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Salesforce was included in a recent rating of the best jobs. That in itself might not seem unusual. After all, Salesforce is regularly named as the best workplace in different cities and nations — and in the world. However, the unique part about this list of the 25 best jobs in the U.S. was Salesforce was the only company named. The other jobs listed were generic roles: machine-learning engineer, insurance broker, realtor; Salesforce developer was ranked #10 on the list.

I may be a little biased because I know so many of the extraordinary folks in this role, but in my opinion, this recognition shows how important and how special this role is. These are people who understand the tech – but who also understand the businesses where they work.

 

Developers sharpen their skills with Trailhead

 

The beauty of being a Salesforce developer is the ability to build on a platform which has new releases with incredible innovations three times a year. And it's one code base so every feature, new and old, will always just work. This makes it easy for devs to concentrate on innovation instead of being burdened by maintenance. Also, the Salesforce platform gives developers a constantly evolving set of tools that keep pace with modern and advanced technical trends. If the newest thing coming out is AI, or blockchain, or serverless, or something that hasn’t been created yet, Salesforce developers don’t have to worry about how to add that technology to their stack. They trust we will innovate and build these technologies into our platform for them to then build into their apps for their business.

Empowering Salesforce developers to be creative with our platform is important, and how we see them adding tremendous value to their companies. Salesforce developers are doing much more than writing 1’s and 0’s! They are able to spend their time ideating, innovating, and solving business challenges by applying a beginners mind and leveraging the power of the platform. It's no surprise that when business leaders look to see where change is coming from within their organizations, they see it coming from Salesforce developers. And this is yet another reason why Salesforce developers are so in demand.

The rise of this job category is also a testament to what we call the Salesforce economy. International Data Corporation research shows Salesforce and its ecosystem of customers and partners will drive the creation of 3.3 million new jobs and more than $859 billion in new business revenues worldwide by 2022.

That’s a global economic force, but it also applies at a very human level. Trailhead, our free online learning platform, has leveled the playing field by empowering anyone, no matter their walk of life, to learn on their own. Trailhead has removed barriers to entry for everyone from accessibility to approachability to proximity. This has an incredible impact on helping us change the ratios in tech by making it possible for under-represented groups to have access to learn the in-demand skills that lead to great jobs such as a Salesforce developer. And with the power of the community, we are inspiring people every day to be what they can see when people from all walks of life share their successes with each other.

The impact we have seen from this approach is incredible. The industry standard is single digit percentage of developers that are women according to the annual Stack Exchange developer survey. Now, in the Salesforce ecosystem, our ratios are 45% female for Salesforce system administrators and 20% female for Salesforce developers. The power of the Salesforce Platform, Trailhead and the Trailblazer Community has helped to narrow the gender gap and change the ratios in tech.

This also goes for young people who can’t afford to go into heavy student loan debt. If I were to rewind 20+ years ago when I came out of college, I owed $13,000 in debt. I waitressed. I tutored. I was able to pay off the debt. But if you look at the stats now, the cost of higher education has quadrupled. People are coming out of college with crippling amounts of student loan debt. The ROI doesn’t make sense anymore. Trailhead is a tech education that is entirely free, with a sense of community that rivals many colleges.

Trailhead brings people to jobs instead of automating people out of jobs. This new category in the top jobs list is an empowering sign of the times. We’ll see many more this year at TrailheaDX. Join us, or start your journey to be a Salesforce developer on Trailhead.