In this episode of “How I Solved It” on Salesforce+, #AwesomeAdmin Chance Martin solves an account communications problem using Slack and Flow. Learn how he approached building his solution and his tips for developing admin skills.
A while back, I worked with a sales team who struggled to keep everyone on the same page while helping clients go live with their products. An account manager might start a Slack channel, a support specialist might send a few DMs, a sales agent might start a thread in another channel, and maybe another team member might create a different channel. This created a mess. Everyone knew different pieces of information, the client was getting caught in the chaos, and it took way too long to get a client set up to go live. I needed to find a way to centralize these communications into one Slack channel, and connect it to the client data in Salesforce so that clients could go live as quickly and efficiently as possible without adding friction and manual effort to the process.
I’m an #AwesomeAdmin, so I knew I could automate this communication process by connecting Salesforce data with Slack using flows. I put on my #flownatic hat and built a flow that created a Slack channel for new accounts, named the channel using standard naming conventions, added the right people connected to the account, and created a pinned post in the channel with important information from Salesforce. I also brought approval processes into Slack to reduce the effort around keeping data up to date in Salesforce. And—perhaps my favorite part—I built a flow that automatically archived the channel once the account went live. Yup, I automate archiving Slack channels. BOOM!
You can see the full solution in action by watching my episode, but while you’re here, I’ll share how I approached the problem using a few of my favorite skills from the Salesforce Admin Skills Kit: communication, process automation, and designer’s mindset.
The heart of this problem was communication. Communication is what drives our work—it’s how we know what needs to be done. When we communicate effectively as admins, we accurately translate business requirements into technical requirements. So, as I approached this problem, I took in the data about what wasn’t working and translated that into what I needed to build with Salesforce (that’s the #AwesomeAdmin magic!). Throughout the project, I made sure to maintain open and accessible lines of communication with my stakeholders to make sure they understood what I was building and how it would help them do their work more efficiently. Not only were they bought into my solution, but they were excited about it!
Automation is one of the most powerful tools in our #AwesomeAdmin toolbox. So I decided to dig into my toolbox and put this one to work! Automating processes allows us to eliminate manual efforts behind complex or repetitive business processes, which makes everyone happy. By building a flow to create an automated go-live communications process, I saved my users from wasting time trying to track down information in different places and empowered them to spend more time helping the client. Automating this process also improved the integrity of data in Salesforce, which limited room for human error, meaning no one would create duplicative channels in Slack or transcribe data from Salesforce that might be outdated. Triple win!
Do you like using clunky apps? I don’t. That’s why I like to design apps and experiences with the user in mind. Using a designer’s mindset ensures that people like to use your solutions. That’s why I involved my users throughout this project, from learning about their needs to supporting them after I rolled it out. What’s the point of building something if no one likes to use it? By staying up to date with the latest Salesforce features, I can be sure I’m designing solutions—or updating existing ones—that are human-centered.
Make sure you check out my episode and the rest of “How I Solved It” on Salesforce+!
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