Center of Excellence: Security

The last pillar of a Salesforce Center of Excellence is security. Here are three main considerations for security:

1. New/Old Users

With a small org, it’s common for new users to be manually added and maintained. When a user leaves the organization, they can be manually frozen or deactivated.… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Metadata Management

Knowing how you will manage metadata is the next pillar of the Salesforce Center of Excellence. Here are three many considerations.

1. Source Code Repository

When you have a small org, it’s OK to start building metadata in a single instance, say a Development (DEV) sandbox.… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Leadership

Nothing happens without leadership. It’s the staff at the helm of the ship that drives projects forward. Without them, everyone would randomly bump into each other, like bumper cars at the arcade.

Here are three important roles of leadership within a Center of Excellence.… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Architecture

The architecture pillar of the Salesforce Center of Excellence is a massive conversation. Setting up the architecture team and For now, let’s focus on three topics.

1. Data Modeling

One of my favorite expressions in construction is “measure twice and cut once”.… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Change Management

Heraclitus, a Greek philosopher, is quoted as saying, “change is the only constant in life.” Despite being so common, people often resist change.

So in the context of a Salesforce Center of Excellence, the Change Management Office (CMO) is responsible for warming the audience to the upcoming change and supporting their needs.… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Tooling

Selecting the proper tools is one of my personal favorite pillars of the Center of Excellence. Here are three themes regarding tooling:

1. When to Build vs Buy

One of the first questions to ask is, under what conditions should you build a custom piece of functionality or buy an existing product?… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Methodology

The methodology pillar, as part of a Center of Excellence, is about defining the delivery process. Let’s focus on three core topics of this pillar.

1. How to Deliver

This step is about determining how projects will be delivered. What business processes will projects use, how DevOps is weaved into the conversation, and .… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Governance

One of the most important responsibilities of a Center of Excellence is setting up a proper governance framework.

In short, governance is a system of rules and processes that a company creates. It determines who has power and accountability, and who makes decisions.… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Standards

Establishing and maintaining standards are important in a Salesforce org. They determine the basic rules of an implementation, so it doesn’t look like it was built by 3 admins and 2 devs.

Here are three core ingredients to build standards in a Salesforce CoE:

1.Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Vision

Vision is about the art of the possible. There are three main components to focus on.

1. Business Goals

Too many agencies focus on the wrong problem to solve. They focus on the inputs instead of the outputs. The number of hours something will take instead of what are the business goals.… Read the rest

Center of Excellence: PMO

Out of all the pillars in a Center of Excellence, the Project Management Office (PMO) is the one I’m least familiar with. So if any of my PM readers want to add to anything I say, please chime in 🙂

In a Salesforce context, three main functions of the PMO is:

1.Read the rest

Center of Excellence: Prototyping

In short, prototyping is the innovation hub that builds out Salesforce prototypes to show the “art of the possible”

This can be broken down into three main components:

1. User flow

It’s important that user’s know and understand how they will be using Salesforce.… Read the rest

What is a Salesforce Center of Excellence?

Let’s start with a definition of what a Center of Excellent (CoE) is.

According to Wikipedia, it “is a team, a shared facility or an entity that provides leadership, best practices, research, support or training for a focus area”.

In our world, this can be translated into providing the “best of breed” across multiple facets of the Salesforce ecosystem.… Read the rest