February was a super busy month. I’ve returned to full-time hours and am working in a new role as an Associate Consultant. The additional 8 hours a week has been a load I’ve noticed as my husband was unexpectedly overseas, so the timing wasn’t great managing the kids and additional work hours. We survived and this was yet another reason I’m grateful to be working remote. I think if I’d had to add 3 hours of travel each day I would have dropped my bundle!
The role change has meant my work scope has changed, and I’m moving more into more significant projects. This is great in so many ways, learning from the more experienced consultants how to run bigger/more in-depth scoping sessions for complex existing orgs. Also, Jira is no joke; when used properly, it’s a fantastic tool. Building great user stories is what I’m focusing on now. I’ve just purchased User Story Mapping: Building Better Products Using Agile Software Design and have been listening to a youtube session by the same author.
March is my month to refocus on Sales Cloud certification. I’ve already used much of the knowledge gained in earlier study, so building on it and refreshing will hopefully reinforce what’s already there. My goal is to sit this by the end of the month.
I’ve hosted several training sessions this month on relatively new products. High-Velocity Sales has some recent enhancements, and the documentation isn’t so wonderful. However, I’ve had the opportunity to work with it in 2 orgs and learn, then teach about building Sales Cadences and features like LinkedIn Navigator. These are great tools once you understand how to leverage them.
Training sessions can be intimidating. To offset the nerves, I make sure to spend extra time preparing so I well and truly know what I’m presenting information about. The best results come when the users have made the most of UAT and become a part of the training session, screen sharing and showing tips on what they have found the most valuable. Identifying this in the beginning and setting the expectation benefits everyone. I highly recommend this to be a part of all projects.
We’ve had some fun meet-ups in the Talent Stacker space. One, in particular, was “The best places to live for remote workers”. Costa Rica is a place we discuss daily; maybe the future will hold one of these exotic destinations for us!
Sync Savvy 