People Behind the Certs – Sanjay Gupta – saasguru

SG: Let’s get started. Why don’t we start from the beginning? Please tell us about your education/ career before entering the Salesforce ecosystem.

SG: I am an Arts Graduate who later did M.Sc. in IT and M.Tech (CS). I taught Programming Languages to engineers for around 10 years. Then to gain more knowledge, I decided to switch to the IT industry and started learning Salesforce through Trailheads and working on projects as a freelancer with the help of my brother, who has been working in IT from the beginning of his career.

SG: That’s awesome. Now we would love to know what was the tipping point when you said, “I want to make this change,” and what was the trigger for that?

SG: After getting enough knowledge about Salesforce, I decided to switch to IT as a full-time profession, and I jumped into the Salesforce ecosystem and started my second career. To be honest, I am just loving the ecosystem and got a good amount of growth opportunities.

SG: You achieved many certs along the way. Can you share three things with us?

1. Why do you value certificates?

2. What are the challenges associated with the process?

3. What are your top tips for being successful in cert exams?

SG: 

1. Certifications basically provide the authenticity of your knowledge of Salesforce products and their features. 
2. If you work on a particular cloud or tool before getting its certification, that makes sense, and this is the biggest challenge of many who don’t work on a project first and go for cert.
3. Go through Trailhead, superbadges, and do some hands-on with the projects so that one can clear the cert on the first attempt. Also, one can confidently say that they have proper knowledge of the product for which certification is done.

SG: What do you enjoy most about your work as a certified Salesforce professional?

SG: I enjoy doing consulting work the most. Alongside I enjoy mentoring new consultants as well. Whenever I get a chance to give back my knowledge, I never miss that. Currently, I am educating Trailblazers on Youtube, Udemy, and saasguru.

SG: Time for gratitude!! Finally, is there anyone (individual or company) that you would like to take this opportunity to thank for their role in helping you along your journey? If Yes, what was their role in your success?

SG: I want to thank my younger brother Vikas Gupta because of him I am currently in this ecosystem. He always motivated and guided me on the right path in my initial days, as he was already associated with Salesforce Ecosystem. As he was always there to back me, I came so far and got nominated to become Salesforce MVP for the class of 2023. If by luck, I become Salesforce MVP, then I would love to dedicate that to my younger brother.