception.

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In an interview with CNBC, Benioff spoke about Salesforce’s great first quarter results, which exceeded expectations. He told interviewer Jim Cramer that the company is “fast tracking” to a revenue run rate of $20billion (£14.9billion) - a target he hopes to hit by fiscal year 2022: “The economy is really ripping and you can see that customers are going through this massive digital transformation.” https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/29/salesforce-ceo-marc-benioff-toutsearnings-says-economy-is-ripping.html

It’s no secret that Benioff is a Hawaii enthusiast - in May it was reported that he had paid $7million (£5.2million) for a Hawaiian relic at an auction so it could be returned to a museum on the archipelago. He took to Twitter recently to thank his Salesforce Ohana (meaning ‘family’ in Hawaiian), using a screengrab from the film Lilo and Stitch: “Ohana means family, and family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten. Thank you to all of our Salesforce Ohana. We know that without you we would never be who we have become today. We are Ohana, We are one. We are so grateful. Mahalo A Nui Loa.”

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Three quotes from the CEO: Recently, Salesforce chief executive Benioff was named as a top CEO for diversity - not surprising, considering that Salesforce remains one of the best Big Tech companies for diversity. 35% of employees are ethnic minorities, while the 1-1-1 model means that equity, employee time and products are donated to non-profits in local communities. Here’s what the business leader said in response to his award:

https://twitter.com/Benioff/status/1004260941448429568

To promote World Oceans Day, Benioff and Bridgewater Associates founder Ray Dalio wrote an article for Wired called: ‘It’s Time for the Next Wave of Ocean Exploration and Protection’. The Salesforce CEO has been vocal about protecting our oceans and reducing plastic waste: “To us, the ocean is humanity’s most important and most under-examined treasure… We must embrace ocean exploration in the same way President Kennedy inspired the nation when he called for man to land on the moon. We’ve spent 65 years since that moonshot pledge looking up at the stars, while the oceans and all the wonders and creations they hold are sitting right at our feet, waiting to be discovered.” https://www.wired.com/story/forget-space-oceans-need-exploring/

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A QUICK LOOK AT THE TRANSFORMATIONAL IMPACT SALESFORCE IS HAVING IN THE TRANSPORT SECTOR

by Rex Langton

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These days you may not have a diary, if you do it is most likely a smart device!

Train travel has evolved in many ways beyond the significant engineering accomplishments and the transport industry has had to evolve too.

Once the trains are running on time, which is key to customer satisfaction, placing Customers, Employees, Partners & Technology (CEPT) at the heart of the operation is a route to deep understanding of the multiple relationship they have.

Here I’ll refer to two companies I have travelled with recently and highlight elements of CEPT. They are all amazing companies who are deeply customer-

systems previously used by its contact centre, with 80% of customer queries now handled through the solution.

Eventually all customer-facing staff, including business lounge hosts and train managers, will be able to view every customer detail from their iPads and other mobile devices. “Our customerfacing teams will be able to see if a passenger has experienced any disruption, and address any remaining concerns,” added Chris Shaw, Head of Customer Contact Strategy.

ɐɐ

at salesforce.com or even better go travelling with them!

Eurostar

Since deploying Service Cloud in 2014, Eurostar has been able to retire at least eight of the

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Oscar Wilde

subject matter experts, Shatpathy and his team were able to keep their focus on the mission instead of tasks more reflective of a technology company.

Make the customer experience the #1 priority.

about these trailblazing customers

As customer relationships develop, preferences can be added to the profiles, which helps the contact centre team sell additional services, such as hotel accommodation, car hire, and insurance. Taking a more centralised approach has already helped Eurostar reduce the length of some calls with its Frequent Travellers by 70%.

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“I never travel without my diary.

One should always have something sensational to read on the train.”

Amtrak serves over 85,000 passengers a day from 500 stations spread across 46 states, Washington, D.C., and three Canadian provinces.

They have the amazing Dome car too which I plan to experience soon! Here’s what they have to say:

and quotes. You can read more

Every customer interaction on the apps — and other channels — is captured in personal customer profiles in Service Cloud. “Our officebased staff already have a 360-degree view of the customer; we’re now extending this to our teams based at stations and on trains,” claims the company.

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Amtrak

centric and pull out some key messages

More than 10 million people cross the Channel every year on Eurostar trains. Connecting London with major tourist and business destinations in France and Belgium, Eurostar’s 27 high-speed trains offer a fast, convenient, and environmentally-friendly alternative to flying.

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Savoy, Shatpathy and the rest of the Amtrak team turned to the customer experience to guide their decision-making process.

Conversations started with questions like, “How do we enable a superior customer experience?” and ended with assessments like “We understand the customer holistically, giving us the context to better serve the customer base going forward.”

Develop an alliance between IT and line of business. ɐɐ

By starting with the business requirements resulting from customer-centric priorities, and then using IT expertise to solve them, Sovan and his team saw “the actual value of cloud technology as it impacts our workforce and our customers. We have had a frontline view of how it applies, helping Amtrak mitigate any future square peg, round hole conundrums”.

Leverage subject-matter experts — via inhouse and external partnerships. ɐɐ

“For us, if it’s a choice between spending more time to optimize our workforce and develop actual business value using technology – as opposed to maintaining technology itself –the choice is clear.

Cloud makes a great deal of sense for us.” By developing a repeatable set of core competencies, outlined by cloud

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Find a platform that meets key success criteria.

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“How can we make the life of the conductor, the engineer, the people who are in the train cars, easier? How can we give them all the tools and technology they need, within a handheld device, and make them more productive while they go about the business of running our trains, serving our customers, and taking people from one place to another? At a high level, driving Customer 360 view creating loyal Amtrak customers for life along with enabling workforce productivity for happy and productive employees is what inspires me the most. This is a unique opportunity to drive them both,” Shatpathy continued.

Don’t shy away from a co-exist strategy.

“We skipped reinventing some very old systems, and instead are building engagement layers on top of them. As a result, we are unlocking more value. This mix of the ‘old’ and the ‘new’ technology platforms, enables us to support employees who are steeped in legacy system knowledge as well as newer hires who tend to be more familiar with modern approaches.”

W hat vertical do you work in? We’d be keen to hear your examples how Salesforce has been transformational. Email: editor@ sfmediapartners.com

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The population is young and digitally savvy and several Middle Eastern countries are racing to become fintech hubs for Islamic banking.

Leading the Digital Revolution in the Middle East PwC Middle East acquired NSI two years ago … now they’re leading the digital revolution in the Middle East In the November of 2016, PwC announced that it had entered in to an agreement to acquire NSI DMCC, a technology-consulting firm headquartered in Dubai. With the acquisition, PwC Middle East enhanced its ability to offer digital transformation services, Customer Experience and CRM solutions, and Cloud, web and mobile applications.

Since its establishment in 2010, NSI had become an industry pioneer through assisting and accelerating organisations across the Middle East in their transition to cloud computing.

Offering experienced technology consultants, solution architects, and developers, NSI became Saleforce’s largest implementation partner in the Middle East region. The acquisition by PwC Middle East strengthened their ability to deliver a suite of cross-industry, cloud based front office solutions to their marketplace.

“We are thrilled to be joining forces with PwC in the Middle East,” said Ali Hosseini, then the NSI CEO, when acquisition was announced. “NSI’s deep technology skills coupled with PwC’s scale and experience allow us to expand on our footprint to become the uncontested market leaders and deliver a stronger and more comprehensive digital and business transformation offering to the Middle East marketplace.”

The enthusiasm was mirrored at PwC with Hani Ashkar, the Territory Senior Partner at PwC announcing: “We’re delighted to welcome NSI to PwC. Adding NSI means that we are now leaders in the important and growing customer experience market in the region… through this acquisition, we are now uniquely positioned to bridge the strategy to execution gap with innovative solutions that create measurable value for our clients, supported by our business transformation capabilities. PwC is one of the largest Salesforce partners globally and this acquisition will help further cement PwC as the leading Salesforce Partner for businesses in the region.”

Since the acquisition, PwC Middle East has worked to help their clients to determine where they are and where they want and need to be when it comes to digital services. With the whole region shifting towards digital, PwC has demonstrated their ability to help their clients exploit the potential of digital. Their successes in this area have been widely recognized by leading analyst firms, who named PwC one of the world’s leaders in digital transformation, digital strategy, digital operations, and customer and brand engagement consulting services.

According to the Centre for Public Impact, Saudi Arabia’s “National Transformation Program 2020”

The region, however, faces significant challenges as well with roughly 30% of 15 – 24 years olds unemployed, a significant digital gender gap, and more than a third of Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan’s populations comprised of displaced persons, the result of the tumultuous wars that have plagued the Middle East.

Many Middle Eastern governments, however, recognize the potential of the digital economy and the opportunities it presents for their populations, including but not limited to it’s ability to boost GDP by somewhere between 2 – 3%. It also provides opportunities to provide better education, financial inclusion, and healthcare.

With digital transformation ranking high on the agenda for Middle Eastern governments and regional business managers, PwC Middle East has prioritized enabling their customers’ transitions, helping them to strike a balance between the skills of their workforce and new technologies.

Recognizing that Middle Eastern counties have the capital and the will to invest in technology, PwC is helping their customers take the critical steps in to that space, while addressing the challenges specific to the region. One of the ways PwC is empowering its Middle Eastern clients is through the PwC Academy, which offers digital training courses for all levels of their clients’ staff.

“The digital revolution will be at the forefront of much of the change that the region is set to undergo,” said Mr Hosseini, now the PwC Chief Digital Officer and Partner, when discussing PwC’s investment in digital services in the Middle East.

“Major transformation programmes and projects, Expo 2020, the growing prominence of the travel and tourism sector, as well as global trends such as cybersecurity and smart government and business, all provide a backdrop from which the Middle East digital landscape can grow and thrive. That is why investing in digital is a top priority for PwC.”

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What The MVPs are saying What is your role in the Salesforce

the platform it was possible to have a deep knowledge of all of it - that is no longer the case.

I also experience Imposter Syndrome and in more recent years anxiety. Like most, I try not to show this but it is something I am regulating and working on. Physical and Mental health is really important and the latter in particular we do not spend enough time talking about.

Kerry Townsend MVP

What’s the best thing about being an MVP?

What is your role in the Salesforce community? ?

The best thing is getting to know more of the other MVPs who are interesting and inspiring people.

Within the Salesforce community, I am most active with the community conferences. I am a co-organiser of London’s Calling and Surf Force, both of which I have been involved with for the last 3 years. I am also a co-leader of the London Marketing Cloud user group.

One thing I have used every day since I got it is a really nice water bottle…

Inspired by my involvement with Surf Force, I am trying to reduce my use of single use plastic. This bottle is really practical and looks great - I love it.

What events are you currently getting involved in?

I try to regularly attend the London Admin and Developer groups to stay connected with friends in the London community. Where I can, I also attend other community events. I know how much work goes into setting these up and wondering if people will show up! Last year I set a goal to attend as many of these as possible. They are all different so I encourage everyone to go to one when they can.

One recent event that really stands out for me was Surf force, at Newquay, UK. You can find it at @surfforce What is the biggest challenge you’ve had to face?

There are certainly a few and I don’t think I am alone. One is keeping up to date with all the changes that happen with Salesforce. When I started with

What’s on your bucket list for the future?

This is so long I don’t know where to start! I have lots of ideas but as with everyone, limited time. I love dancing so hopefully a place in the Partner Strictly…

I would like to blog more regularly - I find written communication harder than verbal and would like to work on expressing myself more clearly on paper. More recently, I have been exploring performance poetry which I think is very powerful.

I would like to continue speaking and facilitating the sharing of ideas at events. Maybe one day have an idea worth sharing...

From a Salesforce point of view, I am going to round out my knowledge by pursuing the architect exams. I think it is great to have that structure to be able to identify knowledge gaps and fill them.

Daniel Peter MVP Can you tell me about your role in the Salesforce community and how you came to be an MVP? I have been leading the Bay Area Salesforce Developer Group for two and a half years, and prior to that started a group in the North Bay. I’ve been a big fan of Salesforce since 2009 and I enjoy sharing my solutions to the neverending challenges you run into when pushing the platform to its limits. I’ve done articles, podcasts, and presented at events around the world to share ideas with the community. I’m active on Twitter and love to share information with the community there as well.

What’s it like working in San Francisco?

It’s the center of the Salesforce Universe! SF and the entire Bay area is a great place to be if you are in the Salesforce ecosystem.

Other locations have their own benefits, but there is no substitute for being where the action is. Of course it is expensive and the traffic is bad, but it still nets out to be what I think is the best location to further your Salesforce career.

very few at the top. I’m only one person, so I don’t scale very good!

What’s the best thing about being an MVP? Everything that got me to be an MVP is by far the best thing about being an MVP. It’s not the MVP title, it is the privilege I’ve had to give back, learn, and meet new people. MVP is a small award on top of this, but the process of getting it and continuing these activities is the best thing. And anyone can do it! Receiving the MVP award is an amazing recognition, but only represents a small percentage of the value of being involved in the Salesforce Community.

What’s on your bucket list for the future?

What is the biggest challenge you’ve had to face?

Start a company and change the world!

Taking on too many things. There are so many great opportunities, I have to get better about saying no to the ones that aren’t the

Are you an MVP? Talk to us .... we’d like our readers to get to know you too! Email: editorial@ sfmediapartners.com

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Salesforce Announces Record Q2 2019 Results SALESFORCE IS ON TRACK TO MAKE ITS GOAL OF $23 BILLION IN REVENUE BY FY22

their position as the leader in the CRM space.

“Salesforce revenue grew 27% to almost $3.3 billion in the second quarter, with excellent performance across our clouds, industry segments and geographies,” explained Keith Block, Salesforce’s co-CEO, when discussing the subject of the Q2 results. Shifting his gaze to what he clearly views as a bright future ahead, he went on to state that “With this strong quarter, we’re well on our way to our next milestone of $23 billion in revenue in FY22.”

Despite it’s maturity, Salesforce’s ‘Sales Cloud’, a tool responsible for managing customer relationships, delivered more than $1 Billion in revenue, a Year on Year growth of almost 13%.

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alesforce exceeded expectations again this quarter, reporting even better-than-expected Q2 Revenue for the 2019 Fiscal Year. Though they’ve managed to exceed analysts’ expectations in terms of both Revenue and Earnings, it was not quite enough to offset the share price impact of a softening of their Q3 guidance.

A rising demand for cloud solutions and a growing customer base, however, will likely continue to drive Salesforce’s growth for coming quarters.

Salesforce posted $3.28 billion, an increase of 27% year-over-year, and 27% in constant currency, compared with analysts expectations of $3.23 billion.

Subscription and support revenues were $3.06 billion, an increase of 28% year-overyear, and professional services and other

revenues were $221 million, an increase of 14% year-over year.

In addition, Salesforce reported, its second quarter GAAP diluted earnings per share was $0.39, and non-GAAP diluted earnings per share was $0.71.

Cash generated from operations for the second quarter came in at $458 million, an increase of 38% year-over-year. Total cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities ended the second quarter at $3.43 billion.

The company’s focus on partnerships and acquisitions has the potential to effect their bottom-line in the short term, but in the longer term it should enable the company to hit its lofty target of reaching $20 billion in sales in the longer term and cementing

What has been particularly exciting for Salesforce, however, has been the strong performance of it’s ‘Platform and Other’ category. This area led the charge, posting an impressive 54% Year on Year growth figure.

This impressive growth in a newer category supports Salesforce’s vision for providing the leading platform for customer success.

“Salesforce’s vision and position as the #1 sales, service, marketing and CRM platform is enabling our customers to stay ahead and thrive in this Fourth Industrial Revolution,” said Marc Benioff, chairman and co-CEO, Salesforce. “We are guided by our values as we ensure our technology drives our customers’ success and improves the state of the world.”

Despite a 4% fall in the Salesforce share price due to soft Q3 guidance, Salesforce Stock is up 51% for the year and with customer preferences shifting to cloud-based products, it is likely the company’s revenue will strongly increase across both their products and geographies.

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A view from down under: INSIGHT INTO THE CHALLENGES FACING FULLCRM A FAST GROWING SI IN AUSTRALIA

It’s clear to us, the Salesforce ecosystem is alive and thriving in Australia. Not only with International Data Corporation predicting it to add US$29 billion to Australian gross domestic product by 2022, but because of the successes and networks we have forged as a Salesforce solutions integrator.

W h i l e s o m e t h i n g s h av e c h a n g e d significantly in our 20 years of implementing customer relationship management solutions, many of the challenges remain the same for Australian businesses.

Team FullCRM

only a few who have a lot of travelling and multiple specialties to deal with.

For businesses providing onsite service, managing the logistics of getting people and parts to regional or even remote areas to meet service level agreements often relies on local sub-contractors who also work for numerous companies, including competitors.

With our unique and vast geography, we find clients have to compromise on many things including how to manage sales territories.

This is especially relevant when According to the t h e i r p e o p l e Australian Innovations s p e c i a l i z e i n System Report 2017, p r o d u c t s o r companies with services.

Fo u r y e a r s a g o , Fu l l C R M s t a r t e d implementing Salesforce platform only solutions, which coincided with Salesforce’s ‘mobile first’ approach. In the subsequent years, mobile internet use began to outstrip desktop and the perfect storm of Salesforce’s superior mobile capability, everyone using smart phones, and the ever-increasing mobile coverage of our vast brown land came to a head.

The eastern seaboard of Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne is usually fine but with a third of the population living in regional areas the rest of the country is often covered by

A user’s ability to use technology was no longer an issue and disparate teams had the advantage of being completely up to date, collaborating remotely … and management had reports and dashboards instantly, where previously they would take days to compile.

persistent innovation generate four times the employment growth...

Our land is large but our population is small.

For us, as partners, the art is in having a team of solution consultants who can understand our clients’ complex requirements, design simple to use solutions on all devices and provide intelligent information for everyone in the business to make great decisions.

Moving forward, it will be about helping our clients innovate to stay ahead of the curve. The more a business innovates, the more it grows. In fact, according to the Australian Innovations System Report 2017 , companies with persistent innovation generate four times the employment growth and five times the sales growth of regular innovators.

This also applies to us as partners, and being able to operate with agility while continuing to deliver transforming solutions and managing strategic partnerships within the ecosystem will be our keys to success.

SF Society wants to here from you. Tell us what it’s like to be a Salesforce partner in these extraordinary times. Email: editorial@sfmediapartners.com

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Sports Traider SPORTS TRAIDER IS THE CHARITY CHOSEN AS THE BENEFICIARY FOR THE UK’S VERSION OF #PARTNERBOXING. FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THE CHARITY AND IT’S FOUNDER, DR LANCE HAGGITH

Sports Traider has established the first chain of charity retail shops in the UK that specialise in sports kit and equipment. The aim is to make clothing and sport equipment affordable to all, and at the same time generate a sustainable source of funding to help disadvantaged young people participate in sport.

We channel all the money we raise back into grass-roots sport within the community area from which it was donated. We encourage kids to try new sports and help talented sporting youngsters excel. For example, by organising community sport coaching sessions, access to sporting facilities, helping with club fees or transportation, getting talented but disadvantaged athletes to training and events. We firmly

believe that community sport is an essential part of society and should be available for all, and never an inaccessible luxury.

Not all kids have soccer mums and dads. Some families don’t have the time, the money or sometimes – sadly – the commitment to support their children to take part in sport. Take a teenager we know in Bedford. Let’s call him Joe. His mother died a few years ago, and his father can’t cope.

He’s a talented athlete, selected to train at national level, but he often turned up to training with ripped clothes and broken equipment – if he turned up at all. For Joe to make training and attend fixtures on a regular basis, he needed support as well as money, and kids like Joe just

can’t manage it without assistance.

That’s where we came in.

Sports Traider helped Joe and hundreds of kids like him to enjoy sport, get the kit they needed and receive the support to excel; young people like the ones in your community.

We believe this will create a virtuous circle transforming community sport: the children who get opportunities and coaching now are likely to become the coaches and enthusiasts of the future.

For us, sporting competition should be about talent, not about access to opportunity.

That’s why our goal is about creating a level playing field for all.

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MEET THE FOUNDER LANCE HAGGITH

‘Lance’s background in the sports branding industry means that he has first-hand experience of the wastage that sports companies dispose of every year.

Sports Traider Charity provides a series of volunteering opportunities for people in the community, which we firmly believe benefits the volunteers as much as the people they work to support. Volunteers, managed by part time, paid team leaders, give their time working in our outlets as sales staff; they work in warehousing, transport and distribution; with fundraising, governance and finance, marketing and publicity; and with end users e.g. coaching in a number of different sports. All of the opportunities we provide help people at different points in their lives. Volunteering helps improve skills, confidence and self-esteem, reduces loneliness and isolation, improves mental and physical health and wellbeing.

Friendships are forged, with many of our volunteers realising new opportunities to move on to education, employment and/or training.

Where a retail outlet is trading successfully the profits are pumped back into the local community. The store acts as a catalyst in support of local sports clubs and the voluntary sector; a place where we can help build community capacity e.g. through youth diversionary schemes reducing crime and antisocial behaviour; offering alternatives to the gang culture; helping single parents increase participation levels; providing opportunity for NEET young people; offering disabled people greater chances to participate by providing specialist equipment. The more funds we can secure to cover costs, the greater assistance we can give to those in need.

SF Society wants to hear about more charities, worthy causes or just great initiatives you have supported. Get in touch now so we can help share the message. Email: editorial@sfmediapartners.com

This culminated in him establishing Britain’s first sports charity shop, the first opened in Bedford, closely followed by others in deprived areas of the country.

Lance’s tireless pursuit of funding and publicity for his charity has given him the opportunity and privilege of working with and meeting many influential and generous people in the world of commerce, sport and entertainment. Without the help and support of these folk the charity would not be as successful as it is today. But it is the generous support of community groups and the general public that gives the charity its purpose and meaning. For this, Lance is truly grateful.’

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T TA L K I N G P O I N T S : I N T R O D U C I N G T H E C I R C U L A R E C O N O M Y

As stated on Ellen MacArthur’s Foundation Website, one of the pioneers of contemporary interest in circular thinking:

Where do you fit within the circular economy?

Looking beyond the current “take, make and dispose” extractive industrial model, the circular economy is restorative and regenerative by design. Relying on systemwide innovation, it aims to redefine products and services to design waste out, while minimising negative impacts.

John Lever University of Huddersfield Business School

IN RECENT YEARS, THE ‘CIRCULAR ECONOMY’ HAS EMERGED AS A WAY OF THINKING ABOUT MOVING TOWARDS AND BEYOND SUSTAINABILITY. ALONGSIDE THE RISE OF NEW VALUES AND TECHNOLOGIES, CIRCULAR ECONOMIC THINKING IS CLOSELY ALIGNED WITH IDEAS ABOUT REDUCING AND REUSING SCARCE RESOURCES. Posed as an alternative to the traditional linear economic model that emerged during the industrial revolution – and which uses vast quantities of scarce resources to make, use and dispose of products as waste – a circular economy aims to keep products and resources in use for as long as possible before recovering and regenerating products and materials.

PIONEERS Circular economic thinking was evident during the Second World War, when circular production and design principles were imposed on manufacturing companies by local governments to address concerns about the UK running short of scarce recourses during the war effort. Today, people are onceagain worried about the scarcity of resources, and governments are once again promoting circular thinking as a way of changing and

sustaining production across all economic sectors to address a range of increasing environmental problems (Lever et al 2018).

Excerpt from Salesforce Global Environmental Policy: Vision Excerpt from Salesforce Global “At Salesforce, we believeVision the business Environmental Policy: of business is to improve the state of the world, and we work to make sure our company is a platform for change for all our stakeholders — including our employees, customers,partners, communities, and the environment.

Through our global commitments and the policies set forth here, we’ve set high levels of environmental standards for our business and will continue to look for opportunities to innovate and lead in environmental stewardship, creating a low-carbon future.”

A circular economic model aims to create a ‘closed-loop’ system that keeps resources in play for as long as possible. While the only true closed loop system may be the planet itself, the concept provides a useful way of assessing movement towards sustainability.

Loops can be closed by recovery, re-use or by recycling products, ingredients and materials that would otherwise be wasted.

DESIGN Innovation and design thus lie at the heart of circular thinking. But the circular economy is not just about designing products that can be returned, disassembled and recycled; it’s about making a product that has a positive impact on the environment and human health from the start of the design and production process. As Michael Braungart and William McDonough state in their recent book The Upcycle (2013): Human beings don’t have a pollution problem; they have a design problem. If humans were to devise products, tools, furniture, homes, factories, and cities more intelligently from the start, they wouldn’t even need to think in terms of waste, or contamination, or scarcity.

Good design would allow for abundance, endless reuse, and pleasure.

Making a profit is a central goal of companies in the linear economy. Yet in failing to embrace sustainability, ‘business as usual’ scenarios ignore the ‘value’ of capturing social and environmental benefits and the new business opportunities this may present. While linear thinking illustrates the limits of the current ‘take-make-dispose’ system, and the risks this approach poses to economic growth and sustainability, circular thinking provides a way of rethinking systems to generate new value and bring about much needed social and environmental change.

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Interface

INTERFACE, THE LARGEST GLOBAL MANUFACTURER OF COMMERCIAL MODULAR CARPET TILES, IS WIDELY SEEN AS A SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS PIONEER. In recent decades, the company has moved away from a traditional linear model of carpet production towards a business model focused on circular principles and closed loop business operations.

RENEWABLE After twenty years of “business as usual”, in 1994 Interface founder Ray Anderson decided to take the company in a direction that would enhance sustainability by creating additional economic, social and environment value. Through Mission Zero®, Interface set out to eliminate all the negative impacts the company had on the

environment by 2020. To achieve its goal, they set out to radically redesign the company, its products and the way it they business. A central element of their approach was a sustainability strategy that pursued a circular economy model in which the company was viewed a self-contained ecosystem with closed technological and biological cycles.

ECOSYSTEM Using lessons from nature, Interface developed business practices based on the fundamentals of nature, which included recycling and reusing materials, renewable energy use, and waste elimination. Working with Gecko, Interface began eliminating the toxic glues used in carpet installation with adhesive stickers. This made installation quicker and easier, the tiles more durable and replacement and recycling quicker, thus reducing waste and costs overall. Interface also worked with a number of partners (Net-

Works, The Zoological Society and Aquafil, an Italian yarn supplier) to reduce the number of fishing nets discarded in the ocean by providing an opportunity to recycle the nets into yarn for carpet tiles.

On top of these innovations, Interface aims to create value for everyone in the wider ecosystem, nurturing employees, users and partners to bring natural processes into the built environment.

Circular economic thinking lies at the heart of everything Interface does and the business model provides a clear pathway towards a social, environmental and sustainable economic future.

To join the debate, email:info@sfmediapartners. com and share your views with us. To find out more about the Circular Economy or download case studies, go to: https://www. ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/circular-economy

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2 0 1 8 � Lifetime learners: more learners are studying over longer lifetimes which is resulting in an extended exposure to their teaching institutions thereby providing new and additional recurring engagement (income) opportunities. � Alumni development: a growing trend for UK institutions to follow the USA lead in engaging and thereby extracting more value from their alumni. Examples include, but are not restricted to; course sponsorships, guest lectures and workshops, scholarships and jointventures.

Salesforce.org Higher Ed Summit started as a small Salesforce user conference six years ago and has grown into the innovation event of the year for global higher education trailblazers. In March, nearly 2,000 attendees from colleges, universities and business schools, across the world came together in Washington D.C. to learn, share, network, have fun, and be inspired. Building on this momentum, Salesforce is bringing a regional Summit to EMEA.

The New 3r’s of Education Nadio Granata-MCIM, FHEA, PGCE, AIRP The following is an excerpt from the recent paper delivered by Nadio Granata at the Connected Campus Conference, Birmingham UK. The UK landscape “It’s been a bad year for universities” … BBC News, “Everyone who wants to change the world should have the tools and technology to do so” (www. salesforce.org).

inappropriate student behaviour and/or attendance. Issues around student rights as a paying consumer. � the geo-demographic variances of retention rates across the UK. Historically high levels of circa 19% at London Metropolitan University down to circa 1% at Cambridge, Durham and Bath with a propensity for higher drop out amongst ‘disadvantaged’ students. � the different student experiences from the perspective of local versus regional versus European versus International students highlighting the challenges faced with maintaining high engagement rates especially amongst full-time local undergraduates. Issues around attendance rates associated with students living at home versus overseas students with a tendency to seek a higher ROI through greater access of resources BUT within shorter term times due to preferences to revise at home and avoid peaks in international travel costs.

Introducing the New 3 R’s of Education: Recruitment, Retention and Recurrence In the context of modern teaching methods, changing student behaviour and increasing employer demands, the following challenges have been identified: •

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Recruitment: � the challenges faced by course leaders to recruit to mid-table institutions situated in provincial locations outside of London.

Marketing focus placed on student testimonials, employer engagement ratings and teaching quality � the challenges of launching a new suit of (business) courses in an entirely new marketplace. Marketing focus placed on delivery by UK resident staff and opportunity to engage with a celebrity chancellor (Sir Patrick Stewart) Retention: � the specific challenges faced by the individual educator is dependent on job role and KPI’s. For example - a subject leader is less likely to be concerned about dropout rates than a course leader due to the pressures placed on all institutions to minimize dropout rates (recorded at 6% in March 2016 by HESA and published in Times Higher Education March 23, 2016). � disciplinary options available to academics and management when seeking to punish

•

Recurrence: an increasing requirement to extract lifetime benefits from the student population for mutual gain. � Employer engagement: the increasing demand from government to provide ALL students with more ‘workplace experience’. FE colleges are especially under pressure to provide an increasing number of work experience days per learner (45-60). Sandwich courses and apprenticeship requirements. � Graduate USP’s: the challenges faced by current graduates to differentiate amongst their peers.

Concluding comments: ɐɐ

The education sector is out of sync with its market - Baby Boomers are nothing like Millennials … and Millennials are nothing like Generation Zeds! Traditional marketing methods communicated in conventional methods are falling on deaf ears as opportunities are being lost by technical luddites who fail to engage with their super-savvy digitally astute audiences.

ɐɐ

HE and FE are different - target markets, communications strategies and product offerings vary considerably between FE and HE providers. The subtle nuances of these distinctly different operators cannot and should not be ignored when looking to engage with them.

To read the full paper go to www.sfmediapartners. com ɐɐ

To find out more about the Salesforce Higher Education Summit go to: http:// www.salesforce.org/events/higher-edsummit-horizons-2018/

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Expanding EMEA’s Higher Education horizon in

BARCELONA

Salesforce.org’s Higher Ed Summit Horizons aims to serve their international Higher Education trailblazers closer to home

On Monday, the 22ndOctober an evening welcome reception will kick off the Salesforce.org co-hosted EMEA regional Higher Ed Summit Horizons.

Taking place in Barcelona, Spain at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra’s Ciatadella campus, Higher Ed Summit Horizons will be a first for EMEA based higher education industry trailblazers.

In March of this year, the Salesforce.org Higher Ed Summit, now in its sixth year, attracted more than 2000 attendees from within the Higher Education field to Washington, D.C. Building off that momentum, Saleforce.org now plans to broaden its horizons by bringing a regional Summit to EMEA. This shorter, one-day long summit will continue to advocate for the shared mission of all attendees: to make every student successful.

Challenges facing Higher Education within EMEA make the content of Higher Ed Summit Horizon’s timely.

Within the U.K., for example, Higher Education faces numerous challenges including but not limited to the areas of recruitment, retention and recurrence, referred to as “The New 3 R’s of Education” at the recent Connected Campus Conference in Birmingham. The case for utilising cloud technologies to improve and successfully navigate these challenges

will be one of many discussed at the upcoming Summit.

Scheduled to provide expert speakers to discuss these complex issues is a list of heavy hitting academic institutions including: Harvard University, London School of Economics, and Ecole des Ponts Business School. In addition, Professor and Economist, Noreena Hertz, the renowned thought leader and former Associate director of the Centre for International Business and Management at the University of Cambridge and current Honorary Professor at University College London, will deliver the Summit’s closing keynote speech.

Higher Ed Summit Horizons has been developed to serve Salesforce.org’s international customers in their own neighbourhoods. The larger, U.S. based, Higher Ed Summit has grown in to a multiday, must attended, annual event for Higher Educations movers and shakers that have adopted the connected campus. The more compact, region based, one-day Higher Ed Summit, however, will be designed for EMEA based Higher Education institutions, offering them the chance to share best practice solutions, network with one another, learn from their peers, and discuss the evolution of education at their universities, colleges or schools.

The EMEA summit will provide a platform for its attendees and speakers to discuss the challenges facing the education sector while re-imagining education and its relationship with new and innovative technologies. In addition to talks from industry experts, attendees can expect ample opportunity to discover new ways to connect with students, faculty, staff, and alumni.

The summit will aim to endow its attendees with the knowledge and skillset to innovate through the use of social, mobile and cloud technologies in order to accelerate their success.

Higher Ed Summit Horizon’s agenda will cover a diverse range of topics and is sure to provide a subject of interest for anyone working in the Higher Education field. Some of the subjects that have been logged for discussion include: admissions, student advising, alumni engagement and relations, education cloud, recruiting, student success, Sales Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Community Engagement and more. It seems likely the Higher Ed Summit Horizon will become an annual event, generating as much interest within EMEA as the Higher Ed Summit has come to produce on a global scale.

Get in touch if you would like to join the HE discourse. Email: editorial@ sfmediapartners.com

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presents...

CAMPFIRE TALES From Salesforce, Salesforce.org, Partners and Customerss Come and learn about two of the fastest growing up and coming offerings from Salesforce Field Service Lightning and CPQ.

Two years in and still striking with Field Service Lightning ACT ONE: Presented at the Hilton Union Square, on Tuesday September 25th from 2:30pm-3:15pm How did FSL develop and why? What are its current successes and what does the future hold?

Hear from product experts, partners, and customers who have been on the journey with Field Service Lightning and how they are revolutionising the service industry.

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CPQ! Billing and Beyond!!

ACT TWO: Presented at the Thirsty Bear, in Session Rooms 1&2 on Thursday September 27th, from 10:00am to 11:00am How did CPQ develop? Here are its secrets and complexities made simple!

Hear from product experts, partners, and customers who have been on the journey with CPQ & billing, learn how it has evolved and what the future holds.

Join expert panels for critical insight and experience of CPQ & Billing opportunities possible for your business.

Register now!

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Health and wellbeing:

In order to move fast and achieve success for our customers and our company, we need to be in tip-top shape – mentally, physically, and emotionally...” Salesforce.com

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techniques that we introduce to people is learning to breathe properly. I personally, when I’m working under stressful situations, actually set an alarm to go off once an hour. Providing I’m not in a conversation with someone when the alarm goes off, I stop what I’m doing, pause and focus on my breathing for two minutes.

That’s a way of calming myself down and bringing myself down to an acceptable level of stress in my body.

What can managers do to help employees?

Managers, first of all, need to be aware that an environment can get stressful - they need to be aware of their own stress levels and the impact it can have on them. As a result of that, they will be more aware of the stress levels of their teams and they can be on the look-out for it.

We always help people recognise what the possible symptoms are of stress and then enable them to be aware of those in their teams. They can then have those gentle conversations which might say: “your behaviour’s changed, you’ve become a bit more withdrawn than you normally are, is everything okay, is there anything I can support you with?”

Feeling stressed is a normal part of life - we can feel it when going for a new job, trying to reach deadlines, or meeting new people.

But what happens when we let stress control our lives? According to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), 526,000 workers suffered from work-related stress, depression or anxiety in 2016/17. In the same period, 12.5million working days were lost due to these conditions.

SF Media Partners spoke to Julian Hall, the founder of Calm People, which offers courses in stress management, anger management and emotional resilience, to find out what we can do to combat stress.

Why is it important to keep on top of stress?

At its heart, stress is about fear. Fear is about feeling vulnerable, which our culture and our society does not value. As a result of that, we don’t deal with our feelings in a healthy way and we tend to suppress them - we hide them, we deny them. That means we can cause ourselves potentially long-term mental health issues by not dealing with our feelings in a healthy way.

The other side is it can reveal itself physically, in symptoms such as backache, being continuously ill, stomach problems, blood pressure problems, heart problems - all these things which can be linked to and exacerbated by stress. When we’re stressed, the hormones going through our body suppress our immune system and that’s why people actually find themselves getting ill on a more regular basis when they’re stressed.

What are some basic techniques we can use to keep on top of stress?

In the workplace, we use a number of models.

We help people understand what the five core areas that are within their control and the choices they make that cause them to feel stressed. We name those as: our need for control, need for approval from others, the way we people please, our need to put pressure upon ourselves, and our inability to trust ourselves with other people. Those five things draw us into stressful problems - we use challenging and very complex coping mechanisms to help people change those aspects within themselves.

One of the more straightforward and physical

A lot of managers have a fear of having these conversations because they worry it’s going to u n l o a d a whole load It’s worth of other stuff remembering t h a t t h e y ’ re that there is a not prepared healthy level for and it’s of stress - it can be a healthy going to cause motivator and it can improve more trouble. your performance - you The reality is just need to have a healthy that a really relationship with it.” simple, early intervention could help stop someone from going off ill with stress.

Dealing with stress is a bit like sales management - the more on it you are and the more smaller, gentle but regular interventions you make, the healthier Salesforce will be.

What are you doing to achieve optimum health and wellbeing? Tell us your does and dont’s!

Email: editorial@sfmediapartners.com

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White collar boxing White-collar boxing has its beginnings at Gleason's Gym in New York City. Gym owner Bruce Silverglade began organizing informal fights between the whitecollar workers of his clientele in the late 1980s, which later developed into regular monthly events.

After developing into a regular monthly event, the sport came to prominence in the mid-1990s under the organization of boxing promoter Alan Lacey.

In 2004 over65% of Gleason’s Gym membership was from a white collarbackground, compared to 10% in the early 1990s. The increase of membership from this demographic has been credited with maintaining the profitability of boxing gyms in the US and UK. Event management consultant Alan Lacey, who co-promoted the Gary Stretch vs. Chris Eubank WBO middleweight championship bout in 1991, belatedly discovered boxing training at the age of 45. Captivated and motivated by the discipline over the following years, he started training under former European champion Jimmy McDonnell and alongside two-time Olympian and world title challenger Adrian Dodson, who having spent most of his youth at Gleason’s Gym in New York suggested Lacey to fulfill his ambition to box, even at the age of 48, and arranged for him to visit Gleason’s and box there.

On the flight back to London, Lacey decided white-collar boxing could flourish in London.

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KNOCK OUT SUCCESS THE SALESFORCE PARTNER COMMUNITY HAS BEEN WITNESS TO ONE OF THE BIGGEST WHITE COLLAR BOXING EVENTS IN THE HISTORY OF THE SPORT. HERE’S WHAT HAPPENED ...

The Salesforce partner community has been witness to one of the biggest white collar boxing events in the history of the sport. More than 700 guests were at the world famous Troxy at Limehouse, in London’s East End to watch 10 scintillating bouts of sheer white collar boxing entertainment grossing over £100,000 for the Sports Traider charity.

Supported by five partner companies from within the Salesforce ecosystem, and led by diamond sponsor and innovation award-winner, makepositive, partners including Jitterbit, Conga, New Voice Media and Cirrico all contributed to a huge night of entertainment, fundraising and bonding as the whole venue was up on its feet cheering on their colleagues in the ring.

The event consisted of 10 bouts of 3 x 2 minute rounds, featuring 14 male contestants and 6 females in a night full of high energy drama from start to finish. Each of the contestants

trained tirelessly for 12 weeks in the lead up to the event, through some of the worse of the winter weather to be able to be fit and mentally agile enough to raise to the challenge.

The fighters represented over a dozen companies in total, including New Voice Media, Zuora, Salesforce, makepositive, CloudShift, Ricoh, Ceterna and 4C with several other partners also involved in the lead up to the event. Each contender had an aspirational fundraising target plus a training plan with regular check-ins with a top quality fight promoter and trainer. The rigorous training regime required each contender to attend scheduled training sessions for a minimum of once a week plus provide evidence of engaging in their own training routines as many of them come from across Europe and travel globally for their companies.

“We set the bar high. But we always knew that the Salesforce ecosystem is made of highly motivated, dedicated individuals and there was never any concerns about motivation when it came to climbing into the ring”, says James Collett, the inspiration behind the event.

“We had a phenomenal response when we called out the challenge and in the end we had to turn possible contenders away. We also had a few drop out on the way, mainly due to injuries they picked up, ironically, whilst doing other things such as skiing and cycling. The Head Trainer and his team are highly skilled and know just how far to challenge each contender so that they make steady but significant progress over the twelve weeks. I lost two stone and I wasn’t even fighting!”

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We were thrilled when James Collett approached us to be his official BoxingAid beneficiary for this event but in all honesty, we had no idea it was going to be this successful...

Dr Lance Haggith

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James Collet

Grenfell Boxing Club with Adebayo ‘The Beast’ Akinfenwa

LtoR : Barry Jones, Lance Haggith, John Conteh

Sports Traider charity founder and beneficiary of the event, Dr Lance Haggith was on hand to congratulate each fighter as they received their trophies, win lose or draw. “We were thrilled when James Collett approached us to be his official BoxingAid beneficiary for this event but in all honesty, we had no idea it was going to be this successful.

“The money raised tonight and in the lead up to this event will make a huge difference to our charity and more importantly to the kids we support. It will enable us to provide more kit, coaching and general support to so many more individuals who desperately

need to engage with sport for their personal well-being.

We cannot thank Partner Event Promotions, the participants, sponsors and guests enough. This has been a phenomenal success for us and we hope to be be back again next year .”

If you would like to take part in #PartnerBoxing 2019 or register to be a sponsor, then email: info@ partnereventpromotions.org

Right : Danielle McVeigh and Salesforce colleagues Below: Damien ‘Clubber’ Devilin

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The Second Age of Digital AND THE RISE OF THE MULTICHANNEL REP Chris Wade - Director, Multichannel Strategy, Europe Veeva Systems

Chris Wade works as part of Veeva’s Commercial Strategy team in Europe, and is focused on leading the company’s multichannel strategy in the region. Prior to joining Veeva, Chris was business director at Doctors.net.uk, leading its online marketing and education programs for companies including Eli Lilly, Novartis, and Roche. Chris has deep experience of CRM, business intelligence, and business consulting through his formative years at organizations such as Dendrite, IMS Health, and PwC Consulting.

The life sciences industry has already been through several phases of commercial evolution, from face-to-face interactions, to multichannel engagement, to coordinated interactions between commercial and medical teams.

We are now entering a new phase of intelligent engagement, in which field and medical teams can better use data and insight to drive valuebased conversations with customers, through the channels they prefer.

The next evolution in commercial operations will make capturing and consuming data for engagement much easier and drive more tailored, seamless interactions.

This is leading to the emergence of a new type of commercial organization in the life sciences industry: one that can operate across brands and divisions to plan and execute according to the specific needs of both individual customers and the healthcare system they work in. And within this commercial model, a new style of rep has emerged.

The rep of the future will use data and insight to make better decisions, select the right channels for engagement, and drive the best interactions with customers. The role of the rep will continue to evolve as organizations better anticipate the needs of a much larger, diverse

set of stakeholders, and deliver smarter, informed interactions that are predictive and at the point of execution.

Here, I consider why this new role will be critical in helping pharma better align its approach to shifting customer needs – and the opportunity ahead as the industry embraces this new go-to-market model.

The rise of digital A recent survey confirms 2017 was a turning point in digital for life sciences. The annual report, Across Health Multichannel Maturometer,

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measures the digital maturity of life sciences companies in Europe. In 2017, digital marketing budgets grew by 20% with increasing support from senior management.

Companies made significant investments, rolling out multichannel platforms and digital capabilities and hiring staff with relevant expertise. Digital is a priority for companies as they look to scale their operations and drive more efficient execution. They are leveraging customer insight to enhance engagement, and using well-designed impact measurement to evaluate their progress.

The move to multichannel The emphasis for companies now is to move their field forces to a multichannel approach.

This is being driven by several factors, most notably demographics. More and more HCPs are digital natives – in fact, by 2020, close to 70% will have studied medicine at a time when the internet was already well established. The Across Health survey shows that those in the youngest HCP segment – aged 30 and under – spend about 40% more time online for professional purposes than their counterparts aged 60 and

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above do. Consequently, those aged 50+ prefer face-to-face channels for both medical and promotional content. However, younger digital natives prefer a mix of face-to-face and digital channels – 65% of those under 35 say this is how they want to interact.

Empowering reps to use various digital channels to reach and engage HCPs is a priority, but progress has been inconsistent. While channels such as rep email and remote engagement are now enabled through CRM, adoption across the industry varies.

For example, tablet e-detailing has become a standard approach (used by 84% of companies) and rep email adoption has risen to 49%, with another 38% planning or currently running pilots. However, only 17% of companies say they are currently integrating cross-channel campaigns as standard practice, although 56% plan to pilot this approach.

Growing demand for digital engagement among HCPs The Across Health survey asked HCPs about their experiences and found that half (48%)

still have “monochannel” experiences, with no engagement with reps through other digital channels. Only 6% say they engage on all three levels – rep, rep email, and remote engagement.

Of these last two channels, email is the most used, with 43% of HCPs engaging with reps through email versus remote engagement (12%).

Digital provides the life sciences industry with a greater opportunity to reach and engage with HCPs through the channels they prefer, especially those that typically don’t engage with reps in person. For example, 13% of HCPs who meet with reps face-to-face engage with pharma companies through other digital and non-personal channels, while 20% of HCPs do not engage with pharma at all. This signals a tremendous opportunity to interact through digital channels.

The rep of the future What are the elements and skills needed to become an effective rep in the age of digital?

At the heart of this is a solution that allows for effective rep-driven multichannel execution.

And it includes the understanding of what channels will work best to deliver the optimal customer experience for each individual HCP.

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Research shows that 75% of HCPs aged 50+ are reached through reps, as opposed to just 59% of those under 35. Interestingly, figures for email are consistent across all age groups, ranging from 43% (50+) to 45% (35–50 years old), with under-35s in the middle, at 44%.

Remote detailing has its highest impact in the youngest age category, but even in older groups it has a similar score to that of reps. Fifty percent of HCPs find the timing of face-to-face meetings inconvenient, Veeva Engage remote meetings tend to last 15 minutes (three times longer, on average, than face-to-face visits) , and 90% of those that take part in remote meetings do so again. Considering this, the opportunities for remote detailing are clear.

Combining them with other, face-to-face engagement channels is therefore the perfect way to maximize their impact and boost the customer experience.

Independents overtake relationship seekers Traditionally, pharma companies targeted HCPs that were relationship seekers, as defined by

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McKinsey. This group was open and, indeed, eager to interact with pharma companies and other clinicians, and tended to be early adopters of new medications. However, the latest Across Health research shows that they have now dropped to the third-largest demographic group, behind independents (39%) and knowledge seekers (27%).

Independents tend not to place much value on interactions with pharma companies, preferring to rely on evidence-based materials, and are generally slower to try new medications. For both independents and knowledge seekers, there are opportunities to educate through content that goes beyond the traditional relationship call – a need that can be met best through a multichannel approach.

However, there is currently a large “digital divide” between what is currently supplied by pharma companies and the demand from HCPs. This covers all age groups, even for 50+ specialists, which mirrors the shift to independents and knowledge seekers. Pharma therefore needs to focus on creating and sharing a greater range of digital educational content.

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Adopting a multichannel approach means reps can continue serving the relationship seeker the way they are used to, while reducing their in-person efforts with the other groups, and instead providing these with evidence, education, and science content through intelligent multichannel coordination. All of this demonstrates that the second age of digital is now a reality – those pharma companies that adapt best will flourish, better meeting customer needs and delivering a better, more tailored experience.

About Veeva Systems Veeva Systems Inc. is a leader in cloud-based software for the global life sciences industry.

Committed to innovation, product excellence, and customer success, Veeva has more than 600 customers, ranging from the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies to emerging biotechs. Veeva is headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area, with offices in Europe, Asia, and Latin America.

For more information, visit veeva.com/eu.

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The Top 10 AppExchange Apps for Salesforce: Conga Composer: This innovative doc gen solution app makes document generation both easy and accurate. The app allows you to produce consistent documents and templates using any standard or custom Salesforce object with a single click. In addition it enables user to scale up to 1000s of documents a day without needing to add staff. Conga Composer is compatible with Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Communities, Portals, Platform, Salesforce1 & Lightning. It has a 5/5 star user rating and starts at $20 USD per user per month.

MapAnything: This app is more than just a mapping app; it is an entire mapping platform. It allows businesses to perform Salesforce tasks from within the map. Businesses can log calls, send emails, update records, and create tasks and events within their maps. In addition it allows for the reassignment of entire territories and thousands of contacts to a marketing campaign with a single click. Its most popular features include: Map Geo-Visualization of Salesforce Data, Advanced Routing and Optimization, Territory Management and Prospecting and Lead Generation. It has a 5/5 star user rating and starts at $195 USD per edition (up to 5 users included) per month.

VisionE Business Card Scanner: The perfect app for an industry networker, VisionE Business Card Scanner does exactly what its name suggests: it allows users to scan business cards in to Salesforce with an iPhone, iPad, or Android device. The app then allows you to designate the data as a new contact or a new lead. It has a 4.5/5 star using rating and is free from the AppExchange.

Milestones PM: This project management app tracks any and all project information in Salesforce. Milestones PM was developed

by Passage Technology in 2012, and they have continued to add features and functionality over recent years. The app can support any business model or project type including but not limited to: program management, professional services automation, billable and nonbillable project work, customer onboarding, goal tracking, at-a-glance summary view of multiple projects and much more. It has a 4.5/5 star user rating and is free from the AppExchange.

DocuSign: Electronic signatures are just one feature of this innovative contract management app. DocuSign makes workflow and approval simple, secure, and fully digital. It is configurable and customizable for all Salesforce cloud solutions and allows users to send, sign and track agreements and approvals from any device. It meets the industry’s most rigorous security standards and uses the strongest commercially available data encryption technologies to keep user data safe. It has a 4.5/5 star user rating and starts at $30 USD per user per month.

Financial Force: This accounting app works to streamline your opportunity to cash process, generate financial analysis and audit trails while also managing revenue. Financial Force offers comprehensive financial reporting, cash inflow and outflow management, along with aligning CRM and accounting across different systems. It is easily implemented and aims to accommodate your most complex financial requirements. It has a 4.5/5 star user rating and starts at $1 USD per user per month but offers discounts to nonprofit customers.

GetFeedback: This intuitive app is the number one rated survey tool for Salesforce employees and customers. It allows users to build mobile friendly surveys that have been able to increase customer response rates by over 240%. In addition to mobile versatility and easily applied push response that allow for seamless reporting, GetFeedback allows customers to easily create net promoter score surveys, customer effort score surveys, employment engagement surveys, customer satisfaction surveys and sync the survey result to Salesforce. It has a 5/5 star user rating and starts at $50 USD per user per month.

Jitterbit Data Loader: This integration app enables Salesforce users to automate the import and export data between flat files, Salesforce and assorted databases. Jitterbit reduces the time required to automate the import and export of business data from Salesforce CRM as well as all business-critical databases. It has a 4.5/5 star user rating and is free on the LevelEleven: Having identified motivation as the key sales behavior that drives revenue this productivity app enables sales teams to focus on the team member behaviors that drive results. LevelEleven accomplishes this through the utilization of activity scorecards, real-time leaderboards, TV broadcasts, sales coaching and contests. This is an app that aims to close the gap between what sales leadership expects and what salespeople actually do. It has a 5/5 star user rating and starts at $30 USD per user per month but offers discounts for nonprofits.

DupeCatcher: This comprehensive data-cleansing app enables users to accurately identify, block and dedupe accounts, leads, and contacts at the point of entry. It allows users to retain control of the merging and identification process without the fear of data loss.

DupeCatcher simplifies the management of Salesforce orgs and ensures clean data that dramatically improves customer service and support. It has a 4.5/5 star user rating and is free on the AppExchange.