Transcript of a short retrospective video marking Salesforce's 20th anniversary. Multiple speakers (founders, early employees, leaders) recall the company’s messy early days, founding anecdotes (ethernet to a founder's house, puppy, basement), early product and business-model innovations (cloud delivery, subscription/customer-success focus, Chatter, mobility), cultural/philanthropic initiatives (1-1-1 model), and the company’s rapid global growth and community-driven mission.
Chapters
This is the beginning of salesforce.com.
Those photos are exactly what it was like. It was disheveled. There are wires everywhere.
I think we had to string an ethernet cable through the window to Mark's house so that we could add additional employees.
It was a very exciting time. We had an inspiration of where Amazon.com and Google and Yahoo could come together with what traditional enterprise software was doing and together could create a new paradigm.
The Internet is a vast network that allows computers around the world to communicate and share information.
The first thing we did is build a prototype.
How do we make it easier to use enterprise software? That was the hook.
It was like in the heyday of the dot com boom.
We had the basement. They said, sure, you can set up down here in the basement.
It was fun. We felt a huge amount of camaraderie and I think a real excitement to build something new. My first day on the job, I didn't know what to do when I showed up and Mark had just gotten a puppy named Kelleth off the newspapers.
Mark asked us to go get noticed.
We were standing out in front of the Siebel conference with, you know, no software signs and you sort of questioning like wait, what company did I join here? We're out here trying to get the word out that software is totally superfluous.
One of the biggest mountains I remember celebrating is when we were cash flow positive. The business of business is to make the world a better place. What more can we do?
We created the one one one model. It was really innovative of us to really create a three legged stool where we had a new technology model, a new business model and a new philanthropy model.
As the company rises, as the value that is created by customers and by stakeholders goes up, so does the vested interest of the philanthropy.
It was revolutionary. It was a crazy really thinking about Internet scale. We weren't thinking about how do I build something and run it for one company. We were thinking about how do we run it for all companies in the world.
Of course we have to have a user conference. We want to get feedback from our customers. We love our customers. Let's talk to them about how they're using the technology. Consistent, easy to use, competitive, responsive, very quick, highly automated, fit within our budget. Mark Beniel. That first dreamforce that we sold out that I walked into, I just could not believe the size and scope of this company.
We went public in 2004, my first time on a private jet. The big name this afternoon is salesforce.com shares of salesforce.com soared today.
While it was a great celebration and something I'll never forget, it was also a time when Mark was like, okay, back to work.
And from that moment on, it just went to pure warp speed.
We were way out in front of where the industry was.
BlackBerries were cool.
We recognize that mobility would be a huge strategy for us going forward.
You're able to use all these services right over the Internet. That's the democratization that's happening around the world.
We were San Francisco born and bred, but I think what's amazing is to see the growth around the world.
This is just our legacy, and we have to work harder as an industry to transform faster. Mark basically stood up and said, I'm going to buy your company.
These incredibly talented leaders that have joined us is just amazing. You know, I think Sassy's just like a spiritual, grand character to Astro and Einstein and everybody else. Right. And I think if you look back, like, even back then, we were fun.
Chatter was really transformational. We just turned the tech organization on its head to focus on moving to social.
Mark used to say, right from the beginning, it's all about customer success. Our business model mandates it. You know, when you're a subscription business, you need to earn your customers trust every single day.
Our culture is built on trust, and we take that very seriously.
And we've had a meteoric rise. You think about cloud, you think about mobile, you think about social, you think about artificial intelligence. There has never been an acceleration of technology to the extent that we're seeing today.
I really think that the dream was to create a new kind of a company that operated differently in the world that not only was super innovative as it related to technology and business models, but was really innovative as it related to people and community.
Everybody in the company needs to find that passionate thing that they're interested in and decide, that's going to be my project and I'm going to drive that. That's where I really feel like, wow, the trailblazers out there that are transforming their careers, our customers are transforming how they're working with their customers.
And so what I've seen is this incredible velocity start to happen. And I think that's because of the community.
Hands down, we're moving into the fourth industrial revolution. Everything is starting to get connected. We are all deeply connected.
We are of something bigger than us.
We can't just look at it from, oh, let's just take a review of employees we have today. It's built into our compensation philosophy as we hire people and also as we promote people.
I can't think of a better place for purpose and mission than here at Salesforce. And so that's what keeps me going.
