Manager, Salesforce

Overview: The Manager of Salesforce Administration & Center of Excellence owns the management, optimization, and governance of our Salesforce platform - an 800+ user environment spanning Salesforce and Marketing Cloud. This role leads a team of 3-4 people and is responsible for maturing the existing Center of Excellence, raising platform governance standards, and ensuring the business gets real value from its Salesforce investment. This is a platform leadership role, not a ticket-response role - the right person brings Salesforce capabilities forward to the business proactively, not just responds to what is asked. Location: Remote Essential Duties and Responsibilities Includes the following. Other duties may be assigned. Salesforce Administration & Platform Management • Leads the Salesforce administration function across Salesforce including user management, security, roles, profiles, permissions, flows, reports, dashboards, and data quality. • Manages intake, prioritization, and delivery of platform enhancements, support requests, and operational needs across 800+ users through a structured, consistent process. • Oversees system configuration, automation, and ongoing maintenance - keeping the platform stable, secure, and aligned with business processes. • Partners with technical teams on integrations, data flows, releases, and system dependencies; maintains strong documentation across configuration, processes, and release changes. Center of Excellence • Matures the existing Salesforce Center of Excellence - building on what exists and closing gaps in governance, standards, intake, change management, and stakeholder communication. • Exercises decision-making authority on platform design and configuration standards, including when to push back on requests that do not meet the bar. • Partners with business leaders to evaluate requests, challenge unclear requirements, and ensure solutions address the right problems before configuration begins. Business Partnership & Platform Advocacy • Works closely with Sales, Operations, and Marketing to deeply understand how each team works - not just what they are asking for today. • Proactively brings forward Salesforce features, configurations, and platform capabilities that business teams would benefit from but may not know to ask about; stays current on Salesforce releases and translates what is relevant into business value. • Challenges requirements constructively, facilitates roadmap and prioritization discussions with a clear point of view, and promotes adoption through training and enablement. • Partners with data and MDM owners to ensure Salesforce data quality, hierarchies, and account records stay aligned with enterprise master data standards. Team Leadership • Leads, coaches, and develops a team of 3-4 people across Salesforce administration and platform support; sets clear expectations for quality, ownership, responsiveness, and delivery. • Builds a culture of accountability, continuous improvement, and strong business partnership. Release, Governance & Quality • Owns Salesforce release planning and ensures changes are properly tested, documented, communicated, and deployed across both clouds. • Maintains strong controls around change management, access management, data integrity, and compliance; monitors platform health, technical debt, and user adoption. • Identifies opportunities to simplify processes, reduce manual work, and improve platform performance. Education and Experience • Bachelor s degree in Information Technology, Business, Computer Science, or a related field; equivalent combination of education and experience will be considered. • 5+ years of Salesforce administration or Salesforce platform experience, ideally in an enterprise environment. • 2+ years of people leadership, team lead, or platform ownership experience. • Hands-on experience with Salesforce and Marketing Cloud. • Salesforce Administrator certification required; Advanced Administrator, Platform App Builder, or Marketing Cloud certifications strongly preferred. • Familiarity with Master Data Management concepts preferred; hands-on MDM experience a plus but not required. Core Knowledge and Skills • Deep understanding of Salesforce configuration, security model, flows, reports, dashboards, objects, fields, and automation. • Proven ability to translate business needs into practical, scalable Salesforce solutions - and to proactively surface platform capabilities the business has not thought to ask for. • Strong communication and influencing skills with both technical and non-technical audiences; able to challenge requirements constructively and guide stakeholders toward better outcomes. • Experience building or maturing a Salesforce governance model or Center of Excellence, with sound judgment on when to configure, when to customize, and when to say no. • Experience managing Salesforce enhancements, support queues, releases, and stakeholder expecta...