Diary of a Saasy Girl

I've been a recognised mentor in the last few companies that I have worked at. I've been an informal mentor at other places and not been aware about it at the time. What's the difference you maybe wondering? Well the former were specific mentor/mentee programs set up by the companies to bring people together to help with personal development. The latter happened to me, on multiple occasions when, for instance, at the end of a project a person told me that I had been their mentor and they had learnt so much. What is a mentor? It's someone who can give their time to someone else. That time can be spent listening to the mentee but also to give advice based on their own professional or life experiences.  Businesses are now recognising that a mentor/mentee relationship can provide intrinsic benefits to the bottom line. Here's how;  1. Setting up a formal mentor/mentee programme internally shows the employees that the business considers professional development. ...

Some years ago I wrote a blog titled, Agile is a dirty word. I talked about how businesses approached project delivery, where clients feared Agile as a slap dashed route. I mentioned how marrying the governing powers of Prince 2 can help clients improve Agile delivery method. As long as they remember the business case of the project and the success criteria, then iterative delivery of the product, in the style of Agile can benefit everyone. Since that post, the term Agile has become more prolific within the realms of business transformation. What I wonder about is if  businesses have really progressed to really understand the term and how it can impact on them.  The term Agile is banded about by companies almost to show that they are on trend, so they may attract the talent they desperately need. Agile delivery suggests that teams can produce technical outputs to end users quicker than traditional waterfall methodology. This is factually correct. The beauty of Agile is...

Once upon a time, many decades ago, before the internet and mobile phones were created, we lived simpler times. We had to plan and be organised. We also had to stick with the plan too as making changes were much harder to do.  For example, I would leave the cinema, walk to a phone box which had a working phone in it. I would insert a 2 pence piece (yes, really) and manually dial a number. The call would engage and start to ring. I would let it ring 3 times and then hang up. My 2 pence coin was returned to me.  This was the signal for my dad to get into the car and drive to a predefined location to pick my friends and me up and take us home.  I know that there is a generation who will not understand this concept. They have been born into a more technological society where we have solutions at our fingertips.  The way they organise themselves and communicate are very different. Plans are more fluid.  For those of us also old enough to remember, in the UK, ...

I finished reading the book, Becoming by Michelle Obama on Friday. I had given myself the challenge to complete it in time for the book tour talk that happened in London last night to an intimate audience of 15,000.  Back last December I saw that tickets where going up for sale for this book tour so suggested to my fellow Salesforce ladies in our WhatsApp group whether we fancied attending. Some of us had been lucky to see her speak at Dreamforce in 2017. Michelle Obama came over so well, warm and genuine that I was eager to hear her speak again. When the tickets went live we scrambled to make the purchases, managing to buy 10 in all. We were set.  Let me tell you a bit about the book first, which by the way has already sold over 10m copies. Its produced in 3 sections; Becoming - which talks of Michelle growing up in her Chicago neighbourhood, her family, going to an Ivy League College and first major job as a Lawyer. She meets a hot shot intern who over time becomes he...

I used to sit at work and on my neighbours desk resided a mobile phone that continuously 'binged and dinged' throughout the day. I called it her Tamagotchi. This phone demanded attention from its owner via its multitude of noises; a notification here, a call there. It was exhausting to hear, let alone try to keep the Tamagotchi fed and happy. But it did make me wonder how productive this person could truly be if, all their time was devoted to this device.  I walk along the street trying to get to my next location. For a short person I am a speedy walker and often surprise others who are much taller than me, as they quicken their pace to keep up. There are now two types of groups that slow my progress down. For many years the prime group were the teenage students who would huddle together in the middle of the street, backpacks on, filling the pavement area, and chatting loudly with each other. The new group of people who have added to the slower pace are all individuals. These...

Its just over 2 weeks since London's Calling 4. I can't believe how the time has flown already. As an organiser for this year's event it was months in the planning, for it all to happen over a Thursday evening and all day Friday and now be over for another year. Let me share you my thoughts from this super event.  The Thursday night was an opportunity to bring our speakers and MVP's together prior to the main day. It was a chance to mingle and say thanks to our volunteers, whose great content we value dearly that helps keeps London's Calling quality so high. It always makes me smile that for any of the Community Conferences it is customary to supply a smattering of drinks the night before. Nothing like preparing your speakers to deliver their optimal performance on the day. I like to ensure that our speakers also get their fill of food and logo branded cake as sustenance.  A few quality hours of sleep later and I was back at the venue, Skills Matter, bright a...

A few weeks ago we had a career week at my company. It was an opportunity to take some time to think about our own personal development. Each day we were presented with a motivational message from one of our C-suite members on a particular learning from their own career progress in relation to a company value.  As part of the week each employee was invited to attend a growth workshop which was held by an external company specialising in learning and development. Each session lasted around 2 hours and was filled with interactive elements. I attended a manager orientated one which focused on both how to help my team identify and achieve their goals in addition to looking at my own career path options.   With my manager head on, for one of the tasks I was asked to think about one employee and consider what skills they were good at and which needed development, in order to make them a more rounded individual. Once the gap had been identified, I then had to think about...