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24Jun

Remote and Freelancing market in Belgium

24 June 2020 Verolina Kintop Remote Market 11

Bio: Saravana is a Salesforce Expert with 6+ years of experience in Salesforce. He started his career in freelancing by creating his company (Lewafa). Before that, Saravana worked as a Salesforce Developer and Administrator in a leading company in Belgium. He is also a certified Application and System Architect. 

Saravana, are there any remote opportunities in Belgium and how does the market look like for Salesforce freelancers? 

It is still quite complicated in terms of remote opportunities, because most of the companies are “old fashioned”. They prefer people who can work onsite full time. But we have to differentiate between freelancing and remote working. Meanwhile, there is still a market for freelancers that can go to the company office (even from time to time). Still, companies don’t trust remote workers. With that said, it is important to mention that tech startups are growing a lot in Belgium. So maybe in younger environments, companies are more open to remote jobs and to trust people that are not located in Belgium.

So, you weren’t actually afraid about the difficulties and decided to start your freelancing journey …

Yes, I moved to a freelance career to have more flexibility in my schedule and to be free to take some vacations between two projects, as well as to better organize my working day.

A lot of freelancers have difficulties getting direct access to the final client, is that also the case for Belgium?

Yes, especially when it comes to big companies. They have their procedures that need to be followed and they already work with their own subcontractors, so it is complicated to get direct access. Usually, freelancers work with an intermediate like a consulting company or any other subcontractor who actually brings the client. So, quite often, a freelancer signs with an intermediary and not directly with a client. Then, the freelancer works onsite with a client. 

In your opinion, what is the best way to approach a potential new client? Would you write a direct private message on LinkedIn or search on job boards?
Well… you need to be creative about it that’s for sure!  I use different approaches including searching on job boards and LinkedIn. You can also go on the appexchange to see the companies that have published a package and try to get a contact via LinkedIn.  And of course, never forget the power of networking.

What was the method that was successful for you?
In the end, it was the networking! I found a contract because of a contact I had in the company I was working at before. This is why I said that here in Belgium, companies want people that they can trust.

Is it difficult to register and open a company as a freelancer in Belgium?

Opening a company is quite easy, the most important part is to have a good financial plan and apply in order to get and activate your VAT number.
I would like to suggest a link that was very helpful for me.

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10Jun

Why does your company have to adopt a remote and flexible work policy?

10 June 2020 Verolina Kintop Remote Market 8
Verolina Kintop

Salesforce Network’s founder

“I’ve noticed how companies struggle to find and retain skilled professionals. Yet they still don’t want to reconsider their work policies, for example, by proposing more flexible working hours”. 

The change in the way we work is in a real acceleration stage since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world, and of course, the Salesforce industry did not stand aside. CEO and Salesforce founder Marc Benioff announced that Salesforce employees could work remotely during 2020. I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that from this moment on, a new era of remote working begins. 

Modern talents want their work environment to become more flexible, or even fully remote. GlobalWorkplaceAnalytics.com data shows that the amount people who regularly work-at-home and who are among the non-self-employed population, has grown by 173% since 2005, 11% faster than the rest of the workforce. 

Personally, I’ve been working with Salesforce as a Consultant for about three years, but for the last year and a half I started to mentor and also recruit Salesforce professionals. 

Every time I propose a contract to a candidate I get the questions: 

“Are there any possibilities to work remotely? At least one or two days per week?” 

 And very often, when the answer was “no”, the candidate wasn’t interested in pursuing the role. 

“Why change the company I work for to have exactly the same conditions?”, they question. 

I’ve noticed how companies struggle to find and retain skilled professionals. Yet they still don’t want to reconsider their work policies, for example, by proposing more flexible working hours. 

Remote and freelancing work are a trend and Salesforce professionals want to be a part of it. Some want to move from big cities to smaller ones and have more time to spend with their families rather than waste it in traffic jams. Others want to get rid of micromanagement, and for others, having geographical freedom and the ability to work from wherever they want becomes a necessity.  

Thanks to the fieldwork with candidates as well as recruiters, I’ve come to understand what is happening in the market, and so the Salesforce Network project was created. The Salesforce community includes professionals looking for flexible, remote, and freelancing positions. They are looking for the future of the work realities. 

However, while candidates aspire for more flexibility, a lot of companies still prefer to have an employee in the office, 5 days of the week, with standard working hours. 

Let’s have a look at what happened on the company’s side.  Firstly, during the COVID-19 crisis, companies didn’t really have a choice and were obliged to work or hire remote resources. However, a lot of companies just stopped recruiting altogether. 

Thus, small and very specific demands came onto the market. This was because companies didn’t want to take the risk of onboarding new candidates as employees, or long-term contractors. 

Instead, they preferred to fix the most urgent of needs. What is the logic behind this? Since the projects and the tasks themselves are short, companies feel comfortable to allow remote working. 

If we don’t take COVID-19 into account with the high rise of remote opportunities, the Salesforce remote and flexible jobs market is still quite small. The majority of long-term full remote contracts on Salesforce are in the USA, and, very often, companies prefer locals as there is a question of time zone differences and probably trust. 

As for Europe, the majority of remote positions are in the UK. The rest of the remote market is mostly hidden. Remote work is considered a privilege, so usually, employees who already build trust within the company renegotiate internally to transform their office contract into a remote one. 

I’ve been working with Salesforce mostly in France, and to be honest, I haven’t seen a lot of remote positions. However, more and more flexible contracts are appearing in the market, with 1, 2, or even 3 days of remote work per week. 

Now, since we know about this trend, which projects or positions in your company you may propose to  Senior skilled profiles who are looking for partially or fully remote options if your company is still not very confident with remote possibilities but still want to try.

Remote Salesforce Support 

Remote Salesforce Support

I myself used to work with a remote developers team based in Lebanon.

So, the methodology behind it was that I received tickets in the support department, then I pre-qualified them with the client in order to be clear on what was expected. I then described it in a more techno-functional way, so the team could really understand what I was talking about, and pushed it inside ticket management software. When someone took the ticket, I could see the notification and so on. So, that is the great benefit of working remotely. You don’t need to stay behind someone’s back to manage, you don’t even need to have a person in the office. The time for the resolution is estimated in advance, so there are no surprises there. 

Online Salesforce Mentoring 

Training is not a big aspect of the market. Usually, companies ask for training to onboard new people, or to reinforce skills when a new role is taken, or even

to sometimes help juniors not get lost when they start to work onsite with the client. Mentoring is something you don’t really need a person onsite for.

Sometimes, companies still ask for it, but as a Salesforce Admin Trainer, I did 90% of my job online as many schools and coaches in other sectors do right now. 

Agile Salesforce Projects – 100%!

Communication is a key to success when it comes to implementing Salesforce and yet becomes even more important if you work with a remote team.

So, I work on Scrum, one of the most popular agile approaches which are actually based on short cycles, called sprints.

As soon as a feature is delivered, it is tested and then deployed. That is why they are called quick sprints, as they ensure the delivery, let’s say once a week.

So, the concepts of remote and agile for me are on the same level.

Small team projects with clear goals

When the team is quite small and can stay close to each other, communicating smoothly every day is easy to do. At the same time, it is important to be really clear about what is expected from the beginning. I remember I once worked as an online mentor for one learning platform and they just sent me videos about my future task and a huge document to read. Remote doesn’t mean that you digitise everything and leave another person to figure out what is expected. For me, remote working means working closely with each other, even closer than at the office. When you have to wait for the meeting to start, the advantage of remote is that you can use a new communications tool which makes communication something more natural and effective. 

Summary 

As it is so difficult to attract and retain Senior Salesforce professionals, remote and flexible hours at work is the way to become more attractive to candidates and attract talents. It is also proof of being a modern company, which builds internal relationships with employees based on trust. If you’re interested in building your employer branding strategy or need to get a Salesforce professional on board, feel free to get in touch with me. 

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08May

3 Myths about Remote Working in the Salesforce Ecosystem

8 May 2020 Verolina Kintop Remote Market 8

The Salesforce Economy will create 3.3 million new jobs by 2022. These are great opportunities, but how many of these jobs will be for remote workers?

In this post, I will uncover the state of remote working in the Salesforce Ecosystem and explain why the 3 common objections to hiring remote workers I hear most often, are in fact, not true.

‘Remote’ is a Trend

Everyone is talking about remote jobs. It is highly beneficial for companies: cost reduction, happier employees, better productivity, and so on.

Remote work is a hot trend, but what is the reality like for experts working in Salesforce, an ecosystem-based entirely around a cloud-based solution?

Over the last 8 months, I experienced this myself – how hard it can be to get a remote job, freelance contract or an internship?

About a year ago, I moved with my family from Paris to Malta. I wanted to have a little bit more time to build my entrepreneurial projects and work remotely. France is a big Salesforce market and Salesforce experts are extremely in-demand there. I used to have a lot of propositions for freelance or employee contracts, in fact, I had so many offers that I assured myself that getting a remote job wouldn’t be such a big deal. Since you have the skills, experience, references, it should be easy, right? But very soon after, I realised that the remote market is completely different from on-site because you are in competition with the entire world.

What Happens Inside the Salesforce Remote Job Market?

Here are two factors I believe have shaped the remote job market for Salesforce experts.

First of all, the majority of remote positions are based in the USA. As you can imagine, American companies will prioritise workers based in the USA. In  90% of cases the job description indicates that the position is for the USA-based candidates only. The primary reason for that is a practical one, related to time-zone; it is much more difficult for the company to work with someone 6 or 10 hours away, than someone who is situated in the same time-zone.

Personally, I applied to Salesforce remote positions for myself and I also sent Partnership Propositions to a lot of consulting companies in the USA, but without much luck.

Ten days ago I started sending messages to Salesforce managers, HR,  people working in consulting companies, anyone I could find on LinkedIn related some way or another to Salesforce. I was asking them about paid or non-paid (volunteer) remote internships for students of my online school. Despite the real value we’re offering (trained students who record a short video of their proposal for your project), the word “Remote” is still holding back companies. Quite often, you get the response: Remote? No, thank you.

Why? Now we come to the other reason: trust. Here are 3 myths I have heard from different types of companies while doing my research.

Myth 1: We need Juniors onsite

“We need people on-site because they are juniors and they won’t be able to work alone”.

Well, it is true they are juniors, but why do you think they won’t be able to work alone? I remember my first project very well. When I started to work on the Salesforce platform, I was in the office, but just because I was there physically made no real difference to the level of help my colleagues could give me; because they had their own work to do, they answered my questions as much as they could, and I honestly don’t see how it would have been any different had I been working remotely.

If you have a school with a personal senior mentor who supports the student when they are in need to help, why be afraid of remote since it is really a win-win partnership?

Myth 2: We trust people onsite

“We need people on-site because we are not sure that they actually work at home”.

Without someone watching to keep them accountable, some employers think that standards and work ethic will slip. Well, that is easy to check.

Every step that you do on Salesforce has a visible result. Dashboard configuration, validation or workflow rule. You don’t manage your project without knowing which task your intern or freelancer completes, and which deadline they have for this task, do you?

If you are still in the old project management methods this is a great time to change and start using a result-oriented methodology. This means that remote workers have to work towards goals with deadlines (mini sprints), so it is easy to follow what has been completed. You won’t need to control remote workers, so long as they deliver the work.

This is what we do with our students; you provide a task and our students complete the task remotely. Ask for results, and stop worrying.

Myth 3: We need people onsite for collaboration

“We need people on-site because they have to work closely with users”

It is true that a Salesforce Admin, for example, has to work with users almost on a daily basis – but, it is not true that they have to be in the office to complete this work successfully.

Last year, I worked as a freelancer in a big American company with an office in Paris. In the beginning, I was recruited exactly for this reason “work closely with users in order to provide them support”, but in one year I met users probably two or three times for workshops. The entire work for support was achieved through a ticketing system, and sometimes I called them to better understand their requirements. Later, I completed a Salesforce audit for the same company, and my managers were based in the UK and USA. I’ve never seen them, but still, I was asked to come into the office every day. Why? Because it is better to see the person here, working. However, the side effect is that it’s demotivating that people don’t trust you.

Since January 2019, I probably received about 30-40 job offers, the majority from recruiting companies, and some as a result of applying myself. I barely say the word “Remote” and the conversation stops. So, it is not only about juniors, it works on the same way for experienced experts as well.

Summary

We work in an ecosystem-based around a cloud solution, which means that with internet access, remote positions are now a real possibility, especially when it comes to attracting great talent. While companies are chasing to attract the best talent, the best way to do it is to propose flexible and meaningful jobs. However, without fluid communication process and planning on both sides, you may still have some frustrations.

This article covered the remote job market for Salesforce experts, as well as difficulties which can face a candidate when companies avoid hiring remotely, even if remote work is feasible.

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