Interview: Preparation for CTA with Svata Sejkora

We have just only one CTA in Czech republic, but that could change very soon! Let's see how Svatopluk Sejkora prepares for this most demanding Salesforce certification!

Sváťo, most people in the Czech scene will know you, but could you introduce yourself to us? How long have you been working with SF, what is your role and so on.

• Hello Martin, first thank you for the opportunity to have a nice chat with you. I am a Salesforce Architect working at Bearingpoint. I am running 13th year in the Salesforce ecosystem and mostly I am responsible for the technical part of the implementations. After so many years I have worked in or alongside most of the clouds, I would say that I am best at core clouds, B2B, experiences and revenue cloud. Areas that I find most pleasure in are Integrations and CI/CD. 

What was your first certification and what motivates you to pursue further certifications?

• My first certification was SF Administrator back in 2010 (first try, as I failed 3 times). Those were a rushed tries because my company needed SF Sales Cloud Consultant certification to become a partner. I had no real experience, there was no trailhead, so it did not work as intended :-) . My position about certifications is to prove that I got the necessary knowledge, in 95% I would only get certification that I have real experience for. And as I am around for a long time, you get your share of exposure.  

What is your motivation to succeed in CTA certification? 

• This is interesting question. I had been asked exactly same when I stated the preparation, the answer is the only thing that let you keep up and get out of the dust. For me it is to prove myself I am still capable of investing such effort into a single goal over long period of time. 

How do I get CTA certification and what does it involve? Can it be booked using the webassessor as standard?

• First, one need to make the decision they are going for it. And I mean it, it is draining and exhausting experience and there are no shortcuts. One must sacrifice a lot. Once one is on the road, there are groups with like-minded people to discuss and practice. Having a good group of person around you is very important as they will keep one up in the darkest of days. The exam itself is now split into 2 parts. First 602, you can register via webassesor. It costs 1500 USD and there is single judge and 60 minutes scenario. If you fail, you need to wait 6 months to be allowed to go again. If you pass, your board review (second part of the exam, 4500 USD) should follow 2-4 months later. To my understanding you are assigned a date, and you would not register over webassesor (I am not there yet, so this might not be entirely true)

How are you preparing? How much time have you spent on it so far?

• I started in May with proper and dedicated preparation. Since than I invest, on average, 20 hours a week. Currently bit over 650 hours. As a first step I have evaluated my gaps in over 600 areas. Then, based on the gaps I would prepare a list of items I need to study for the upcoming 2 weeks. Once done, just repeat and enjoy the grind as much as you can. After while I moved to training mocks partly, as that is one of the most important parts, you need to be able to sell your knowledge.

What do you consider to be the most difficult and most easiest part of the preparation?

• For me personally the hardest to learn is the way how to talk. To understand, you have 80 requirements that you need to cover in 45 minutes. After deduction of time for other areas, you need to mention, you have approximately 30s for each requirement. In that 30s, you must explain your solution in an understandable manner in a good enough technical depth. Normal speech is nowhere close, and you need to practice a lot. Most of the CTAs I spoke with would say you need to do 50+ mocks to train it. Easiest for me are the integrations as that is my passion and the amount of experience I have is paying of greatly.

Is there a special Salesforce "cookbook" that guides you through the entire process?

• I think there is a trailhead, but well, it does not cover many details. The best resource with no doubt is the Salesforce documentation and well architected pages. 

How do the certification preparation courses work?

• They are great! For me, being part of FlowRepublic (thanks to Bearingpoint, that is paying for it), it is the only reason I will be able to try to go to the board. Let me explain. The amount of knowledge there is vast, without knowing how to treat it and what is important, you will be lost. You get to talk to CTAs regularly, in one2one sessions which is single most pushing experience you can have. There are also materials that you get access to. Don't get me wrong it makes your life bit easier, but you still need to learn everything yourself. I think, if you are not part of SF directly, such program is your biggest shot to become CTA. But for me, the biggest gain from the program was the people. Persons on the journey, as I am, willing to wake up at 5:30 to talk, to study and practice, to have never ending discussions and full-scale support in all ups and downs.

• I would also like to mention Benelux Architect Group, they do sessions (4-5 per month) where the board exam is simulated. These has been of tremendous help as well. Being able to judge, listen and eventually present to get feedback, is priceless. 

How are Salesforce people helping you prepare?

• I am not aware of anything. I believe later in the process (I will be attempting 602 this year or very early next year) you get contacts to align on specifics, but so far, nothing really. 

Do you have any idea how many people CTA has in the world?

• I think it is around 500. It seems that no one (except persons running it) knows exactly :-) 

What will be your next goal after successfully completing the CTA? What other certifications or goals do you have related to Salesforce?

• A vacation! I will take a long vacation with my family, as they are the biggest victim of my journey. I don't have specific certifications planned as I have most from the areas I covered. Nevertheless, for my job, and I believe as CTA even more importantly, you need to stay up to date, no matter what. Not only in SF specific topics, but all other parts influencing your project, being it third party systems (SAP S3 migrating to S4 Hana, changes to security protocols or updates in middleware) or everchanging business approaches. So yeah, there will be plenty to do afterwards. 

At the end: What has been the most challenging certification for you so far?

• With no doubts it was B2C Solution Architect. When I did it I had only limited real life knowledge (single project) which caused me to study a lot more I would like to. I was able to benefit from knowledge of SF core clouds and marketing cloud which are quite big part of the certification.

Thank you Svato! Good luck!