- Gemma Blezard
- Apr 19, 2018
- 4 min read
Let’s spend a few moments with the lovely Priscila Renwick, Business Analyst and adrenaline junkie at Wandera! She lives in Highgate, North London with her husband, calls herself quite the geek and is always reading something, except now some of her reading includes Salesforce! Priscila has a pretty unusual hobby – flying trapeze – like that one you see in the circus where someone throws some somersaults and someone else catches you on the other side (!).
You can see some videos on Priscila’s Instagram if you’re curious.
Tell us about yourself
“I was a Brazilian lawyer and I really didn’t enjoy my job in corporate law. I worked with a good team, but I found the job boring and didn’t suit my personality. By that time I was in a long distance relationship for almost 4 years and my now husband, who is British, proposed to me. We had some back and forth about where we would live and ultimately I was happy to move here [to the UK] and start a new career. I had no idea what I wanted to do as I had never done anything outside Law.
“I was applying to all sorts of jobs, basically to just get me going. One day I received a message on LinkedIn from a recruiter inviting me for a phone interview for this new super exciting start-up. That went really well and I moved on to do a face-to-face with the CEO, President and VP of Finance next. I absolutely loved them, the work environment, the idea of the company. They said I would start as the Executive Assistant to the CEO and President, but I would have spare time to explore different departments of the company and see what I liked the most and that they would support my career development from there.
“This was almost 5 years ago, I’m still at Wandera and still loving it. I did play with different departments and Salesforce administration kind of fell into my lap as there was no else to do it at first, but I really got into it.”
Confession time
“I think the main reason I started to want to really learn about the system was that I one day I did a bulk upload on opportunities and the day and month was swapped in the Close Date, messing up all of our numbers, booked and forecast! Eeek! I realised I had very little idea of what I was doing and if this was going to be my responsibility, I needed to learn a lot more about it and learn it quickly! Which I did.
“We went on to implement all sorts of integrations, with our own product portal, with reseller systems, we have Customer and Partner Communities, Service Cloud, FinancialForce, 3rd parties like Adobe Sign, Conga, Marketo and so on. We even already migrated to Lightning. I’m so proud of our org and it works like a well oiled machine, it’s a thing of beauty. And I’m the person responsible for it – but now I’m a Business Analyst and more than happy to take all the credit or blame for it.”
How did you hear about us?
“I heard about it when I first met Gemma at the London Admin User Group. I saw her husband Chris’ presentation about the Architect route and that spiked my interest, I thought that maybe I could do it. I have been an admin for so long and have a really good understanding of the declarative features of the platform, but had never done any of the exams. And then I met Gemma and she said she was starting this group that would inspire and empower women to go all the way to be Architects, so I think I was one of the really early joiners.”
What feelings did Ladies Be Architects inspire within you?
“I joined the group just thinking that maybe I should do this. And then I saw other women going for it and decided that I would go for it. Baby steps. No rush. And see where I get to. I have done the admin, platform builder and platform developer 1. I have booked advanced admin and sales consultant for the end of May. And then I’ll do the other two for Certified Application Architect (CAA), aiming to complete that by the end of the year. Those still scare me, mainly because it feels like there isn’t a ton of resources out there. But I now know I have the support of the group and so many ladies willing to help and that gives me confidence to for it. Only good things can come out of it, right?”
Tell us why the CTA journey is important to you...
“I work hard and I enjoy studying. I’m good at what I do and I want to be even better. I’m not at CTA level yet, but I want to push to get there.”
What’s the next step for you on your Journey to CTA?
“I’m halfway to CAA, but I haven’t done any of the actual Architect exams yet. My company already said they will sponsor me, so I’m committed to do Data Architecture and Sharing and Visibility by the end of this year.
What are the biggest challenges you’re facing on your Journey to CTA?
“I do have concerns due to the lack of study materials out there, but maybe that is just a misconception because I haven’t started preparing for the Architect exams yet. The study group sessions help a lot with that, makes me feel like I do know what I need to know on a subject, or where I need to dive deeper. Hearing from others who did it is also helpful as it breaks that idea that it’s too hard and inspire me to go for it too.”
