With all my raving on the automagic in salesforce.com, the title of this post may cause you to do a double-take. But I assure you, dear reader, that I am completely serious when I tell you not to go on autopilot. Perhaps a bit of an explanation is necessary.
As Salesforce admins, we have a bevy of tools at our disposal for making Salesforce appear to have that automagic. We can use workflow rules to make fields update, emails gets sent or tasks get assigned. We can leverage triggers to create new records, sum values of non-detail objects or update multiple records. We can use schedules to deliver reports & dashboards to an executives inbox. And with the new Chatter Actions, you can extend that automagic even further. And all of that is great & fantastic, and I am in no way advocating that you stop doing it. In fact, do LOTS of it!
What I am suggesting is that you review your automagic on a regular schedule. While workflows can help automate a lot of your processes, if you set it and forget it, you may end up with some outdated automation in your org. Instead, make time once a quarter to review your magic. Make sure the workflows are still updating fields with values you care about, and sending emails to the appropriate people. You can even schedule an audit of fields that you know are touched by workflows, if that helps you to review your data. (Not to mention, doing these reviews is a great chance to make sure all your description fields are filled in.)
As a Salesforce admin, your number one priority is staying on top of all that is happening within your org. By reviewing your automated processes, you can help assure that your org remains in line with your business goals. And alignment is a beautiful thing.
