David’s note: You’ve got a lot of guts taking a pay cut like that while also supporting a family! Mad respect! Sometimes you have to do crazy things to achieve your goals, and your story is a perfect example of this. Thanks for sharing daddy!
Hi David,
You probably don’t remember me given the amount of people that you have helped jump start their career with Salesforce development. I have met you in person after you have given a breakout session at my first Dreamforce in 2013.
Earlier that year was also when I just switched career from software sales to becoming a full-time Salesforce Administrator. They were willing to bring me on board because I had self-studied for a year prior and passed the ADM 201 exam. It was a risky move for me because the first full-time Admin position was a immediate 50% pay cut from what I was making as an Inside Sales Rep. This couldn’t have happened at a worse time, because my wife had just become pregnant with our first child and I was struggling to see whether switching career was prudent or not.
During that week of Dreamforce, I just remember being so encouraged by your story that I had only an average of 3 hours of sleep per night in my hotel room since meeting you because I was stuck on SFDC99.com going through all the articles, people’s comments on your forum, and testing in my developer org!
Anyways, I just wanted to quickly reach out and say thank you for your encouragement and your countless articles on SFDC99.com. Because of your encouraging words and your willingness to help others, you have helped improve me and my family (now of 4!)’s standard of living as now I work for Salesforce as a Software Engineer focusing on leveraging all Salesforce technologies for their internal Salesforce orgs.
Needless to say, since you probably already know this, but YOU’RE AWESOME.
Many thanks,
Mark Liu
Inspired by this story?
Read more success stories from other SFDC99 students!
Want to tell the world your story too?
Email it to sfdc99.mailbag@gmail.com and your story could be heard around the world!
Wow! I’m looking to do this too. Just need to sort some stuff out for next year then push hard on certs and studies.
That is a great story Mark and yes, David is awesome as. I find myself on drowned in SFDC99 many a times too. Switching to SF after so many years and working with the pay cut is tough (sailing in the same boat). However, must admit, it is people like David who are a great help to the self taught people like us to proceed and progress on the Salesforce path. Keep it up champion!!
Sweet! Well Done, Mark! Great Story!!!
Very admirable and inspiring to all of us!
Cheers,
AO
Very brave! And well done!! The risk obviously paid off professionally speaking, are you back at the salary level you were at yet? Or when do you expect that to happen?
Thanks, Ed! I am definitely back at the level and some :)