Salesforce MVP
The class of 2024 Salesforce MVP’s were announced this past week. The MVP program is a community-generated list of individuals who are very active in the Salesforce community. Individuals accepted into this program have made large contributions to the Salesforce ecosystem by leading community groups, posting informative blogs, sharing their knowledge with others via mentoring, speaking at community conferences, etc. There were only 24 people added to the MVP list this year.
There is always a large list of individuals who have yet to be accepted into the program. The ones missing always surprise me as some are quite active & outspoken in the community. They should already be on the MVP list. Another interesting aspect is the individuals rejected feel the need to post their disappointment on LinkedIn. Some are quite candid complaining about the selection process & how it is political in nature. I don’t see how these types of posts truly help the original poster in the long run. It seems like it would work against them for future nominations since the entire purpose of the MVP group is to help others positively about Salesforce. Being negative & complaining about the Salesforce MVP program isn't a fruitful, positive endeavor.
In my opinion, the MVP program is similar to Salesforce’s Golden Hoodie program. It is a marketing program pushing the Salesforce brand. Each individual in these groups are marketing ambassadors for Salesforce. This saves Salesforce staff time & quite a bit of advertising money. Each time someone posts about Salesforce, that is free advertising for them. Each time someone wears a Salesforce branded hoodie or drinks from a Salesforce branded mug, all free advertising. Yes, the Salesforce MVP program & the Salesforce Golden Hoodie program are acclaims worthy of praise, but it is only part of Salesforce’s large marketing engine. In other CRM platform industries, these Salesforce acclaims are worthless.
It is a noble goal to one day be a Salesforce MVP, but a heavy dose of perspective is needed in pursuing this. The MVP acceptance process is very selective. One could spend an enormous amount of time dedicated to the Salesforce ecosystem & not be selected for their MVP program. One should have the drive to do that without needing a reward for it. Perspective, understanding & acceptance of the MVP selection process is needed or bitterness will creep in. Many of the rejected individual's posts mentioned above display bitterness which is an unfortunate syndrome of having these types of achievement programs.