31 January 2017 - Get writing

In the world of Salesforce the 31 January is their end of financial year deadline. Anyone making deals with them around this time can come away with some interesting options so its worth the negotiation. In my world of work we were doing just that, renewing our overall Salesforce contract and also taking CPQ as a new feature. 

 Thing is, it came really close to not happening and that was all due to internal work pressures and not that of Salesforce. There really was a moment when I wondered if, as a company, we were serious about Salesforce and if we were really going to move the business further forward. Its that moment when you start to consider life alternatives. I'm glad that the Execs made the right choice (in my opinion) and we got to sign the deal as the last minutes ticked away towards the deadline. 

 In other news, London's Calling is looming and I needed to get my presentation nailed. I'd been suffering from writer's block, entirely probable considering the work stuff going on and ideas weren't flowing as easily as before. 

 I'm relieved to say I have got my act together and have it sorted now. Let me tell you how I managed it. The Xmas break was meant to be the time when I was going to get the initial ideas formed but that didn't happen. 

 So, I took pen and paper with me onto my morning train journey and just started to scribble any old nonsense that came into my head based on the title and abstract that had been accepted. I ended up scribbling pages of paragraphs but they were all very disjointed, I still hadn't managed to find my hook. And then it happened, just one morning on the train I saw a thread and knew this was going to be the crux of my talk. Its all about the "C's" and everything else is fitting around this. 

I've now written up the talk, with aid of some wine (additional inspiration) and after a glass or some, I think I'm onto a winner (hic). You'll just have to wait and see.


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