Don’t let the fear of failing hold you back
Here are three reasons you should embrace your fear and take your certification exam, and why risk-taking should be encouraged AND valued — even if it means (multiple) retakes.
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Lissa has been a user and an admin working on the Salesforce platform for more than 12 years. She is a 4x #CertifiedPro; a Trailhead ranger with 250+ badges; co-leader of the Indianapolis Women in Technology User Group; and Director, Salesforce Business Analysis at Liberty Mutual Insurance, leading a team of Salesforce admins.
Have you put off taking a Salesforce Certification exam because you’re afraid you’ll fail? Well, don’t put it off any longer! There is no failing, only learning.
I earned my first certification at Dreamforce a few years ago after I had already been a full-time administrator at two different companies for nearly ten years. I had a lot of real-world Salesforce Administrator experience at that point, but I didn’t feel official because I wasn’t a Certified Administrator.
My own fear of failing
I knew the value that having a certification provided, but I also wanted to earn the certification to challenge myself personally, to show my commitment and dedication to being a Salesforce professional. I wanted to learn even more about the platform, specifically the features I didn’t use in my day-to-day job.
Even still, I kept procrastinating and coming up with excuses for not taking the exam. (Sound familiar?)
Looking back, the one reason I waited so long to take that first exam was my fear of failing. I worried what my boss and team would think about my abilities. If I failed, what did that say about my decade of experience? My company was willing to pay for me to take the test, but would I have to pay them back if I didn’t pass?
What I didn’t recognize at the time was that my fear of failing was not only preventing me from becoming a Certified Salesforce Admin, but it also was limiting me personally and professionally in countless other ways.
Here are the three lessons I learned about the value of failing.
1. Failure is an option
And it should be celebrated. Failing the exam does not make you a failure. Research consistently shows that encouraging employees to be risk-takers and allowing them to fail leads to innovation. Successful people have failed — a lot.
You not only need to give yourself permission to cultivate your big, wild, crazy ideas, but you also need to act on them or they might be wasted innovations that lie dormant in your head forever. You can’t keep saying, “Someday I will be a Certified Salesforce Administrator;” you need to make someday today!
So let’s say you try and fail the test. Bummer, right? However, I would challenge you to flip your thinking around. If you fail, you should actually celebrate! Celebrate the risk you took, celebrate what you got right, celebrate the fact that you are doing something difficult, and celebrate that you’re one step closer to your certification goal.
To really drive innovation, celebrate publicly and tell your teammates. Sharing your struggles helps to create a safe place for others to fail as well. If one of your coworkers fails the exam, cheer and clap for them and everything they’ve learned to get as far as even taking the exam.
We’re all in this together and celebrating these exam failures will counteract the fear of failure, lowering everyone’s inhibitions while building greater trust. It also will make your team more likely to take (and share) risks in the future.
2. Failure is not a waste of anything
Not time, not money, not resources. It sounds counterintuitive, but you’ll actually gain a lot by failing a certification exam.
Not only will you experience the exam style and format, but afterwards, you’ll receive an email with a breakdown of section-level feedback scores. The section headers in your breakdown will match the section headers in the official exam guides, which means you’ll know exactly which areas to study when you retake the exam.
Chances are, you’ll also remember at least a few questions that stumped you, so you can go back and search the documentation to learn more about those topics before your next attempt.
3. The fear of failure can prevent learning, productivity, and innovation
A couple of years ago, another member of my team failed the Admin exam the first time she took it. It’s a tough exam! She was embarrassed about failing and didn’t feel comfortable asking our boss to pay for her retake, so she paid for it herself out of her own pocket.
I recently mentioned to her that our manager has now agreed to not only pay for exam retakes but is also encouraging them. She lit up and said now she’ll definitely start studying for the Advanced Admin exam.
Think about that: Now that my teammate knows it’s safe to take a risk and sit for this exam, and doesn’t feel shame or embarrassment about a potential fail, she’s going to spend more time studying — which will inherently lead to learning and growth.
Now, she plans to tackle the Prepare for Your Salesforce Advanced Administrator Credential trailmix, which means she’ll have more skills, more ideas, and more motivation — making her a more productive and innovative employee even before she takes the exam.
And if she fails? She’ll continue studying, learning, growing, and further building her skills. From a management perspective, it’s a true win-win!
A no limit policy on retakes?
Why wouldn’t a company offer a “no limit” policy on taking exams or paying for retakes? It might take someone one, three, or thirteen attempts to pass the Admin Certification — it’s no walk in the park after all!
But if companies believe in their employees and trust they’re giving it their all (for example, doing all of the Trailhead modules, studying, and putting in the effort), then they also can trust that company resources are being well-spent for retakes.
I mean, not everyone is in a position where they’re able to pay for what could turn out to be multiple retakes themselves. So I’m calling out all of you managers reading this: supporting your team in this way is an opportunity for you to step up and embrace a culture of innovation and learning at your company.
And you can be assured that valuable learning will take place as a result of the journey — even before the members of your team attain their certifications!
When companies trust and support employees to be professional stewards of company resources while advancing their knowledge and expertise, a culture and spirit of innovation and collegiality is the highly valuable outcome.
Saying and doing
As for me, I took my own advice and pushed past my fears of failing. I finally took the Advanced Admin exam at Dreamforce this year… and I passed. Then I took the Platform App Builder exam, and passed that, too. Next up, I’ll be taking Sales Cloud Consultant. I’m nervous, but I’m going to keep going and continue to attempt certification exams, even if I fail along the way.
Understanding that failing the exam does not make me a failure is key. And having a leader who has offered to pay for retakes gives me an extra push of confidence to try now, rather than wait until “someday.”
My goal is to continually challenge myself, increase my knowledge, and see what I’m truly capable of. I’m not stopping at 4x certified, I’m going to keep going. If I fail, I will publicly celebrate it, learn from it, and try again (and again!) until I get that magical word, “PASS.”
Want to take the leap and get started (or build!) on your Salesforce certification journey? Here’s everything you need to know.
