Salesforce Helps NYC COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout | Success Anywhere World Tour | Salesforce

Well, one of the ways that we like to really talk and motivate and explain what we're doing is to talk about stories. We like to be storytellers here at Salesforce. And we have two amazing stories to tell you about two customers who have been incredibly successful this year. One, the first customer. They were given challenges like they could never have experienced. They were already one of the very largest cities in the world. Now they had to fight a pandemic. They had to implement contact tracing. They had to be prepared to implement the vaccines. That's New York City. And we're going to hear directly from their executives. And then Honeywell, a company not so far away from here, one of the largest and most important companies in the world, and how they have had to adapt to create success from anywhere. So let's go ahead. Let's hear. Let's go to New York City and hear from this amazing story that has happened over the last year. Take it away.

At the beginning of the pandemic, New York City was the epicenter. We had significant pain and suffering. Vaccinations are joyful for us because it is the one thing that we're looking at that will get us out of this.

New York City is sort of like a hub for the best of the best, and I feel like I needed to be part of that. I love cooking food because it connects me to people.

Teaching is pretty much my family business. My parents are both teachers. One of my siblings is a teacher. I definitely had that moment where I realized I was born to do this.

I was doing a pop up dinner series then to hear in the news, like no gatherings whatsoever. My livelihood was kind of like down the drain. Basically change everything. You build your business and start all over again. It's, it's, it's a lot. It's a lot to navigate. Sorry.

When I heard that the school was going to be closed, I was afraid. Many of my students and families suffer from the trauma of poverty. The kids need me. And the more that I've worked there, the more I realize that I need them too.

Bye. Bye.

We had a platform live less than three weeks. I think the thing that will stick out most is watching people use this platform to get us out of this pandemic one shot at a time.

I finally got an appointment through NYC Vax Finder.

I remember leading up to that first injection was this wave of what the whole year has done and what the world has changed to.

I felt really excited and I just felt really good. And I haven't felt really Good. In a really long time, New York was alive again.

I'm watching this place come back to life.

The thing that I'm most looking forward to is to be sitting at a table and sharing a good meal, hugging my mom, who I haven't seen in over a year and a half. That's where I'm most excited about.

All right, well, that was a very powerful story because you could really see what has happened in New York City, one of the largest and most important cities in the world, given the most complex challenges they have ever had. And let me tell you, who got him through so much of that. It was Jessica Tisch. Jessica Tisch is the commissioner and citywide CIO of the city of New York. She works directly for the mayor, Bill de Blasio. So, Jessica, can you hear us today? Can you hear us out there?

I can. I can.

All right. Well, welcome, Jessica. We're here in Washington, D.C. we're in a torrential down floor. All of our monitors have gone out. It's crazy what's happening here. But we want to talk to you because you have the messages and the stories, Jessica. And you know, we've been on the phone a lot this year together, haven't we?

We sure have.

So, Jessica, let's just talk to us. Tell us your story right from the beginning. What has this year been for you, and how have you gotten New York City through this amazing year?

So, Mark, I want to focus first on the vaccination effort because that has certainly been the most profound challenge of my career, and also, I think, one of the greatest success stories. In the beginning stages of the vaccination efforts, New York City faced the same problem that all other big cities and states faced, which was we had dozens of different vaccination locations and different providers, and everyone had their own scheduling tool. And the public couldn't navigate this message. This problem was compounded by the fact that the first community that we really wanted to serve with vaccinations were our seniors, some of whom were less digitally literate. It was an even bigger problem than it would just otherwise be. In January, the mayor called me and he asked me to fix it. The first thing that I did was I called you and I said, mark, we need to fix this. And so in less than three weeks, in two and a half weeks, your team at Salesforce worked hand in hand with us and with mtx, and we built a single, streamlined scheduling tool for the public. But it's more than just a scheduling tool. It manages the end to end vaccination Efforts for New Yorkers from the time a member of the public goes online to schedule their appointment through to when they show up at the clinic through to when they get their vaccination. We schedule their second dose appointment all on this platform. But more importantly, we are able to offer this platform as a service to all vaccine providers citywide. So we have dozens of different providers, including some of the biggest hospital systems in the city, all using our platform for scheduling of vaccination appointments and also for processing of those vaccination appointments at their clinics, which makes New Yorkers lives easier. What we want to do this year is we want to treat people with dignity. They have had a terrible year. And it is our job to make signing up for a vaccination appointment and getting your vaccination as easy and as streamlined as possible.

Well, Jessica, you have been a light in the darkness. You have accomplished amazing, amazing challenges. And while others have failed at distributing the vaccines and getting these vaccine systems up and running, you have succeeded. And it's amazing. And before that, contact tracing as well. I know very, very well everything that you have been doing this entire year. So, Jessica, give us some advice. Tell everyone, what is the key to being successful from anywhere and in a world like this that we're going through in this new pandemic world?

Mark, I would say you got to pick your partners well. And if you pick your partners well, you can do more than you ever would imagine you'd be able to do. If I look back at the past year, distributing 500,000 iPads to New York City school students, 300,000 of them in the first five weeks of the pandemic, standing up a platform to deliver 200 million meals to New Yorkers in lockdown in April, building a contact tracing system with you in three and a half weeks, which was the key to opening New York City back up after it had been on lockdown. Built that system in three weeks. We have traced 600,000 cases, 650,000 contacts. We've used that platform to deliver services to 211,000 New Yorkers in quarantine. Meals, medications, tests, 13,000 hotel isolation rooms booked. It's incredible what you can do as long as you pick the right partners who are in it to win it with you.

Jessica, thank you so much. Thank you for being successful from anywhere. Thank you for being a great partner yourself. And thank you for everything you do for everyone in New York City. Thanks so much. Jessica Tisch, please give her a hand.

Thank you.