Akash Mishra - New Delhi, India Nonprofit Group

This blog is part of a blog series to highlight Salesforce Community Champion, from user group leaders, developer group leaders, and members from around the world #Ohana

Today, I would like to introduce one of the community champions from New Delhi - India, Akash Mishra

• Senior Salesforce Developer and Team Lead at Dazeworks
• 6+ years of dedicated hard-core development on the Salesforce success platform, been through different roles in my career like Developer, Sr. Dev., Team Lead. 
• Core member of IndiaDreamin, founder of New Delhi - India Non-profit Group, Non-profit speaker at Hyderabad Trailblazin, founder Not-For-Profit Hackathon in India.

Fun Facts:
Salesforce Developer | Salesforce Evangelist | Creative Nerd | Blogger | Supports WIT and Race to Equality | Supports Non-profits and Pledge 1% | Trailhead Geek | Father of two | Sportsperson | Extreme Foodie

Career:
Started my career as a Jr. Chef in the year 2006 at Holiday-Inn where I worked for 1.5 yrs after I completed Hotel Management.

Due to the family of engineers where I belong to, I turned back and took admission in B-Tech, while I was in my final semester, one of my close friend (Salesforce MVP, Vinay Chaturvedi) suggested me to learn Salesforce and that turned out to be a life-changing moment for me. 

I started my Salesforce journey in 2012 and never looked back, I really appreciate and admire Cheryl Feldman for her words The best thing I ever developed over the Salesforce Platform is my career, I feel exactly the same. 

Salesforce according to me is a "Customer success platform if you're a customer/end user, Student Success Platform for all Students/Aspirants, Employee success platform if you're a Salesforce employee, WIT success platform if you're one among "Women who Salesforce", all I want to say is, It's a success platform for every soul that breathes in Salesforce ecosystem", and I am proud of being a member of this incredible #Ohana. 

I've co-leaded Noida Salesforce Developer group and still lead New-Delhi, India Nonprofit Group, where I managed all the meetup activities and till date, we have successfully hosted 11 meetups and involved in the volunteer-ship activities for Nonprofits in the region. 

I also helped in planning strategies and execution of the first ever IndiaDreamin and am a core member. I have been running the #SFDC4Students campaign with Vinay Chaturvedi, since 2016, focusing on students from different colleges and helping them learn and build a successful career on the Salesforce Platform. 

Due to recent changes in the ecosystem, I had a choice between Noida Salesforce Developer group and New Delhi, In Nonprofit Group, I choose to be a part of the Nonprofit group as I believed there's still something missing that needs help, organizing India's first Not-For-Profit Hackathon was a big success. 

I am part of campaign #SFDC4Students initiated by/with Vinay Chaturvedi to support the Notion of “Giving Back” to the Salesforce community. #SFDC4Students is the campaign run and managed under Salesforce community in the region, to bring more developers in Salesforce, for the reason we target colleges and do regular meetings in there, help the students learn Salesforce through Trailhead.


How and where will you see your Salesforce group and community in the future?
My definition for the amazing Trailblazer community in one line is, "People helping people grow". This is what inspires and motivates you to be at your best and support the person next to you and the person next to him and next and so on, that's really a #BAM show. 

I watch the amazing Trailblazer community reaching new heights and lead the world by example, it's 4th Industrial revolution and this is the world of Salesforce, building a new culture for the technology industry, that's so incredible. 

New Delhi, India Nonprofit Group, is my life; it allows me think beyond Salesforce Evangelism and philanthropy, finding new initiatives and ways to impart more knowledge and skills to the members of the Trailblazer community in my region, collaborating and communicating to various NPO’s/NGO’s in the region to discover more volunteers activities, generating more fundraising opportunities through community events and help them use Salesforce success platform to grow like never before. 

Till now it’s been an absolutely exciting journey from nowhere to state of stability as far as knowledge about Salesforce for Nonprofit  is concerned in the region, but lot to be mended still, I see more Nonprofit/HEDA/K12 customers of Salesforce in India in the coming years as there is a huge count of  Non-profits and Educational societies- trusts working in every region of India.

One last thing you would like to share with the community:
The #TrailblazerCommunity is placed we work together to help the people, we grow together and equal, we follow the true values of our technology and we evangelize the same way across. Keep inspiring! Keep motivating! Keep trailblazing!

Pritam Shekhawat - Noida Salesforce User Group

This blog is part of a blog series to highlight Salesforce Community Champion, from user group leaders, developer group leaders, and members from around the world #Ohana

In this blog, I would like to introduce one of the community champions from Noida - India, Pritam Shekhawat, he is Salesforce Noida User Group co-leader, and he is also very active in Salesforce Answer Community.

Tell us about yourself, which User Group you lead?
I am 3x Salesforce Certified Developer and Salesforce Lightning lover and champ. The most imperative thing which I like about Salesforce is giving back. There aren’t sufficient words in the lexicon to portray the essentialness of giving back. Also, egotistically, when I give my time and vitality to others, I simply feel better — about myself and my group.

No matter how much time I have, I am a big fan of Answers Community where I have been answering for almost 2.5 years. My count is over 9000 answers now and I am inspired to never stop contributing.

Here’s my example of overcoming adversity that as of late got distributed on:

• Salesforce MVP Vinay’s (Noida User Group Leader) "Know Your Answers Community Leaders" site. 
• My Salesforce story distributed at 3x Salesforce MVP Eric Dreshfield’s online journal.
• Salesforce in 2017: Predictions for the Future with Mason Frank.
• My guest blog “Tips For Classic To Lightning” on Salesforce MVP Sharif’s site.

I started my career back in the year 2014 and I hold 3-year hardcore Salesforce Implementation experience. Currently, I lead Noida Salesforce User Group, which is the most vibrant user group in India. It was set up by my friend Vinay Chaturvedi, who supported me here. 

I am also involved in the campaign #SFDC4Students which focus on Students and train them to be successful with Salesforce, with the sole aim of bringing more developers in Technology.


How do you become User Group leader? and how is your journey when taking the role as User Group leader?
I use to collaborate in the events managed and run under Noida Salesforce User Group. Also, I am involved in other meetups by other User/Developer groups in the region. That gave me to gain experience in managing and executing such events successfully and that's the reason why Vinay assigned me the group leader for Noida User Group, which is the most successful group in the region and India, I was always a big fan of.


How often your User Group meet up?
As we have a large community here who support us, we plan a meetup every 40 days, more than just the members, we all are friends, the reason is we meet so frequently and so many exciting stuff keep on happening here in the Noida region.


How long have been your User Group established?
I believe 2+ years approx if I am not wrong.


How big is your user group member attend for the meetup in average?
The last event held here recently "#TDX17", we got an attendance of 134 members who joined us.


What have you learned as User Group leader?
So one big learning is "Team work is dream work". We have a really big team of developers here in the region which is ready to help us in everything and every decision. 
Every member here is technically sound and good speakers, they all are real gems from the community.


What do you love being User Group leader?
Being a team leader, I feel proud being within the community and support it grow. I look at it as an opportunity to learn and live together. I am a fan of #OhanaCulture.


What do the challenges become User Group leader and how to overcome it?
Two big challenges I believe here are:
a) How to grow the size and how to improve the quality of meetups.
b) What important steps could be, in order to raise the number of #WIT members in the group.


Tell us what is unique about your User Group
One big unique here is that: "Noida Salesforce User Group" helping the campaign #SFDC4Students to support the Notion of “Giving Back” to the Salesforce community. 

#SFDC4Students is the campaign run and managed by Salesforce community in the region, to bring more developers in Salesforce, for the reason we target colleges and do regular meetups in there, help the students learn Salesforce through Trailhead.


Share us tips that make your User Group success
I am a co-leader in Noida Salesforce User Group and I should say, every member of our group is a leader, with equal opportunities to present himself or to speak, equal opportunities to learn and teach. We respect every girly appearance in our group and with each meetup, we plan something special for our #WIT soldiers.


What would like to see your User Group in the future? 
I am currently looking at and focus on the students, so I would love to see more students joining us and being successful with Salesforce.


One last thing you would like to share with the community
As I always said and will say it again, "For I can't help falling in love with" #SalesforceOhana. 
I love being here and I really love the words said by "Cheryl Fieldman": "The best thing I developed on the Salesforce Platform, is my Career". 
Working on Salesforce Platform has worked wonders for me and many others I know. 

Simplysfdc comment: it always feels great when seeing you guys, with full of the energy in serving the community. Keep up the awesome works mate!

Vipul Goel - Ohanachai of Salesforce community from New Delhi

This blog is part of a blog series to highlight Salesforce Community Champion, from user group leaders, developer group leaders, and members from around the world #Ohana

In this blog, I would like to introduce one of the community champion from New Delhi - India, he is active in Noida Developer Group, Chandigarh Developer Group, and India Dreamin '17. also heading Ohanachai a virtual coffee session with Amy Oplinger.

Hello Vipul, tell me about yourself, which Salesforce group you lead, and how many co-leaders in your Developer Group?
I'm associated with Salesforce for more than 4 years now. I'm Senior associate now & holding 2 certifications, much more lined up this year. I'm also leading Salesforce Chandigarh Developer Group with Paarth Jolly & Madan Khichi as well as a helping hand to Salesforce Indian Community driven event "INDIA DREAMIN" and Moreover, I'm collaborating with Amy Oplinger to have virtual coffee sessions with Salesforce Ohana Family.

I was the most de-motivated & discourages person and never thought about my career to follow this #salesforce route with a big success.


Share us your journey and growth with Salesforce Chandigarh Salesforce Developer Group?
Still, I remember the day when I attended the first Salesforce Noida Developer Group Meetup with Zachary Jeans in June 2016. I was new to this Salesforce Community and got the guidance from Vinay Chaturvedi, Madan Khichi, and Atul Gupta. Due to this Salesforce Ohana family collaboration, now our group has been grown up to more than 200 members. 

Then I have a lot of key discussions with Madan Khichi about the handling, responsibilities of Developer Group.

Responsibilities of handling Salesforce Developer Group:
1. It's a tough job to manage all the things simultaneously.
2. Events, Salesforce Success community collaboration, Handling all the Developers & admins to collaborate with each other, knowledge sharing sessions, Salesforce awareness.
3. It looks very simple from outside but behind the scene, there are many things we need to manage.


What do you love being a group leader?
I love people motivating, inspiring and discussing the Salesforce new features which kick off me to work hard myself for the new features and spread over to the community.

NOTE: Sharing is caring, so giving back to the community.


Tell us one thing you want to share with Salesforce community.
Moreover, today I want to discuss the career growth of students who are involved in Salesforce, and who are keen to know about Salesforce.

Whosoever wants to think about their career in Salesforce, It's better to do certification of their own before getting into the job.
Because this helps you in getting the job little easier because you should be knowing the Salesforce infrastructure before getting to the Salesforce career.

Mainly in India with a lot of population and software engineers, people find it difficult to get into the job. It's just a way around so that they can give a try to get the job this way and build their career.  

All credit goes to my brother who helps me in every way. Moreover, I've surprise for Salesforce Community that I do have a TWIN brother "Vineet Goel" and he loves blogging about Salesforce: https://vineetgoelcloudblog.wordpress.com/

Simplysfdc comment: Thanks Vipul for sharing your Salesforce journey with us, good to see your career, skill, and leadership growth for Salesforce community and ecosystem.  

Sonika Tomar - Salesforce, Gurgaon Women In Tech User Group (India)

This blog is part of a blog series to highlight Salesforce Community Champion, from user group leaders, developer group leaders, and members from around the world #Ohana

Introducing our community champion Sonika Tomar - Salesforce, Gurgaon Women In Tech User Group leader.

Tell us about yourself, how is your Salesforce journey? Are you the group founder, and any other co-leaders in your group?
My name is Sonika Tomar. I have been working as a “Salesforce Consultant” for more than 3 years. At the very outset, I started my journey as VFX artist. 

After then, SaaSnic gave me an opportunity to step in Salesforce. I started learning Salesforce through “SaaSnic Technologies”. I am pleased to change my direction in Salesforce as it has many valuable career opportunities to volunteer. 

Today, I am proud to be part of Salesforce echo system and I am proud that I am leading “Salesforce, Gurgaon Women In Tech User Group”. I don’t have any co-leader as I myself can flourish the group efficiently.

Yes, I am the group founder and leader of the WIT group and I am administrating the group with brimming competence. 


What is WIT group? Is that only for women?
I do believe that every individual is exclusive in his own way just as a fingerprint is and women also must be given equal chance to prove their individuality. The contribution of women can be seen enormously in all fields. Nowadays, women are becoming more and more inclined towards mechanization. 

Current scenario has witnessed many welfare programs for women. Salesforce development is one of the platforms which has taken a great initiative for women empowerment by launching WIT groups globally.

WIT is the acronym for “Women Integrated Technology”. The aphorism of WIT is “Cheers to feminism and the strength all women possess”. 

WIT will work seamlessly for a betterment of women, and to make them realize how valuable, powerful and commendable they are. The purpose of starting WIT group is to promote more and more females in this high-tech world by conducting stirring discussions with them.

Yes, WIT is a female-centric group where they have the freedom to come up with their vision, issues, ambitions, and guidance they are viewing for in the technical world. I hope this initiative will influence more females to work distinctively.


Do you have the standard local group (User or Developer) in your city?
Yes, we do have few groups around the city which comprise of both male and female. Executives from various spheres come up with their unique outlook. This group basically organizes technical sessions and hold discussions on the essence of Salesforce. 


How long have been your group established?
It has been approximately 6 months since “Gurgaon WIT User Group” started. I have organized two kickoff events so far. The events were graced by the presence of more than 20 females and to my surprise, most of them had already made a mark in Salesforce. Conversations of the members were mainly concentrated on how revenue is earned from CRM, advanced outgrowth and how rapidly market is booming in Salesforce.  


How often your group meetup?
I have proposed to organize an event quarterly. Women from all areas can hook-up the link with the group and can debate on the topics like high valued marketing companies, cloud computing, and other vital issues. This made the members more acquainted with the current trends in the market.


How big is your user group member, and members attend for the meetup in average?
The thought of WIT-a new beginning for females gave me the courage to take a step which will make a significant difference for the place of women in society. I knew I had to broaden my vision with more brilliant and innovative ideas and plans to gather members. 

I started the group with the aim of involving as many females as possible. I managed to attract 50 girls and more than 20 members attended the events. As WIT excelled more and more women came in. I am delighted to reveal that at present my group constitutes 120 members and I hope to lay an everlasting impact with my modest initiative.


What have you learned as a group leader?
The thought of becoming a leader is a matter of great responsibility as you have to supervise all the tasks by yourself. Leading a Salesforce group demanded extensive knowledge about not only Salesforce but social media, web services, IT infrastructure and all the latest technologies. 

I would like to convey my genuine and earnest acknowledgment to “SaaSnic Technologies” and its efficient executives for their commendable support and cooperation which assisted me to master in Salesforce. 

As a group leader, I learned the art of coordination and how to cope up with different people. I even expanded my knowledge regarding the recent developments prominent in the market.


What do you love being a group leader?
Leadership requires many skills like good orientation, positive attitude, and commitment towards your work. Discovering your group’s vision is vital to prosper in your endeavors. 

Being a group leader I got an opportunity to come in contact with some of the incredibly talented people not only in Salesforce but from other spheres as well. The group consisted of people from all age groups. Some were college students and were seeking for appropriate career choices. 

After attending the event they were swayed to choose Salesforce as a career. I always love to meet new folk and share my knowledge & experiences with them. 


What do the challenges become a group leader and how to overcome it?
The biggest challenge which came during my journey of establishing WIT was to inculcate in myself the appropriate proficiency in Salesforce. Apart from this I also had to deal with time-management, prioritizing the events, thinking wisely and making correct decisions.

To overcome this I had to increase my efficiency so that I could be an inspiration for the members of the group. After seeing the success of my group all these things seem trivial now.


What do you think the "uniqueness" of your Group compare to others?
I wanted to serve as a guiding light in the lives of those women who felt hesitant to face the world. Keeping this perception in mind I took a step forward to lay a foundation of WIT. The concept of bringing women at the front foot in the field of automation is unique in itself. 

Salesforce has elaborated the group’s perspective to a next level. My main motive is to lend voice to all the females and encourage them to work productively which will enhance an individuals’ personality.      


Share us tips that make your group success 
When we initiate a group then it is expected from the group leader to be patient as you need to deal with people with different psychologies. It is expected from a leader to be open-minded and listen to the audience as only then can the leader give his advice. It is the responsibility of a leader to be more flexible and committed and serve his role systematically. As of my group my association with Salesforce made it huge.   


What would like to see your group in the future? 
As the group is progressing with time my expectations are also growing. I have the perception of making WIT an epic in Salesforce through the participation of women. 

A number of female intellectuals are prompting to be associated with the group which is a great achievement for me. WIT acknowledges the unbeatable spirit of women.


One last thing you would like to share with the community?
Women must be given equality in every sector. They must be stimulated to work by identifying their strengths be it in gathering knowledge in Salesforce, Information Technology, cloud-computing or any other field. 

Simplysfdc comment: thanks for sharing Gurgaon Women In Tech User Group with us, and thanks for your leadership for the community.

Madan Khichi - Salesforce Bengaluru Developer Group

This blog is part of a blog series to highlight Salesforce Community Champion, from user group leaders, developer group leaders, and members from around the world #Ohana

From the biggest Salesforce User Group / Developer Group, I would like to introduce Madan Khichi - Salesforce Bengaluru Developer Group leaders.

Tell us about yourself, which Developer Groups you lead?
I have associated with Salesforce 5 years back. Currently, I am a Sr. Salesforce Consultant and holding 4 certifications.

I am leading:
- Bengaluru Salesforce Developer Group with Abhilash Kuntar
- Bangalore Student Salesforce Developer Group with Kishore BT 
- Chandigarh Salesforce Developer Group with Paarth Jolly and Vipul Goel
- Coimbatore Salesforce Developer Group with Sujesh Ramachandran

I am working very closely with Bengaluru Salesforce Developer Group. So, Today, I want to discuss Bengaluru Group.


Would you like to share the journey with Salesforce and User Group? and what made you would like to lead the group? 
I remember the days when I was searching the job and one of my friends told me about Salesforce meetups. First time I have attained meetup, was on October 21, 2012 and from that, I got depth knowledge of Salesforce.

One day I was discussing with my friend Anurag Malpani to be a part of developer group, by looking my interest he made me the Co-Leader of Bengaluru group and I announced my first meetup on Oct 11, 2014.


How often you plan for group meetup?
We planned to announce meetups in the interval of 2 months but looking at the interested of people till date we have announced 22 meetups in 34 months.


How long have been your group established?
Around 7 years (May 3, 2010).


How big is your user group member, meaning the number of members attend for the meetup?
This is the “World Biggest Group” with 3318 members. Every meetup we are crossing the150 attendees.


What have you learned as group leader?
There are lot more things which I have learned while leading developer group such as:
- Taking the responsibility
- Coordinating with the leaders and attendees
- Management skills and knowledge


What do you love being a group leader?
It’s lot more fun to share my experience and knowledge with others and get connected with new people.


What do the challenges as a group leader and how to overcome it?
Challenges:
As the meetups are very frequent, it’s hard to arrange speakers and relevant topics. The arrangement of place as sometimes the count of attendees are more than from expectation.

Solution:
We have prepared a Google sheet, which is attached to our meetup page. Whom so ever is interested, can fill their information with the topic. For high level meetups companies are coming to sponsor.


What do you think the "uniqueness" about your Developer Group compare to others?
We are in “India's silicon valley”, where we can get a diverse audience like dev’s, admin, consultant, and customers also.



Share us tips that make your Developer Group success
We are pushing Bengaluru Salesforce Ohana to came and present/share their knowledge.


What would like to see your groups in the future? 
Planning for a big event where thousands of people can attend and take the knowledge from speaker’s.


One last thing you would like to share with the community
It’s a great platform where everyone can share their knowledge and ideas. Salesforce Ohana is always there to give hands for the growth and always appreciate the efforts which we are putting. 

Simplysfdc comment: I am very impressed with your dedication to the community. Is being a Developer Group leader your hobby? All the best with Bengaluru Calling and hope it makes a great impact and benefits for the community!!

Rajiv Bhatt - Ahmedabad Salesforce Developer Group

This is a blog series to highlight Salesforce Community Champion, from user group leaders, developer group leaders, and members of the community from around the world #Ohana

This blog will share about Ahmedabad Salesforce Developer Group - Rajiv Bhatt. Rajiv is Technical Architect at the world Leader in Quote-to-Cash - APTTUS.

Tell us about yourself, which Salesforce Developer Group you lead, and how many co-leaders in your group?
I am currently working as a Technical Architect at APTTUS, and I co-lead the Ahmedabad Salesforce Developer Group along with two other co-leaders - Gaurang Bhatt and Anil Yadav.


But, I also heard that you also build Chrome extensions related to Salesforce, would you like to share a bit?
Record and Metadata Comparator: This extension lets you compare Record data values and object metadata in Salesforce and compare the differences in just four clicks! Get it from here
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/record-and-metadata-compa/laghgcpekjofijkmojnhfeiplbffaljp?hl=en

SOQL Extractor: Extract SOQL queries with their execution counts from Debug Logs of Salesforce. Helps you analyze the 'Too Many SOQLs' error. For installation instructions, users should check the instructions under "Support" tab. Get it from here
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/soql-extractor-and-analyz/deihalhihjdilndoidoclmhmgllebkfj


Can you share how do you become group co-leader? and what make you interested in accepting the role as the group co-leader? 
Last year few college students reached out to me as they were curious to know more about Salesforce and they had no idea where to get started. Trailhead came to rescue but they had a lot of follow-up questions. Around the same time, I came to know about #SalesforceSaturday from Atul Gupta. It was just a perfect click. 

A lot of my peers and Salesforce devs from other organizations agreed to volunteer and we planned to meetup every Saturday and do trailhead modules together. We wanted to reach out to as many people as we could so we created a meetup group and started sharing information on social media. These #SalesforceSaturday sessions were not just for students but for anyone who wanted to get started with their career on Salesforce or wanted to learn more about Salesforce. 

Our first meetup was in April '16 and then we did around 10 #SalesforceSaturday sessions until August'16 to complete the Admin trail. The group went on to have 500+ members however the sessions came to a halt as colleges started again and the students could no longer make it coz of their exam and other busy schedules. 

Thanks to Kiran and Gaurang for recognizing our community efforts around the same time and they appointed me as one of the co-organizers for Ahmedabad DG to take the community ahead. 

Unfortunately I was on back to back business trips after that so I could actually start contributing to community efforts only since Jan '17. 

Btw, I am now looking forward to collaborating with student leaders from different colleges who can be the co-organizer of that group and make it an official "Student Salesforce Developer group". We can provide them the required guidance and mentor-ship and this way they also get to inculcate leadership and other skills during the course of their education. It would be a win-win for everyone!


How often your group meetup?
We try to meet up once or twice in a quarter. 


When is the Ahmedabad Salesforce Developer Group established?
 It was founded in September 2012 though I got involved and started contributing only since last 6 months.


How big is your user group member, and the number of members attend the meetup?
The user group is around 450 members of which at least 100 are active. We usually have around 30-50 people attending the meetups. 


What have you learned as group co-leader?
There is definitely lots of learning involved, be it organizing skills, managing skills or people skills. Through these meetups I learned that there is nothing more fulfilling then giving back to the community.


What do you love being group leaders?
The best part is getting to interact with everyone in the community and a platform to give back to the community. It offers excellent networking opportunity as group leaders are the hub connected to different spokes. We help people by connecting them with each other. 

Like few months ago few students reached out to us when they needed guidance for their final year project. We called out for few volunteers who would be interested to help them. Initially few volunteers helped them and after they got busy I took up the challenge and guided them through the entire phase. It gives a tremendous sense of achievement when we heard back that because of this project and their hands-on experience they managed to crack an interview and got a job even before their results are out. 


What do the challenges become a group leader and how to overcome it?
The biggest challenge is to get more active participation from the community to attend the meetups. We are trying our best to get good speakers with relevant content so that more people attend meetup and understand the value of attending these meetups. 

We have also planned to invite MVPs and other DUG leaders to our meetups so that they could share their experiences and motivate others. 


Tell us what is unique about your group
We have a very diverse audience - admins (aspiring to be devs), devs, entrepreneurs having industry experience of 1-10+ yrs.


Share us tips that make your group success?
We give equal opportunity to everyone to present at the meetup. Many people want to present but have no idea about the topics and need some guidance to get started. 

With little push and guidance, we try to encourage new speakers to present at the meetup. This is an excellent platform to develop personal/professional skills and everyone should get to leverage and experience it. 


What would like to see your group in the future?
Of course, growth in terms of participation in meetup group. We would also like to see more people stepping up to present at the meetups. We have plans to kickoff new batches of #SalesforceSaturday, trailheadathon or if possible even a hackathon.


One last thing you would like to share with the community
Don't wait, just get started! Many people wait to take initiatives i.e. they want to do things only after they get officially appointed as DG leader or MVP. I would say if you really want to contribute back to the community then never wait for anything. Just start contributing in a way you want and things will fall in place. #SalesforceOhana is always there to support you.

Simplysfdc comment: that is awesome to see the students in Ahmedabad are so enthusiast in learning Salesforce and how awesome Trailhead for this. I see you guys doing a very good for the community with #SalesforceSaturday, thanks again for sharing!


Good to see you in Apttus, it is a big name and great product in Salesforce ecosystem, and Apttus just sponsor our last Singapore meetup with a great speaker.

Salesforce Community Champion map, who next? Find out here...

Paarth Jolly - Chandigarh Developer Group (India)

This is a blog series to highlight Salesforce Community Champion, from user group leaders, developer group leaders, and members from around the world.

In this first blog, I would like to introduce Paarth Jolly, a very talented and young professional (still pursuing college) in Salesforce technology, he is also a co-leader of Chandigarh Salesforce Developer Group in India, holds 3 Salesforce certificates, and 100 Trailhead badges.

Tell us about yourself, which Developer Group you lead, and how many co-leaders in your group?
I lead Chandigarh Salesforce Developer Group, there are 3 more co-leaders along with me.
I started working on Salesforce platform at the age of 18 after my 12th grade and now I am in 3rd year of my bachelor degree and work as a freelance Salesforce Consultant. Also, you can read my success story at David Liu's blog page.


Would you like to share with us how you become Developer Group leader, and your journey becoming Developer Group leader? 
Sure, I was not a group founder. Actually that all started when I planned to visit #Traiheadthon at New Delhi Salesforce Developer Group, the reason behind that I wanted to start a Developer Group (DG) but had no clue about the responsibilities. 
After that with the help of Regina Walton and Atul Gupta (New Delhi DG), I got to know about the existing Developer Group in Chandigarh and contacted the existing co-leader (Madan Khichi), he was happy taking me in as a co-leader.


How often your group meetup?
Quarterly, moreover, we also have started #SalesforceSaturday - Coffee Special (every second - fourth Saturday of the month).


How long have been your group established?
It was founded Jun 29, 2016 (1st anniversary coming soon).


How many members in average members attended for the meetup?
30-40 members.


Do you learn something being a Developer Group co-leader?
Yes, of course, being a group leader is a tough job, maybe it looks simple from outside but it is difficult. Things I learned:
Learn - learn from every member of your community, everyone has a unique thing. 
Grow - grow and groom yourself with others, in presence of others.
Share - share the idea's of community within the community.


What do you love being a group leader?
I love motivating and helping people, I got help when I started my career so why not pass the legacy.


What do the challenges become a group leader and how you overcome it?
Biggest challenge according to me is managing time for each individual. If you are asking someone to come to the meetup, it is your responsibility to make sure that the time they spend is utilized in learning things and growth of their personality, traits, and thinking.
I try my best to make everything perfect in the meetup and share the quality of time with each individual, taking their feedback and making things better in upcoming meetups.


Tell us what is unique about your Developer Group
Our group fellow members are developers, admins, sales person, director, until CEO, but we also have students from colleges. Actually, the audience of our group is our strength.

Being a developer and interacting with other developers will increase your development skills, but interacting with sales person will be more beneficial as the conversation will take place in the form of consultancy and both the parties would benefit from each other - mindset and expertise.


Share us tips that make your group success
- The audience plays an amazing role in your meetup.
- Give every single person quality of time, because some people hesitate to attend, it's our responsibility to answer their questions.
- Ask the new members to present.
- At last, take feedbacks.


What would like to see your group in the future? 
We are now strong 188 members, hope it goes at least to 400 in a year, every member gets Salesforce Certified Professional and performs well in Salesforce technology.


One last thing you would like to share with the community
At last, I would like to say, being part of the group is a really great experience and I love being part of it. I get to learn and grow as an individual on a whole everytime I meet new people. Also, the ones who get involved in the meetups tend to benefit the same.

I hope that more and more of individuals get to know about Salesforce, its technology, work experience, advantages and scope in near future and get attracted towards this field of interest. I would love working with new individuals, getting to know them, learning and growing with them. 

Special thanks to Madan Khichi to support me and helping me out in making me a leader at Chandigarh Developer Group, and Vipul Goel for supporting the ideas for Salesforce community in Chandigarh.

Simplysfdc comment: Paarth, thanks for the sharing about your journey as developer group co-leader, you are doing such a great job for the community in the region, I hope will see you one day. 

One personal notes, I never heard a place called Chandigarh, you have successfully promoted the city to the world.