Tableau Chief Product Officer: Generative AI Will Level the Data Playing Field
Salesforce today announced a momentum update around Tableau’s data pledge, sharing that nearly two million people have been trained through its data skills program since January 2022.
Why it’s important: Businesses rely on data to make decisions, but there’s a talent gap, with just 39% of organizations training their employees with data skills and less than half of colleges offering specific data skills courses.
Behind the numbers: In 2021, Tableau committed to helping 10 million people across the globe become data literate by 2027. To help reach this goal, Tableau offers free and unique educational programs and resources across the Salesforce ecosystem. They include:
What’s coming: Together with online education platforms Coursera and Pathstream, a newly developed professional certificate* will prepare learners for an entry level business analyst role across industries. Upon finishing all eight courses, learners will receive a certificate of completion and be prepared to take Tableau’s Desktop Specialist exam, which proves basic skills and product knowledge of Tableau Desktop.
Soundbites:
Tableau’s mission has always been to help people see and understand data, and through our data literacy programs, we will continue to make data skills more accessible for all.
Larissa Amoroso, VP of Tableau Community, Salesforce
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*Any unreleased services or features referenced in this or other press releases or public statements are not currently available and may not be delivered on time or at all. Customers who purchase Salesforce applications should make their purchase decisions based upon features that are currently available. Salesforce has headquarters in San Francisco, with offices in Europe and Asia, and trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol “CRM.” For more information please visit https://www.salesforce.com, or call 1-800-NO-SOFTWARE.
Today, Salesforce announced that the Summer ’23 release preview is now live.
Why it matters: The Summer ’23 release includes hundreds of new features across Customer 360 that will be generally available on June 12.
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Tableau is known as a leader in data and analytics, in part because it’s been innovating – and even disrupting – the practice since 2003.
We caught up with Tableau’s new CEO, Ryan Aytay, to discuss what’s on the horizon for the company, his history with Salesforce, and the increasing importance of data and analytics in the new era of generative AI.
Like every company, Tableau is on a journey, and we’ve had some incredible innovations in our 20-year history. One of the largest — and most positive — is Tableau becoming an integral part of the Salesforce Customer 360, and that’s only accelerated since I joined.
As an example, think of our integration into the Salesforce Data Cloud for Tableau. Data Cloud connects all of your data, including data from Salesforce, from any app or device, so you can create a unified, real-time customer profile. Tableau is the data visualization and business intelligence layer on top of Data Cloud, allowing you to act on that data in real time and at scale.
That’s just one example though, and I’m really excited about all the new capabilities we’ll be debuting this year.
First and foremost is the amazing Tableau Community — known to many as the DataFam. There are more than two million members in the community, and more than three million profiles on Tableau Public. They are true artisans of data and bring analytics to life with Tableau and this continues to impress me every day. The community also helps to guide and inspire not only Tableau, but also our customers in terms of product roadmap, usability, and more.
They are true artisans of data and bring analytics to life with Tableau and this continues to impress me every day.
Tableau is also the leader in analytics and BI platforms, and we’re deeply integrated into the world’s #1 CRM, which is of course, Salesforce. We’re not built not only for analysts but also for business users, and we’re continuing to innovate across the board to make the product better, faster, and easier to use for everyone. In fact, we delivered more than 120 new capabilities in 2022 alone.
When you look at the world around us, data and analytics have never been more relevant due to the pace of data being created and the movement toward generative AI. To harness all your data in a trusted and safe way, and then use it to make decisions like how to grow your business, reduce costs, or improve productivity, you need Tableau.
Every single customer I speak with wants to talk about data and generative AI, and the shift is both incredibly exciting and also fast paced. Generative AI will make people across many industries and professions more productive and also make data and analytics more accessible to many.
Of course, in this fast-paced world, we need to be mindful of the potential risks with generative AI and how to help companies apply it in a trusted and safe way. Trust has always been Salesforce’s number one value; we’re using in-house technology to help us build and train our generative AI in a responsible manner, and it’s important for any organization exploring AI to create guardrails to prevent risk or harm.
I’m excited to continue to work directly with the community, our customers, our partners, and our employees, not only to be inspired, but to lead them to the next horizon. The next horizon includes Salesforce and our Data Cloud but also continues to build on Tableau’s core foundation of helping people see and understand data.
I also see many opportunities to bring Tableau to more Salesforce customers, empowering them to be more data-driven across their CRM experiences. Every company needs to be data-driven, and the companies that succeed in the future will be those who can harness their data, apply AI, visualize, and act.
Every company needs to be data-driven, and the companies that succeed in the future will be those who can harness their data, apply AI, visualize, and act.
In March of 2020, I got a call from [Salesforce CEO] Marc Benioff. The University of California San Francisco (UCSF) health care system was already running low on personal protective equipment (PPE) and had called Marc asking if he could help. Marc asked me if I could lead an effort to find trusted suppliers that could quickly provide masks, gowns, face shields, and swabs, and then get those supplies distributed immediately.
At the time, the world was shut down, so we assembled a remote 25-person team and completely realigned to focus exclusively on the PPE effort. We had to be agile; and at one point I had almost 10,000 KN95 masks in my garage that we personally drove to local hospitals. Over a period of a few months, we managed to procure approximately 60 million pieces of PPE and distribute them to more than 500 healthcare institutions across the globe. It was one of the most difficult yet rewarding things I’ve done in my career to date.
With automation, AppExchange, and real-time data from Tableau, Beyond Better Foods has saved up to 70% of employee time
Healthy dessert brand Beyond Better Foods is using Salesforce and AppExchange partner apps to manage its supply chain and operations more intelligently and efficiently, achieving cost savings and freeing up time to focus on what’s next for the business.
What’s the impact: Beyond Better Foods, which owns Enlightened Frozen Treats and Bada Bean Bada Boom Snacks, needed technology that could automate its business processes and access data in real time.
Salesforce and its partners helped Beyond Better Foods transform its technology infrastructure to deliver real-time automation and insights into inventory, distribution, and demand forecasting. This has enabled the growing snack brand to improve productivity and efficiency — quickly increasing its bottom line.
By the numbers: Beyond Better Foods achieved a 769% ROI with Tableau, CRM Analytics, and AppExchange apps GoldFinch ERP and Accounting Seed, within less than two months.
Soundbites:
Tableau and partner apps on AppExchange give us insights into inventory, distribution, and demand and forecasting, empowering us to better serve our customers and manage our supply chain so we never have a situation where the end consumer cannot get the product they want and need.
jen Haberman, Chief Operating Officer, Beyond Better Foods
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Information and communication tech is expected to account for 14% of the world’s carbon footprint by 2040
75% of technologists want to develop software applications that do less harm to the environment
However, 76% also say their leadership doesn’t see sustainable software development as a must-have
Insights from a new Salesforce survey of over 1,000 U.S., U.K., and Australia-based technologists — including UX designers, software developers, system architects, IT operations managers, and more — show that while 75% are eager to help reduce their environmental impact, green coding and sustainability aren’t yet practiced at their job.
The survey, titled The Green Code Gap, reveals why: a gap in skills or knowledge and lack of sustainability prioritization by their employers.
When it comes to concern about the environment, it’s not all about supply chains and transportation. The energy consumption of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), technologies and tools used to communicate, store, retrieve, and manage information, is increasing by 9% every year. By 2040, ICT is expected to account for 14% of the world’s carbon footprint — up from about 1.5% in 2007.
The Green Code Gap research shows that technologists are eager to do something about it.
From writing code to tracking environmental impact, teams also recognize the importance of implementing best practices to help their company develop more sustainable products.
While technologists want to act, they report little knowledge or training around sustainable development at their job. In fact, lack of insight into how to develop sustainable software is cited as the top barrier to doing so among this audience. And, nearly half (45%) of technologists surveyed confess they don’t know how to develop software applications that do less harm to the environment.
As a result, over one-third (34%) of technologists rarely or never consider carbon emissions when doing their job. In fact, over 4 in 10 technologists do not reuse existing code for most projects. That’s a problem, because developing new lines of code requires energy, and, unless an organization’s efforts are powered by 100% renewable energy, using additional energy increases carbon emissions. Writing code from scratch also results in additional time and resources (e.g. developer hours), which also contribute to carbon emissions. And, over half are not using energy-efficient programming languages (e.g, C, C++, Java), which are proficient at optimizing software to minimize resource consumption while executing code.
Energy-efficient programming and reusable code aren’t the only green software development practices technologists are missing in their work. They aren’t leveraging technology like automation, AI, or tracking sustainability metrics to lessen their work’s harm on the environment, either.
The survey reveals that while many technologists would like to lessen their environmental impact, they don’t believe their leadership is aligned. Nearly half (45%) of technologists believe they are more worried about environmental impacts of their company’s software than their leadership is. And while a similar number (44%) believe sustainable software development is a must-have, 76% say their leadership do not.
This also extends to their workplace:
The misalignment around sustainability may get worse as companies race to integrate emerging technologies like generative AI into their tech stack.
Training popular generative AI tools such as Large Language Models (LLMs) takes a massive amount of computational power. And anything that requires additional power risks contributing to carbon emissions. According to Salesforce research, 71% of IT leaders agree generative AI would increase their company’s carbon footprint through increased IT energy use.
“We’re in a planetary emergency, and it’s important for everyone to do what they can — including the IT sector. Fortunately, small actions by technologists can contribute to big climate impact,” said Srini Tallapragada, President and Chief Engineering Officer, Salesforce. “By implementing green code and sustainability best practices, companies and technologists in every step of software and app design, implementation, and operation can contribute to a sustainable future for all.”
We’re in a planetary emergency, and it’s important for everyone to do what they can — including the IT sector.
Srini Tallapragada, President and Chief Engineering Officer, Salesforce
Salesforce conducted Snapshot Research: The Green Code Gap in partnership with YouGov from April 4-8, 2023. The total sample size was 1,059 technologists at companies of all sizes and sectors in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. The figures are representative of adult populations (aged 18+).
In this survey, “sustainable software development” is defined as making the entire product life cycle from design and writing code to operations and management sustainable (e.g., reducing carbon footprint, reducing energy consumption).
New sustainability best practices help technologists cut emissions associated with IT, including heavy computational tasks
New Salesforce research shows that 75% of technologists want to develop software applications that do less harm to the environment
Today at World Tour NYC, Salesforce launched ‘Green Code,’ a new initiative to help reduce carbon emissions associated with the software development lifecycle. Green Code features newly-released sustainability best practices that help technologists — from UX designers and software developers to system architects and IT operations managers — accelerate the world’s journey to net zero.
The information and communication technology sector is responsible for up to 3.9% of global emissions — almost as much as the airline and shipping industries. These emissions are expected to rise as organizations increasingly rely on software to drive their operations and accelerate their digital transformation.
Fortunately, small changes can translate into big impacts for a company’s carbon footprint — and its bottom line. For example, Salesforce’s MuleSoft reduced its yearly public cloud infrastructure spending by 14% by optimizing strategies such as identifying and decommissioning underutilized systems and migrating storage to more energy-efficient alternatives.
“Sustainable engineering is good engineering and technologists can play a critical role in the reduction of global carbon emissions,” said Srinivas Tallapragada, President and Chief Engineering Officer at Salesforce. “With Green Code, we’re hoping to inspire software teams and the entire IT sector to prioritize sustainability, just as they do performance, security, and accessibility.”
Sustainable engineering is good engineering and technologists can play a critical role in the reduction of global carbon emissions
Srinivas Tallapragada, President and Chief Engineering Officer at Salesforce
“We’re in a climate emergency, and we need everyone to get to net zero as fast as possible,” said Suzanne DiBianca, EVP and Chief Impact Officer at Salesforce. “By leveraging these ‘green code’ best practices, technologists and organizations can approach the challenge of sustainability in IT to drive meaningful efficiencies and cost savings across their IT enterprises while accelerating their sustainability journeys.”
According to new Salesforce research, 75% of technologists want to develop software applications that do less harm to the environment, but nearly half don’t know how.
Sustainability efforts to date have been largely focused on hardware efficiency and electric grid decarbonization. Optimizing the code that comprises these applications is a powerful leverage point that remains largely untapped.
The Sustainability Guide for Salesforce Technology offers practical recommendations for designing apps and writing code that have less of an impact on the environment. It focuses on four key areas.
“At L’Oréal, we’ve embedded sustainability throughout our business and products, and technology has always played a key role to help us achieve those goals,” said Ariane Thomas, Global Tech Director of Sustainability at L’Oréal Group. “I’m thrilled that Salesforce is launching best practices for technologists to reduce the environmental footprint associated with software development. Every company can benefit by implementing these changes and accelerate their sustainable achievements.”
Every company can benefit by implementing these changes and accelerate their sustainable achievements.
Ariane Thomas, Global Tech Director of Sustainability at L’Oréal Group
Salesforce has made efforts to support sustainable IT practices. Most of the company’s carbon footprint comes from data center infrastructure, and reducing these emissions is a key pillar of its Climate Action Plan.
To track progress, Salesforce created a metric called Carbon to Serve, which measures the emissions of its data centers relative to work performed by its applications. Since establishing the metric in 2020, Salesforce has achieved a 26% reduction and aims to continue reducing emissions in the future.
Quick take: New Slack State of Work Report finds that companies are missing opportunities to unlock employee productivity, such as using AI and automation to streamline repetitive, time-consuming tasks. For example, employees surveyed estimate saving at least one month per year through automation.
The new Slack State of Work Report finds that companies are missing opportunities to unlock new levels of employee productivity with time-saving technologies, hybrid work, and talent development. The report, based on a global survey of more than 18,000 desk workers, found only 23% of companies are investing in technology to improve productivity and efficiency, and just 27% of companies are using AI tools to help do so.
Many organizations are stuck in old ways of working and antiquated approaches to driving productivity:
“The workplace is continuously evolving – and never more so than in the past few years. Companies must rethink the employee experience to increase productivity today,” said Brent Hyder, President and Chief People Officer at Salesforce. “Organizations that embrace new ways of working, such as flexibility, automation and AI, and collaboration tools, will help their employees – and ultimately their customers – find greater success.”
Organizations that embrace new ways of working, such as flexibility, automation and AI, and collaboration tools, will help their employees – and ultimately their customers – find greater success.
Brent Hyder, President and Chief People Officer at Salesforce
The report uncovers three trends defining modern work and driving employee productivity today:
AI and automation capabilities have the potential to streamline and optimize repetitive, time-consuming tasks, allowing employees to focus on higher-value, strategic work:
However, 60% of employees say their company has not incorporated AI tools to support their productivity. And 43% say that their team has not created automations to make their work processes easier or more efficient.
“AI and automation are on everyone’s minds in 2023. Yet it is crystal clear from this research that most organizations are barely scratching the surface of their productivity value in daily work,” said Rob Seaman, Senior Vice President of Enterprise Product at Slack. “Automation can save employees up to an entire working month per year, freeing up their time for more meaningful, impactful work. There’s a huge opportunity for organizations to help employees work smarter, more efficiently, and more pleasantly.”
Automation can save employees up to an entire working month per year, freeing up their time for more meaningful, impactful work.
Rob Seaman, Senior Vice President of Enterprise Product at Slack
In the age of hybrid work, employees are looking for flexibility and an environment that fosters collaboration and inclusivity:
However, only a few executives are using modern strategies to improve how employees work with each other – wherever they are:
Job satisfaction, engagement, and mental wellness are also top factors that contribute to productivity, so it’s crucial for leaders to consider these areas as part of how they redefine and drive productivity:
Managers play a key role in shaping work culture and need to be armed with people development skills, tools to drive efficiency and manage teams, and team wellness support. However, they face challenges in creating a healthy and productive environment:
“By leveraging Salesforce technology, including Slack as the primary form of communication among account teams, the Spotify Advertising team has been able to build automated workflows and strengthen collaboration, leading to a 40% increase in productivity across the team by cutting down on meetings and email traffic,” said Daniel Walsh, Global Head of Business Strategy and Operations at Spotify.
“‘All for one, and one for all’ is one of our operating principles at Duolingo. We work hard to foster an environment of collaboration, and only encourage competition if it’s playful and in service of a collective goal,” said Molly Lindsay, Chief People Officer at Duolingo. “We believe that intangibles like motivation, fulfillment and passion are key contributors to our efficiency and output.”
Salesforce’s Slack conducted this global survey in partnership with Qualtrics between February 24 and March 21, 2023. The total sample size was 18,149 desk workers and executives across sectors in the following countries: United States (3,115), Australia (2,034), France (2,039), Germany (2,032), United Kingdom (2,027), India (2,039), Singapore (1,341), Japan (1,658), and South Korea (1,864).
*(3.6 hours on average saved using automation x 52 weeks in one year) / 8-hour working day = 23.4 days or about one month of time saved on average from automation per employee each year.
With decades of expertise in AI, data, and CRM, long time partners Salesforce and Accenture plan to create an acceleration hub for generative AI
Today at World Tour NYC, Salesforce announced plans to collaborate with Accenture to accelerate the deployment of generative AI for CRM. Together, the companies intend to establish an acceleration hub for generative AI that provides organizations with the technology and experience they need to scale Einstein GPT – Salesforce’s generative AI for CRM — helping to increase employee productivity and transform customer experiences.
Significance: When deployed effectively, generative AI has the power to transform how companies do business and free employees’ time to focus on more complex and creative work. In fact, most senior IT leaders (84%) say generative AI will help their organization better serve customers. And with 67% of these leaders prioritizing generative AI for their business within the next 18 months, there is an urgent need to ensure the new technology is deployed effectively.
Driving the news: The powerful combination of Salesforce and Accenture’s AI industry knowledge and connected customer experience aims to provide companies across every industry with strategies and technologies that harness generative AI effectively. By connecting to Accenture’s Generative AI and Large Language Model (LLM) Center of Excellence, the new acceleration hub will facilitate:
Generative AI for CRM: Einstein GPT has the power to transform customer experiences with generative AI. It enables companies to create personalized, AI-generated content across sales, service, marketing, IT, and more. For example, Einstein GPT can generate:
By combining Accenture’s industry experience with Salesforce’s technology, we plan to be well positioned to help customers solve problems with generative AI faster and more effectively.”
Emma McGuigan, Senior Managing Director and Enterprise & Industry Technology lead, Accenture
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Any unreleased services or features referenced in this or other press releases or public statements are not currently available and may not be delivered on time or at all. Customers who purchase Salesforce applications should make their purchase decisions based upon features that are currently available. Salesforce has headquarters in San Francisco, with offices in Europe and Asia, and trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol “CRM.” For more information please visit https://www.salesforce.com, or call 1-800-NO-SOFTWARE.
Today, Salesforce introduced new real-time data and AI capabilities built into the world’s #1 CRM. With generative AI-powered emails, qualified leads, and intelligent sales planning, sales teams can improve efficiency and accelerate growth.
Why it’s relevant: In today’s challenging sales landscape and amid rising customer expectations, only 28% of sellers expect to hit their quota. Using AI and data to automate the mundane helps businesses maximize seller efficiency and keep reps focused on making every customer moment count.
Innovation in action: Sales Cloud uses real-time data from Data Cloud and Einstein AI to help teams maximize every selling opportunity and achieve growth targets.
Einstein GPT empowers sales teams with:
Real-time data helps sales teams:
Salesforce perspective: “B2B selling is moving from intuition-based to data-driven and from episodic sales stages to connected customer journeys powered by generative AI. Whether it’s autonomous prospecting, surfacing real-time insights when you need them, or automating time-consuming tasks, AI is the new UI for every seller.” – Ketan Karkhanis, EVP and GM, Sales Cloud
B2B selling is moving from intuition-based to data-driven and from episodic sales stages to connected customer journeys powered by generative AI.
Ketan Karkhanis, EVP and GM, Sales Cloud
Reaction to the news: “Data and AI are critical components for our growth. We leverage Salesforce to gather information across 200 countries and territories in which we operate. This data equips our teams with the right information, at the right time, to provide an optimal experience for our customers.” – Tom Mazzaferro, Chief Data & Innovation Officer, Western Union
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Any unreleased services or features referenced here are not currently available and may not be delivered on time or at all. Customers should make their purchase decisions based upon features that are currently available.
Today, Salesforce unveiled new Einstein GPT and Data Cloud capabilities to help service organizations streamline common requests and power every interaction with generative AI.
Why it’s relevant: Consumers expect real-time, personalized experiences, with 65% planning to stay loyal to companies that meet these expectations. To retain customers, companies must transform, using generative AI and automation to maximize service agent productivity and make interactions frictionless for customers and agents.
Innovation in action: New real-time AI, data, and automation capabilities from Salesforce Service Cloud help service organizations personalize interactions and deliver exceptional customer experiences at scale.
Salesforce perspective: “To meet today’s customer demands, organizations must ‘Shift to Scale,’ which means shifting from high-touch to low-touch interactions. By powering Service Cloud with Einstein GPT, Data Cloud, and automation, we’re aiming to deliver the world’s most trusted generative service AI platform and ecosystem so our customers can accelerate their digital transformation success, reducing costs while improving customer experiences.” – Clara Shih, CEO of Service Cloud, Salesforce
Fast facts:
By powering Service Cloud with Einstein GPT, Data Cloud, and automation, we’re aiming to deliver the world’s most trusted generative service AI platform and ecosystem so our customers can accelerate their digital transformation success, reducing costs while improving customer experiences.
Clara Shih, CEO of Service Cloud, Salesforce
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Any unreleased services or features referenced here are not currently available and may not be delivered on time or at all. Customers should make their purchase decisions based upon features that are currently available.
Today, Salesforce announced new innovations for MuleSoft’s Anypoint API Experience Hub. Part of MuleSoft’s universal API management platform, Anypoint API Experience Hub lets companies build personalized API portals in minutes using out-of-the-box templates to simplify access to APIs and increase their usage and adoption.
Why it’s relevant: Today, 72% of customer interactions are digital, and APIs are key to delivering those digital experiences by integrating data and applications across the business. To get maximum value from APIs, companies need to make them easily accessible — to increase adoption while ensuring quality, governance, and security standards on every API consumed.
Innovation in action: MuleSoft provides a market-leading platform that enables companies to create a consolidated source of truth and a digital storefront for all of their enterprise APIs. With API Experience Hub, API product managers and developers can:
For example, a financial services company shares its published APIs so the banks in its network can self-serve and access those APIs for general information and delivery of digital services. Anypoint API Experience Hub removes the need for custom coding, helping the banks’ IT teams quickly build a rich, custom site to share the APIs, in just a few clicks.
Salesforce perspective: “Our vision for API management on Anypoint Platform is universal, making it easy and flexible for IT teams to have full life cycle management of any API. The Anypoint API Experience Hub enables enterprises to take that a step further by helping them quickly create engaging API portal experiences using pre-built templates for both internal and external consumption.” – Gerry Egan, VP, Product Management
The Anypoint API Experience Hub enables enterprises to take that a step further by helping them quickly create engaging API portal experiences using pre-built templates for both internal and external consumption.
Gerry Egan, VP, Product Management
Reaction to the news: “The Anypoint API Experience Hub makes setup, design, and deployment of API developer portals easy. This allows us to build faster API portals to increase API engagements.” – Michael Mantle, IT Integration Manager, Emerson
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Today, as National Small Business Week 2023 kicks off, Salesforce is proud to highlight its work with New York-based and Latinx-founded Ponce Bank. Salesforce technology supports the bank’s efforts to serve the financial needs of local communities, including small businesses, underserved groups, and immigrant communities.
What’s the impact: Ponce Bank is one of the largest FDIC-certified, Latinx-managed Minority Depository Institutions (MDI) east of the Mississippi.
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The customer view: Ponce Bank CEO Carlos Naudon has coined the phrase, “GPS,” or “Guided Path to Success,” to refer to Salesforce technology internally, underscoring its importance as a single point of interaction for bankers to understand all client information.
With Salesforce, we have been able to scale and impact more people and businesses than we could have ever imagined.
Carlos Naudon, CEO, Ponce Bank
The Salesforce view: “Small businesses are the backbone of our communities, and in today’s uncertain economy, it is more important than ever that we find ways to support them. By helping Ponce Bank scale their business and better understand and serve their customers with CRM, data, and AI, we are able to directly help uplift people and small businesses across New York, building stronger economies and connections.” – Greg Jacobi, VP & GM of Banking & Lending, Salesforce
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