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Team Member Gains Conga Composer Certification

by with No Comment Certification

Everyday is a school day at Cloud Galacticos. We like to encourage our team to keep on learning and developing their Salesforce skills, especially as we operate in a fast moving and dynamic environment. One of our most recent team members to gain a new certification is Nkosi, who passed his Conga Composer Certification. We caught up with him to find out more…

 

What Made You Decide to Take the Exam?

I did the Conga cert because I have been using Conga products for two of our clients, which involves contracts and Batch document generation so to validate my experience it made sense to do the certification.

What Was Involved?

The exam involved knowledge of the full suite of Conga products. From a Salesforce perspective knowledge of Advanced SOQL queries is essential. You also need to understand Microsoft Word and PowerPoint merge functions well.  The exam consists of 50 questions, 60 minutes long, and open book.  But don’t let it being open book fool you, there is no time to look up anything!

What are the Benefits of the Cert?

Conga is the leading document generation software it is likely to become a default option for document generation for most business given the current Covid-19 situation for contracts etc. I think becoming Conga Certified is a great way to demonstrate your expertise to your employer, earn recognition from your peers, and gain status as a respected member of Conga’s certified admin community.

Was it a Tough Exam?

Yes, it was. With it being a fairly new certification program there is not much material to use, so it’s either you know the product, experience, or read through the entire documentation.  The other issue about the exam is once you move to the next question you can’t go back to review the last question. So you have to get it right the first time and given you have approximately one minute per question, it doesn’t give you many options.  I passed it on the second attempt. The first attempt was to get the idea what the exam entails, however the questions change on each sitting.

What Does Passing the Cert Mean to you in Terms of Your Daily Work?

Most importantly, it means the clients have confidence in that I can deliver their requirements. I’m also currently working on Batch documentation requirement for a client which involves Conga Trigger, and Conga Merge, plus many other functions. 

Do You Have Any Other Certs You Plan to Take in the Future?

Yes, from the Conga University, the next one will be Contracts which I hope to take soon. While for Salesforce, I’m in the process of sitting the Salesforce Architecture exams as well as the NPSP cert.

 

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Two Team Members Become Salesforce Certified Nonprofit Cloud Consultants

by with No Comment Certification

At Cloud Galacticos, we like to encourage our team members to keep on learning and developing their skills. Especially as we operate in a fast moving and dynamic environment. Here’s our CEO, Phil Walton, and CTO, Neel Meghani talking about their recent success on passing the Salesforce Certified Nonprofit Cloud Consultant test.

PLEDGE ONE PERCENT

Phil says, “Cloud Galacticos have been working with nonprofit organisations for a long time now. I am not even sure the Nonprofit Success Pack (or Starter Pack as it used to be) was even around back then! As well as working with a number of nonprofits on long term projects, we also volunteer with a nonprofit each year as a part of our belief in Pledge 1%. We thought it was about time we got the certification to go with our experience. So Neel and I took on the challenge!

SALESFORCE NONPROFIT CLOUD CONSULTANT CERTIFICATION

Phil continues, “The Nonprofit Cloud Consultant cert is pretty new, only announced in Beta in 2018. The questions are based around the use of the Nonprofit Cloud and Nonprofit Success Pack. It also covers general Salesforce knowledge and Consultancy skills (‘What would you do if…?’). The general breakdown is:

Nonprofit Domain Expertise 18% of the exam

NPSP Settings and Administration 20% of the exam

Nonprofit Cloud Implementation Strategies & Best Practices 21% of the exam

Nonprofit Cloud Solution Design 24% of the exam

Nonprofit Cloud Data Management 11% of the exam

Nonprofit Cloud Analytics 6% of the exam

SALESFORCE TRAILHEAD

Phil concludes, “I have been using NPSP for years, but there are always areas you only discover when you have to study a subject. I mainly used Trailhead. This Trail was useful particularly in getting me up to speed with Engagement Plans. But also there were Modules covering GAU Allocation, and which Account model to use.”

Neel adds, “My main resource for studying for the NPSP exam was the Nonprofit Cloud Consultants Training & Certification Guide. This in addition to Trailhead gave me the confidence to sit the exam. One area of I felt was important was the Domain knowledge which some of was new to me. Also ensure you brush up on standard Salesforce subjects like Sandboxes, Lightening Flow, Process Builder etc.”

SALESFORCE KNOWLEDGE

Neel concludes, “Being the best in Salesforce means a mixture of skills. Communication, logic, business acumen, and a blend of Salesforce experience and Salesforce knowledge.  Also, certifications alone are not enough, but they do show a level of knowledge. Finally, show the desire to put time aside to learn these skills.”

 

Useful Links

Link to individual articles and trails relating to each subject area https://partners.salesforce.com/s/education/general/Nonprofit_Training 

Trailmix: https://trailhead.salesforce.com/en/content/learn/trails/fundraise-with-nonprofit-success-pack-npsp 

Trailmix – includes Engagement plans & campaigns: https://trailhead.salesforce.com/en/content/learn/trails/engage-constituents-with-nonprofit-cloud 

Link to the exam guide: https://trailhead.salesforce.com/help?article=Salesforce-Certified-Nonprofit-Cloud-Consultant-Exam-Guide

 

ABOUT CLOUD GALACTICOS

Cloud Galacticos is a Salesforce Consulting Partner with an all-star team. We are user and developer group leaders, bloggers, MVPs and all round Salesforce nerds. We have people all over the UK including London, Manchester, Leeds, Oxford, and Bristol.

If you are looking for a Salesforce partner with experience who can help you make the most of your org, why not give us a call on 020 7101 0795, or click here.

 

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Salesforce Field Service Lightning Consultant Certification Tips and Tricks

by with One Comment Certification

This week I passed my Salesforce Field Service Lightning Consultant certification. It is one of the rarer certifications, so I wanted to share some of the things that helped me to prepare for and pass the exam.

Phil is now Salesforce Field Service Lightning Certified

Salesforce Knowledge

Firstly, why? Everyone has different motivation to do something, and if it involves hours of study then you want to have a good reason! I always want to increase my Salesforce knowledge, and training on a relatively new Cloud, and aiming for an extra cert is generally motivation enough for me. But with Field Service Lightning it took me back to my first graduate job. Ok it was a long time ago so we don’t need to know the year, but my first ‘real’ job was working with Cable & Wireless (which became NTL, then as it is today, Virgin Media). Part of the role involved dispatching technicians and installers around the country. After a while I was promoted to a team that was configuring a new dispatch system, which I then became the System Admin of. It wasn’t quite Field Service Lightning, but it led me into a Business Analyst role, and CRM, and eventually Salesforce. So this cloud and this cert feels like it completes a loop!

The Salesforce Field Service Lightning Consultant exam has 2 prerequisites, the Salesforce Certified Administrator credential and the Salesforce Certified Service Cloud Consultant credential. To be honest, you would not want to skip the Service part of this anyway, in fact you will probably need to revisit some of that knowledge.

Resources

Here is the exam guide to get you rolling. I started with Trailhead, I would recommend this Trail with 3 badges or this Trailmix. You can pay for this course (approx $2700) from the Trailhead Academy team.

I was fortunate that as a Salesforce Partner I had access to some Fastpath training. If you work for a partner it is worth joining. There was set up work (covered in the Trailmix above) and then 5 daily 2-hour sessions, plus homework for afterwards. 

I failed the exam on the first attempt. I have a list of excuses if anyone wants to hear them. But I took note of the areas I did badly in, and followed up with a pass and a much higher score.

Advice

My advice would be:

  • Don’t leave it a month in between studying and actually taking the exam! (Christmas holidays got in the way)
  • If possible join the Fast Path Group (Partner training) or a study group
  • Go back to Service Cloud and make sure you learn Entitlements & Milestones
  • Be comfortable with the Object schema. Know what Work Orders, and Work Order Line Items do, and how they relate to Appointments, Territories, & Resources.
  • Learn what makes a Scheduling Policy (Rules, plus Service Objectives, equals Scheduling Policies)
  • Something new I learnt this week is on Webassessor if you are not a native English speaker you can request an extra 30 minutes by sending an email to: certification@salesforce.com
  • Don’t be afraid of failing and retaking!

Good luck! And if you need any help with a Salesforce Field Service Lightning implementation, or any Salesforce project, please contact us.

About Cloud Galacticos

Cloud Galacticos is a Salesforce Silver Consulting Partner with an all-star team. We are user and developer group leaders, bloggers, MVPs and all round Salesforce nerds. We have people all over the UK including Manchester, Leeds, York, Sheffield and London. If you are looking for a Salesforce partner with experience who can help you make the most of your org, why not give us a call? 

 

 

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Cloud Galacticos 2019 Highlights

by with No Comment CertificationDreamforceNewsSalesforce EventsTeam GalacticosUser Groups

Being the CEO of a Silver Partner Salesforce Consultancy and managing a UK-wide team of people is no mean feat. So it’s no surprise that Phil Walton, who is also in the Salesforce MVP Hall of Fame, has a rather busy calendar. As we reach the end of another successful year, he reflects back on some of his personal highlights of 2019.

World Tour London and our Client Drinks Reception the night before (May)

Cloud Galacticos at Salesforce London World Tour with paul Sturgess

Team Galacticos with Paul Sturgess at Salesforce World Tour London 2019

 

For most Salesforce-ers Dreamforce is the highlight of the year. But for me, the London World Tour is the big one. OK so we didn’t have Fleetwood Mac or Alicia Keys, but it is a great chance for the UKI and European Salesforce Community to meet up in person.

We had a great day, meeting Clients and Partners old and new at our Gold stand. Plus we were joined by ex-Harlem Globetrotter and Britain’s tallest man Paul Sturgess, who not only attracted a lot of attention, but was a great guy to chat with!

North Africa Dreamin’

Phil Walton speaking at North Africa Dreamin

Phil Walton speaking at North Africa Dreamin

I was very proud to be invited to speak at Africa’s first Salesforce community event – North Africa Dreamin! It was a great trip to Casablanca, where I met some great people, and had some amazing food. It is amazing to see the Salesforce Ohana spreading around the globe.

Team Galacticos

2019 has been a fantastic year for Cloud Galacticos, with excellent growth in revenue and people. We have also picked up a number of new certification skills, and industry expertise. Between the team we have bags of experience in Healthcare & Life Sciences and also Financial Services, so they are now our official specialisms (although we work in many other sectors). 

We were really excited to welcome both Nkosi Ncube and Mike Gill (who you can see below at MuleSoft CONNECT 2019) to our development team. Both are smart, experienced, knowledgeable and great guys – exactly the type of people we want on the team!

Nkosi and Mike who joined the Cloud Galacticos team in 2019

Nkosi and Mike at Mulesoft Connect 2019

We also welcomed Malcolm Heeley to the team towards the end of the year. Malcolm has a lot of experience as a business analyst and project manager which we cannot wait to use!

Nell Meghani and Phil Walton with Malcolm Heeley (centre) who joined Cloud Galacticos at the end of 2019

Salesforce Consultancy

Certificates

Also between the team we have picked up a number of new Consultancy and Architecture certifications, which we are very proud of! We have also begun to deliver training for Salesforce, fantastic recognition of our deep knowledge of the platform.

Admin and Developer User Group

MuleSoft speaking at a User Developer Group

Manchester Salesforce Admin User Group

We also attended and helped run a number of user and developer groups in Manchester, Sheffield and Leeds – bringing Salesforce to the North of England! We had a variety of speakers including MulseSoft as you can see in the photo above.

Here’s to 2020!

About Cloud Galacticos

Cloud Galacticos is a Salesforce Silver Consulting Partner with an all star team. We are user and developer group leaders, bloggers, MVPs and all round Salesforce nerds. We have people all over the UK including Manchester, Leeds, York, Sheffield and London. If you are looking for a Salesforce partner with experience who can help you make the most of your org, why not give us a call?