The Dawn of TeenForce

A few years ago, I was asked to manage User Accounts in a program that the non-profit organization where I worked was piloting. Since I was always excited about learning new programs, I jumped right into our new Salesforce org. However, my role was small and my permissions were limited. So I didn’t really know what I was working with and how it would eventually change my life.

A little over a year later I was asked to fill the role of our Salesforce Sales Admin who was moving on to bigger role in the Salesforce world. My role and access changed considerably, and I had to learn more about Salesforce, how to manage accounts and contacts, duplicates, campaigns, cases and solutions. I had to quickly adapt to the new role, and within a few short weeks, I was considered one of the experts of our Salesforce org.

That year I attended the Minneapolis Salesforce World Tour, an event that opened my eyes to the magnitude of Salesforce. That was the first step in a journey that I changed my life. It was at that event that I understood that Salesforce was much more than software, it was an open window to a new future.  Then I attended Midwest Dreamin’ in Chicago. If I wasn’t sure before that event, I was positive Salesforce was my future after that event.

I joined user groups, I read blogs, I started to own that I would one day be one of those experts out there helping others. So where do I start? I needed to become certified as a Salesforce Administrator. More reading, more blogs, more user groups. I created a Development Org for one of the self-training courses I was using. I was surprised at how many more options I had working in the Development Org than I had in the Salesforce Org at work. I could customize it, add objects, change page layouts, it was great.

The problem: I didn’t have good data to work with. Yes, there was sample data in the Development Org, but it wasn’t meaningful data. The solution: I was talking with one of my new friends at a User Group meeting who said her recommendation to others about this situation is to create an Org based on what you know. What do you have in your life that you can track? Build your Org based on what you know.

OK so that was easy. I have a teenager at home. I am almost guaranteed that daily I would receive some sort of request from her. “Can I go here?”, “Can you buy me this?”,   “Please can I have this done?”, “Oh my favorite band is playing, and I really need to go!!” That was it, I had my data source, now I just had to build it.

Over the course of a couple of months, I worked on the data model, created the objects, the page layouts, the processes that I wanted to be included the org. Finally I had a working org. She would submit a request, a case would be created, and I would get a notification that the request was submitted. From there, I would review the request, add my additional Information like cost and date, and then submit the Request for Approval to my husband. He would receive an email with all the details and would just click a button to approve or reject the request. Finally I would get an email with the decision and would close out the case notifying our daughter of the results of the request.

The process took many hours of working to figure out just what automation process was right for the job. I tried Workflow, I tried Process Builder, and I tried Flow. Finally I got a process that would do most of what I wanted it to do, enough to be able to get data in my org. It was a hybrid of them that worked best. I was also able to pull reports and create dashboards to analyze trends in her requests.

All the while, I continued to study and finally became a certified Salesforce Administrator. A few weeks later I was interviewed and subsequently hired by Redpath. And, yes, my life has changed. I am on a new path to success and loving every minute of it.

Teenforce is still a work in progress, I have done some new updates to it and was able to get email to case to work successfully. I am so excited to do more with it, and I have so many more ideas. I would love to expand it into a great tool that parents can use to really know how much it costs (in time and money), to raise a teenager.