Failing Forward to Salesforce Success- Parth Vasani — #SFIndiaTour #DF16
My name is Parth Vasani. I hail from a middle class family, born and brought up in Valsad, Gujarat. I have always had an interest in Application Development. In the last semester of my bachelor’s degree, I worked on a project that was implemented in Microsoft .Net framework. It was an end to end implementation for online shopping, and as such, I faced many late nights coding. Despite the late nights, I found that I enjoyed implementing and performed well for the project. That project was where I got the real taste of the IT industry.
Having completed my Bachelor studies, I moved to Pune, Maharshtra to pursue a Master’s degree in Computer Applications. During my time there, I met people from all different walks of life, many of whom are still friends today. In fact, while in Pune, I met a well known and renowned personality in IT industry. He asked me about my goals, and he suggested I look at the Salesforce website. At that time, cloud computing was barely known as more than a concept in India. It was love at first sight! I had a real ‘wow’ moment when I realized a person needs only a computer and an internet connection to get started with Salesforce!
After completing my Master’s, I knew I had to devise a plan to pursue a job in the IT industry. I truly believe that proper planning is an important part in finding the right position. So, I devised three plans to attain my dream job.
My first plan was seemingly simple: Apply at each and every company (at least in Pune) and get a job. I followed this plan for three months, and unfortunately, was rejected by every company. I began feeling down, as if I was seeing black clouds everywhere. My friends were landing jobs, but I was not. This first failed attempt caused me to take serious time to reflect, and move forward with my second plan.
For my next effort, I decided to get a bit creative. I built a healthcare management app that covers doctors, patients and hospital, giving complete solutions on a click on mobile and then move onto product development company. The idea was to build a demo product and then pitch this to VC’s. One fine day, a call came from my entrepreneur friend in California. We discussed the app, and my friend was ready to invest a decent amount. We were on the verge of signing an agreement with one of the known hospitals of Pune but could not agree on Terms & Conditions. The deal fell through. Undeterred by this one setback, we submitted our proposal to 500 Startups based in Silicon Valley, mainly global venture capital seed fund and startup accelerators. We were rejected across the board. We tried one more time as we pitched our product to VC’s in Pune, but were again met with rejection. This plan was certainly a harsh learning curve for me.
After succeeding only in failure, my brother recommended me to meet his friend. Once again Salesforce was the topic. With nothing to lose, my third plan was all Salesforce. I started working and reading the workbooks, ”Force.com Fundamentals” and “Development with Force.com Fundamentals” book, then created proof of concepts and small projects. Having prepared well with Salesforce, I finally landed my first job. It was Salesforce that saved me. I feel fortunate that my first project was quite large; 2000+ users! Since then, there was no looking back. I currently hold 3 certifications: Certified Salesforce Administrator, Salesforce.com Certified Force.com Developer, and Salesforce Certified Platform Developer I.
My dream job is to one day to work at Salesforce. But for now, I am focusing on giving back to the community! I have trained and mentored more than 600 students and 800 end users. I am happy to share that some of them have been working on Salesforce platform now and are Certified admin / devs. I am a big fan of the answers community and spend active time on it. In addition, I am a user group leader for these groups: Pune Salesforce Students Developer User Group, Surat Salesforce Developer User Group, Pune Salesforce User Group, and Pune Salesforce Marketing Cloud User Group.
I truly believe in giving back your best to the community. Translating complex thoughts into simple explanations is what we should all strive for. I was inspired by Nabomita Mazumdar’s session on community development and am thankful for hearing it. .
I would like to especially thank Zachary Jeans. I was able to hear Zachary’s story while he was here on the Salesforce India Tour. He is a wonderful human being and a great inspiration to the Salesforce community.
Follow Parth Vasani on Twitter at @Parth4u
