At a young age, Melissa Shepard excelled in mathematics and had a passion for computer games. Despite being one of the few females in her Computer Science major and a single mother of two, Melissa didn’t let that stop her from excelling. Balancing parenting with her studies, Melissa graduated magna cum laude, served as VP of a national mathematics honor society, and later furthered her education by getting an MBA in information systems.

In 2006, Melissa was introduced to Salesforce when she began a role that required her to customize her organization’s existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) system and build partner and customer portals that integrated with Salesforce. This introduction changed the entire trajectory of her career and her life. She learned Salesforce Administrator skills, customizing the company’s instance for stakeholders. She then eventually transitioned into an architect role where she designed the tools needed to solve the company’s integration issues.