A Salesforce consultant’s job is to operate as a trusted advisor and guide to customers. Their focus is to help customers get the most out of their Salesforce investments. They operate with curiosity and empathy. They are strong communicators who can translate complex technical pieces for their stakeholders. 

The life of a Salesforce consultant is one of constant change with new releases, changing industry trends and customer requirements. It’s a life of collaboration, change management and innovation. 

To learn more about the role, we sat down with one of our Salesforce Consultants, Milo Tarimo. Milo is to get his perspective on A Day in the life here at Ignyto.

Joining a Salesforce Consultancy

Q. When did you join the Ignyto Team?

I joined Ignyto in August 2021 straight out of University, where I completed a (BSc) Business Technology degree. 

Q. How would you describe what we do here at Ignyto?

Ignyto is a Platinum Salesforce Consultancy, which means we work alongside Salesforce and their customers to build a customised platform bespoke to the business needs and objectives. We aim to provide our clients with a professional, scalable and productive system, ensuring they get the best use of their Salesforce instance. We work with many organisations from different industries and sizes, implementing the various products that Salesforce offers.  

Q. How has joining Ignyto helped your Salesforce Career? 

I was welcomed to the team straight away and immediately felt at home. Because of that, I have learned and progressed in my career. In just under two years, Ignyto has turned me from an inexperienced graduate with little knowledge of Salesforce into a Consultant who can lead his projects from start to finish and build key customer relationships with stakeholders.

Q. What do you like most about working as a Salesforce Consultant?

Not to sound cliche, but no day is the same as a Salesforce Consultant within Ignyto. That is because there is a lot of freedom regarding how you plan your week and outstanding tasks. As a team, we have certain meetings that you are expected to attend, but any client meetings and corresponding work can be planned around my diary and the clients. This brings flexibility as to when project work needs to be completed. 

Managing Salesforce Projects

Q. How is a project typically structured? 

During a project, there are many different types of meetings that happen with a client. These meetings include Project Kick-off, Discovery Sessions, Playback/Demo sessions, User Acceptance Testing sessions and Project sign-off meetings. 

Outside of that, it’s common to have more generic ad-hoc meetings with clients if they need extra support on specific topics. I love the variety of the conversations you have with different clients, as no meeting is ever the same.

Q.How do you organise your week?

First thing Monday morning is all about planning for the week ahead. Some of the key questions I would ask myself are: 

1. Have I booked all client meetings for the week? 
2. Have I got a list of all outstanding tasks for each project/meeting? 
3. Am I up to date with all internal procedures, i.e. are my tasks and projects up to date? 
4. Do I need any support from senior resources for any of my tasks for the week? 
5. What risks do I foresee happening during the week? If so, do I need to raise these risks to my manager/director, or am I okay dealing with them alone?

Once the week has been planned and tasks assigned to certain days, I will go through my emails and respond to any outstanding emails, ensuring every client query has been answered. As soon as my weekly plan and my email inbox is up to date then I am in a position to start my tasks for the week.

The last thing I do at the end of every day is to make sure that the time I have used in each of my projects for the day has been recorded and ready to enter in my time cards at the end of the week, and also, make sure I have all my notes, tasks and meeting plans all ready for the next day.

Work outside of Client Meetings 

Q. Outside of meetings, what work does a Salesforce Consultant do? 

Most of my tasks during the week typically involve building the specifications that my client has requested into their Salesforce org. To gather these requirements, I undergo a series of ‘Discovery’ sessions with key stakeholders from the client side. These sessions are usually all about how the client operates as a business currently and what they are looking to achieve through the use of Salesforce. These conversations involve helping the client understand Salesforce’s capabilities and aligning its functionality with their own strategy. Ensuring that their processes are optimised so that they can use Salesforce to improve their productivity across the organisation. 

Q. How do you balance meetings and client work? 

I will always aim to have at least ⅔ hours of build time each day to keep up with my tasks. This is why being organised and keeping on top of my diary is vital, as when I schedule a client call, I must implement the requirements from the past week into the system before I meet with that same client again. Each week more items from the SoW are built and demoed to the client, so any changes to this format and the Project is at risk of overrunning or running out of budget. 

Q. Do you ever get to meet with clients in person? 

Most of my work is completed remotely. Occasionally I will go and visit clients at their offices. For example, in the last couple of weeks, I have travelled to Amsterdam and London to deliver in-person sessions. In-person sessions could be for any of the types of meetings listed above but are typically used for training sessions, as delivering them in person can be much more interactive. I thoroughly enjoy going out to clients and meeting up with them as it makes a change to being sat at a desk, and you can build much stronger relationships when you make an effort to meet in person. 

If you want to apply or learn more about a career at Ignyto, check out our careers page. We have several remote roles open for Associate and Senior Consultants and Developer and Technical roles. You’ll also have a chance to hear from other Ignytos about what it’s like to work with us.