Filling the Salesforce Talent Gap

Large companies dig deep into their vast treasure chests to implement internal Salesforce training. They hope that this practice will shield them from the current Salesforce talent drought. Many of these companies use resources such as e-learning platforms. This kind of learning tool helps them to develop a pipeline of workers to fill Salesforce Developer roles. They also use e-learning to train for other positions they may need in the future. However, training an army of experts is cost-prohibitive for most small-to-mid sized businesses (SMB). Accordingly, a growing number of SMBs are turning to Independent Consultants to keep their ranks strong.

In this way, companies can gain fast access to cloud-based Salesforce Development professionals, and this tactic makes good sense. The need for this kind of talent is enormous.

The Right Skills for the Job

FoundHQ can help you tap into a diverse range of Salesforce Developers. Unlike generic recruiting firms, FoundHQ is a pre-vetted network of Salesforce-specific Consultants. We can help you find talent capable of managing even the most complex Salesforce coding tasks when needed. When seeking a CRM Developer, you need a Certified Salesforce Developer familiar with Salesforce’s drag-and-drop tools and custom development tools like Apex, SOQL, Lightning Components, and more. Salesforce Developers should also have skills in other areas such as the platform’s custom query and programming language. The average Developer rarely has this specific and broad range of skillsets. When it comes time to fill this type of role, it’s tough to know the right questions to ask to prove out their experience.

Starting the Skills Discussion with Candidates

There’s no need to learn advanced coding skills to learn how to hire the right Salesforce Developer. However, it may help to learn the right questions to ask during an interview.

The following questions may help you screen Salesforce developer candidates.

What Collections Are Available In Apex?

Apex supports three collections in Salesforce—lists, maps and sets. The lists are ordered collections of elements. The elements are distinguished by their indices.

Developers use lists when they want to identify an element by its index. Here, it’s vital to understand that lists can contain duplicates. Meanwhile, maps are collections of key-value pairs. Each unique key maps to a value. Conversely, sets are on ordered collections of elements that do not contain duplicate values.

What Are the Transaction Control Limits in Apex?

Salesforce exists in a multi-tenant environment. What this means is that Salesforce users share their resources. The platform enforces process limits to maintain system availability and performance. Quality Salesforce developers know about these limits. They affect how developers engineer solutions.

For example, one of the most important limitations is that static variables are not reverted doing a RollBack. Also, the ID of an sObject inserted after establishing a SavePoint is not cleared after a RollBack. Additionally, each RollBack or SavePoint counts against the governor limit for DML statements.

Also, references to SavePoints do not trigger invocations. Each invocation is a new trigger context. Finally, if a developer sets more than one SavePoint, then rolls back to a SavePoint, its not the last generated SavePoint. The latter SavePoint variables become invalid.

What’s the Time Limit For Synchronous Apex Requests?

If asynchronous Apex request runs for more than five seconds, it’s considered long-running. Developers can use several strategies to prevent asynchronous Apex requests from reaching this limit. For example, they can tune SOQL and DML operations. However, they’ll need to make sure that the queries are selective.

A developer can also check whether batch Apex is a possible alternative. If so, they can use this method to convert asynchronous process into an asynchronous process. A developer might also limit calls to synchronous web services. A qualified Salesforce developer should know these standard solutions.

What’s the Primary Difference Between a Global and Public Class in Apex?

In Apex, global classes are visible in any application or namespace. Alternatively, public classes are only visible within a specified application or namespace. Classes with the public access modifier are only accessible within your own application or namespace. However, classes with global access are accessible by Apex everywhere. An example of a class with global access is an external application invoking an Apex Web service to perform an action in Salesforce.

How to Hire a Salesforce Developer

Compared to the supply, the demand for Salesforce Developers is incredibly high. There’s a massive shortage of Salesforce Software Developers in today’s market. Earning Salesforce Developer certifications is challenging. As a result, many developers choose other specialties.

Still, that doesn’t mean that it’s impossible to find the right Salesforce developer for your firm. All you have to do is look in the right place. Alternatively, you could start looking for word-of-mouth referrals. This tactic allows you to start looking for referrals in the closest places.

Word-of-mouth is a powerful reference. You might have trusted friends or family members and the IT industry. Alternatively, you may know friends who work in the field. You may also try various IT job sites, such as Stack Overflow and Git Hub. These are the most popular ways of finding IT personnel.

You can even try a business social networking site such as LinkedIn. Of course, finding and vetting Salesforce admins using these methods is a Herculean task. Fortunately, there’s a much faster, easier, and efficient way to find well-qualified Salesforce Developers.

Identify the Type of Salesforce Developer Needed

At this stage, the Salesforce product is so mature that it requires specialized Salesforce development experience.

Back in 2008, Apex was just released and the job title "Salesforce Developer" was pretty much all you needed to jumpstart a search. Now, you can hire Salesforce API Developers, Salesforce CPQ Developers, a Salesforce Community Developer, a Salesforce Marketing Cloud Developer, and more.

Be sure to identify the specific Salesforce Product expertise you need and conduct a technical assessment specific around those areas of the platform.

Cost to Hire Salesforce App Developers

A typical Salesforce Developer salary (in the case of FTEs) or hourly rate (in the case of Contractors) can vary based on several factors, including overall seniority, where they are located, and what area of Salesforce they are specialized. While that may be surprising, a Salesforce Lightning Developer (typically focused on front-end development with Lightning Web Components) will command slightly lower compensation than if you hire Salesforce Commerce Cloud Developers. This is based solely on supply and demand - some skill sets are harder to find in the market, thus command higher compensation.

If you are thinking about hiring Salesforce Developers, check out the Cost to Hire a Salesforce Consultant for a full breakdown of how much different skill sets will cost.

There’s a Better Way to Find the Right Candidates

FoundHQ is your source for qualified and 100% pre-vetted Salesforce Developers. We assess and qualify every Consultant before onboarding.

Most of our Salesforce Freelancers have worked in the space for five or more years. Whether you need a Salesforce Developer for a limited engagement or as a full-time staff member, we can help you to find the right candidate. When you partner with FoundHQ, you can spend less time searching for the right Salesforce Developer and more time getting things done. If our freelancers don’t meet your expectations, we’ll refund you for their hours. We’ll also find a new contractor to take their place.

Learn about how FoundHQ hired a 7-person, global Salesforce Development team (hybrid onshore and offshore) for ACV Auctions in just a few weeks!

Hire the Best Salesforce Developers Fast

Now you know more about how to find and hire a Salesforce Developer for the long run. With FoundHQ, there’s no need to launch a project to find the right talent. We’ll do all the heavy lifting.

You may need a Developer for a new or existing Salesforce deployment. In either case, we’ll help you find the perfect Engineer for your needs. Our Salesforce Contractors are categorized by their primary function, making it easy to find talent with the right skillset and expertise.

Sign up today to browse hundreds of pre-vetted Salesforce Developer profiles from all over the globe. Also get free access to confidential Salesforce Partner and product recommendations from our trusted community of Experts.