What is the role of a Deputy Country Leader at Salesforce?

Six months ago, I took on the role of Deputy Country Leader for Belgium and Luxembourg, in addition to my other responsibilities within Salesforce. People often ask me what a Deputy Country Leader does. Because the job is so varied, it is hard to provide one definition. So let me take you through some of the activities I have been involved in so far.

First, there is no true ‘country’ model within Salesforce. Everyone is of course tied to a work location or office but many departments work on a North European level or are part of separate business units altogether. Yet some topics need to be discussed at the local level, too. For this, we have a Belgian country leadership team of fourteen people coming from different roles such as sales, presales, marketing, PR, Alliances & Channel, Professional Services, Employee Success…. Together with Lien Ceulemans as Country Leader and myself as Deputy Country Leader, the team has monthly meetings in which we focus on a number of topics.

What’s top of mind

How can we find the right people in the war for talent? How is our (employer) brand doing in the local market? Are we offering enough growth opportunities and how are we doing with retention? How can we set priorities and reduce noise while communicating on collaboration channels such as Quip, Slack and Chatter?

These questions and topics are also important to our Belux V2MOM, which stands for Vision, Values, Methods, Obstacles, and Measures, and is our internal alignment process. During our meetings, we evaluate the progress on four key pillars:

• People
• Growth of the organization
• Brand/Employer branding
• Salesforce as a platform for change

Communication is key

Communication is the oxygen of a great culture - Kamil Toume

What struck me most during my first months as Deputy Country Leader is the importance of good communication. Especially since people work partly from home and partly in the office, you have to keep investing in informing your staff to help them understand the state of the business and connect with the company. That's why we try to streamline communication and reduce noise for employees. For instance, by sending out a weekly update on our collaboration tool Slack, highlighting just three key messages (to take action on). Besides we try to bring the office together in office huddles and the wider company in all-hands where updates are shared and questions can be asked.

Communication and employee involvement were crucial in the move to a new office in the center of Brussels last year. We are now evaluating to see how we can further improve the office. In this context, we are also working on a new survey for our staff in which we will ask them how they use their new workplace, how often they come to the office, and how they see the role of the office evolving to support them in their daily work.

Focus on the future

To develop a long-term strategy, we are already preparing the go-to-market for next fiscal year. What should be the focus for the Belgian market? Which industries are growing and how can we support this by making the right investments? This process will continue until the end of January 2023 when we will implement the new structures and communicate the new guidelines.

Impact on society

A Deputy Country Leader is also involved in activities outside the Salesforce walls. For example, in September we will participate in the Entrepreneurs Summit organized by Bloovi during which Lien Ceulemans and I will speak about value-driven leadership and employee engagement within Salesforce Belgium & Luxembourg. Recently, I also went to a job fair of several schools in Ghent to promote the entry-level positions within the company.

Salesforce puts a lot of effort in helping people without qualifications to find their first job and develop themselves within our ecosystem. Working with partners is therefore another important focus point for the entire Country Leadership team, including myself.

Building a strong culture

As you can see, the Deputy Country Leader has a lot of different tasks in addition to my formal role as Director of the Industry Solution Advisor team. My personal highlight during my first months was definitely the kick-off event we held earlier this year. Many people had not seen each other in two years, and for new employees it was the first opportunity to meet their colleagues and get in touch with the company culture.

Culture eats strategy for breakfast. In the end, these are the key moments to express your values and establish a strong culture. So as a new Deputy Country Leader, it was great to once again feel the good vibes within the Belux organization.