This week, hundreds of professionals in the higher ed space gathered at the University of Miami for one of the most exciting industry conferences. This year’s Salesforce Higher Ed Summit brought together thought leaders to share, learn, and push the possibilities of constituent engagement in the higher ed arena.

Though not an easy task to whittle down all the conversations from the event, we’ve managed to distill three valuable takeaways from the event:

1. Salesforce Lightning Connect powers data insights.
   
   Salesforce Foundation and USC Marshall School of Business showcased the power of Lightning Connect during a breakout session. Envision this: connect to another database — such as a Student Information System — and make that data visible to a Salesforce user without importing and/or storing that data in your Salesforce org. For those who like to have access to high volumes of student data, this feature allows you to display data very quickly and without hitting any data storage limits. Still in its early stage, Lighting Connect is a read-only solution and cannot be used for reporting or dashboard creation. The next generation of Lightning Connect will take care of that usability to make data access and analytics much more impactful.
2. Increasing focus on constituent engagement.
   
   Though the wealth of knowledge available around the possibilities of the platform can be overwhelming, key stakeholders that gathered for this year’s Summit are hungry to get educated — specifically around constituent engagement strategies. At the end of a full day of keynotes, breakouts, and networking, it was clear that the higher ed industry is shifting to be more constituent-focused. Many of the leaders we met at the Summit were eager to gain experience around using Salesforce to transform their organizations through a constituent engagement lens.
3. Salesforce education is imperative for success.
   
   One of the key themes we’ve identified, especially for Institutions looking to leverage Salesforce for the first time, is the do-it-yourself nature of universities. It is natural for the faculty, SIS support, and other stakeholders to use their natural intellectual curiosity to learn about the platform, configure, and build in-house. The biggest challenge with this approach is the potential to miss out on best practices early on in laying the platform’s foundation, resulting in possible issues as platform adoption expands and matures.
   
   
   
   The do-it-yourself model can kickstart your project, but it’s essential to educate yourself to avoid pitfalls. Expand your knowledge around the basic foundations of the platform, or to learn more about the possibilities the platform affords, get in touch with our Salesforce training experts. Investing in your own Salesforce education is key to self-sufficiency and will help you implement your upcoming initiatives. 

It was a rewarding two days at this year’s Summit, and we hope that our top takeaways help shape your initiatives for the year to come. Want to learn more about driving constituent engagement in your institution? Connect one-on-one with our experts.