Marc Benioff of Salesforce: ‘Are We Not All Connected?’(nytimes.com)
nytimes.com
Marc Benioff of Salesforce: ‘Are We Not All Connected?’
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/business/marc-benioff-salesforce-corner-office.html
34 comments
“We have a plan to get every homeless family off the streets within five years. We’ve already moved hundreds of families back into society and into homes.”
Wow.
You have to start somewhere. A local, wealthy entrepreneur has the same goal, and after about a decade of work coordinating public and private orgs and developing a unified case management system, our city of ~140k has functionally zero homeless because they are all getting help. Replication of this model is underway in other cities. The hard work of scheduling meetings and getting multi-org agreement “scales” if it’s being effectively managed by locals in each city, and of course the software is easily distributed.
Any more info you can share on this?
Very curious what the difference is compared to the usual approach, see how it could apply in different places (here in NL).
Very curious what the difference is compared to the usual approach, see how it could apply in different places (here in NL).
Sure, here’s a very recent article (but the effects of this approach have been accumulating for awhile.) http://www.rrstar.com/news/20180608/rockford-gets-attention-...
Here’s the software referenced: https://www.mpowr.com/focus-areas/community
It’s a SaaS, but as you can see, the hard part isn’t the app development; it’s getting all the government departments and charities talking and agreeing to automatically coordinate via software.
Our city is bad at a lot of things, so I’m a bit proud we’ve actually accomplished something good that we are able to export. :)
The usual approach is to start a new case at each org which duplicates the same kind of assistance, leaving less for others and making it harder to steadily advance someone towards receiving the treatment or rehabilitation they need since they’ll bounce from place to place. When communication between agencies does happen, it generates too much paperwork and decision-making is inconsistent, time-consuming and less effective because the staff might not be up to date on the solutions or money available to treat an individual’s specific problems. Software, along with a more collaborative mindset, helps all of this.
Here’s the software referenced: https://www.mpowr.com/focus-areas/community
It’s a SaaS, but as you can see, the hard part isn’t the app development; it’s getting all the government departments and charities talking and agreeing to automatically coordinate via software.
Our city is bad at a lot of things, so I’m a bit proud we’ve actually accomplished something good that we are able to export. :)
The usual approach is to start a new case at each org which duplicates the same kind of assistance, leaving less for others and making it harder to steadily advance someone towards receiving the treatment or rehabilitation they need since they’ll bounce from place to place. When communication between agencies does happen, it generates too much paperwork and decision-making is inconsistent, time-consuming and less effective because the staff might not be up to date on the solutions or money available to treat an individual’s specific problems. Software, along with a more collaborative mindset, helps all of this.
The “wow” might have come across as being sarcastic but it wasn’t intended that way. I’m honest impressed with this effort.
This was an interesting article.
Changes my impression of SFDC.
Changes my impression of SFDC.
Curious why impression would be different? Benioff has been outspoken like this for at least a decade (two?). And Salesforce is well-known to be very charitable.
> And Salesforce is well-known to be very charitable.
When I interviewed there, every single person who spoke to me talked about their 1-1-1 thing. Might be interview training though.
When I interviewed there, every single person who spoke to me talked about their 1-1-1 thing. Might be interview training though.
Yes, it's their main sales tool for recruiting and public relations efforts. Everyone gets two weeks training in part on 1-1-1 when they join, and employees involved in recruitment get a lot of training on how to present it and respond to questions, and exposed to ongoing marketing on it.
Is it possible to work there (or any socially invested company) and just do your job and go home?
I do certain charitable things but I don't discuss it except with a few people who also participate.
I interviewed with a company here in Austin early this year and one of the things that bugged me was how they'd turned their charitable work into a marketing tool with slick brochures. I actually felt bad about being more interested in the actual business work than the charity work.
I do certain charitable things but I don't discuss it except with a few people who also participate.
I interviewed with a company here in Austin early this year and one of the things that bugged me was how they'd turned their charitable work into a marketing tool with slick brochures. I actually felt bad about being more interested in the actual business work than the charity work.
Yes, it’s possible.
You have the option of using up to 7 days per year (56hours) to volunteer and you’re being paid normally for this time.
You are encouraged to volunteer and there are events setup regularly in which you can take part if you want.
If you have something you personally care about you can volunteer there.
That being said nobody is forcing you to volunteer.
You have the option of using up to 7 days per year (56hours) to volunteer and you’re being paid normally for this time.
You are encouraged to volunteer and there are events setup regularly in which you can take part if you want.
If you have something you personally care about you can volunteer there.
That being said nobody is forcing you to volunteer.
> I do certain charitable things
You’d likely get some encouragement from your manager to do that under the auspices of volunteer time off. If you wanted to give money to a bonafide non-profit, Salesforce would match.
From my vantage point of being related to / friends with Salesforce employees, I’m continually impressed by how Salesforce comports itself—even if I don’t care much one way or the other about its actual product.
You’d likely get some encouragement from your manager to do that under the auspices of volunteer time off. If you wanted to give money to a bonafide non-profit, Salesforce would match.
From my vantage point of being related to / friends with Salesforce employees, I’m continually impressed by how Salesforce comports itself—even if I don’t care much one way or the other about its actual product.
I guess I'll just have to confess my ignorance :(
yet... Every time I work with them, all I found are unfit engineers...
Benioff is one of my inspirations and one of the technology CEOs I most look up to.
Why is that? As someone that has only been exposed to him via headlines and articles like this he has come off as someone that states populist politically correct statements for the purpose of gaining attention and not seeming like a "typical" billionaire.
One of my mentors, who worked with Benioff directly for years at Oracle, says he’s legit - one of the kindest and most generous people he’s known.
Ok, I'm probably looking at him in the worst possible light then.
Cool guy. The core software is pretty dated though (it is 2000 era) and in need of a major refresh which seems like it may never happen. So there are some long-term risks with Salesforce because of that.
You're right. Salesforce is a big, complicated, multi-tenant, CRUD application coupled to an Oracle database. Multi tenant architectures themselves aren't an issue, but Salesforce implemented it well before the days of containers. All the Apex code has to be "bulkified" which means writing almost everything for multiple records in an execution context. This adds to the mental effort and reduces readability. A major concern when not all consultants do it well.
They've been trying for years to replace the Oracle database with Postgres, but it's not easy in such a large, heavily used enterprise application.
For many situations I recommend integrating with a messaging system and using the REST apis from something like Ruby.
Lightning is not bad, but it's slow compared to the front end framework competition. It is pretty fast to develop with though.
They've been trying for years to replace the Oracle database with Postgres, but it's not easy in such a large, heavily used enterprise application.
For many situations I recommend integrating with a messaging system and using the REST apis from something like Ruby.
Lightning is not bad, but it's slow compared to the front end framework competition. It is pretty fast to develop with though.
Have you used it lately? The Lightning update, not to mention their rabid acquisitions have made them quite formidable. They own Heroku for example. There core systems are a pain to learn, but the most powerful stuff in their market.
He seems like he wants to be a better CEO and have employees volunteer but I wonder if this type of business leader ever actually wants to empower their employees by unionizing them? Or giving them the day off to vote? Encouraging regulation on their own industries? Not financing lobbyists?
Not to say he’s a horrible person, just the corporate system we have seems destined to take more and more power away from the avgerage joe.
Not to say he’s a horrible person, just the corporate system we have seems destined to take more and more power away from the avgerage joe.
Opinion only, so take it for what it's worth:
Wanting to unionize is something that should come from the bottom up, and in my mind, is usually a sign that there's a serious disconnect between corporate leadership and employees. A few disgruntled employees is not indicative a major problem within a company and if there's no major problem, why form a union?
Salesforce pushing for regulation on their own industry would be seriously harming their customer base, since their a service provider, not a marketing company themselves. If there was to be a call for regulation in an industry, it would be one or two steps removed from SF.
Lobbying is a fact-of-life in competitive industries. It sucks, but it's absolutely necessary to survive at the level they play at, given how much economic power they have and the legislators they have to endure.
Wanting to unionize is something that should come from the bottom up, and in my mind, is usually a sign that there's a serious disconnect between corporate leadership and employees. A few disgruntled employees is not indicative a major problem within a company and if there's no major problem, why form a union?
Salesforce pushing for regulation on their own industry would be seriously harming their customer base, since their a service provider, not a marketing company themselves. If there was to be a call for regulation in an industry, it would be one or two steps removed from SF.
Lobbying is a fact-of-life in competitive industries. It sucks, but it's absolutely necessary to survive at the level they play at, given how much economic power they have and the legislators they have to endure.
Good grief. Salesforce people are well paid. They can take a personal day to vote. For many people, working at Salesforce is a dream job.
Also, people shouldn't really need a day off to vote unless they are working an insane schedule. Polls are usually open 12+ hours. You should have time to vote before or after the workday.
He encourages regulation that gives him something, like market protection from competitors.
> Then Larry [Ellison, Oracle’s co-founder] took notice of me, and I started working directly for him.
Wow, so much to potentially unpack here! Career advice-wise, I’d love to read the details of how one joins a company (presumably as a rank and file contributor) and all of a sudden the CEO “takes notice” of them and they are working directly for the CEO! How big was Oracle at the time? I can count on one hand how many companies I worked for where I even once met the CEO, and they were all very small indeed.
Wow, so much to potentially unpack here! Career advice-wise, I’d love to read the details of how one joins a company (presumably as a rank and file contributor) and all of a sudden the CEO “takes notice” of them and they are working directly for the CEO! How big was Oracle at the time? I can count on one hand how many companies I worked for where I even once met the CEO, and they were all very small indeed.
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Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but it appears he was in sales there? If you're a high performer in sales you get access to people because your activities directly impact the balance sheet
If you're remembered primarily for doing great philanthropic things in a few decades I'll buy it. Til then you're just a billionaire who went to India and likes to say stuff, in my books.
Bit of a puff piece. For a contrasting view, Dan Lyons (Fake Steve Jobs) has some choice quotes on Benioff excerpted here http://www.platformonomics.com/2016/09/the-spectacle-that-is... “There’s an art to this kind of horseshit, and Benioff is its Michelangelo.”