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True Blue Blazing Melbourne 2026

True Blue Blazing is a community-led Salesforce learning event based in Melbourne, Australia. Built on the belief that "looking under the hood" should be fun, we bring together Salesforce professionals in an environment that prioritises authentic connection and real knowledge sharing over corporate polish. Everyone is welcome — we keep tickets accessible through bursaries and subsidies to ensure a diverse community can participate. Expect sessions that are surprising, unpredictable, and genuinely useful; less boring slide decks, more "here's how we actually built it."

At True Blue Blazing, we're committed to putting together the best possible lineup; one that's packed with moments you won't forget. We're working hard behind the scenes to finalise the details and make sure everything comes together perfectly. In the meantime, we're accepting speaker expressions of interest, so if you're keen to be part of it, now is the time to put your hand up.

Don't miss your chance to be involved - register your interest to sponsor today and we'll keep you in the loop as the schedule takes shape.

Share the Dignity
At this year's event, we'll be supporting Share the Dignity by packing over 200 bags of toiletries for girls and women experiencing period poverty. When you buy your ticket, you can opt to pay for one or more bags to be added to the 200 that the conference organisers are paying for.

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Event Schedule

9:00 am - 9:30 am

Registration and Networking

9:30 am - 10:45 am

Welcome to Country & Un(b)locking Transformation Panel

UN(B)LOCKING TRANSFORMATIONS Real stories. Honest lessons. Practical advice. Hear from leaders who've delivered successful transformations, recovered stalled programs and navigated the messy realities in between. Learn what creates lasting value, what gets in the way, and how to give your own transformation the best chance of success.

Nicole Aebi-Moyo

Nicole Aebi-Moyo

For Purpose Practice Lead

Shailja Sharma

Shailja Sharma

Associate Director

Amanda Nuttall

Amanda Nuttall

Salesforce Functional Consultant/IT Support

Arnaud Cherval

Arnaud Cherval

Digital Platform Manager

Christopher Nugent

Christopher Nugent

Director and Co-Founder

10:45 am - 11:15 am

Morning Tea

11:15 am - 11:45 am

What 100 Customer Journeys Taught Me About Business

After working across hundreds of customer journeys, one thing has become clear: the biggest barriers to great customer experiences are rarely the customers themselves. They're disconnected teams, fragmented processes, competing priorities and assumptions made inside the business. This session shares the recurring patterns, surprising lessons and practical strategies that emerged from real transformation projects. Through real-world stories, attendees will learn how small moments shape customer perception, why empathy is a competitive advantage, and how to design experiences that deliver measurable outcomes for both customers and the business.

Sophia Conradi

Sophia Conradi

Head of Client Service

11:45 am - 12:15 pm

Your user IS the goal

"Thea works in Customer Service. She's been in her role for nine years. She knows her customers by name. She can de-escalate an angry call with warmth. She's the reason customers come back. Thea has also been through two CRMs and a SAP migration and she's about to be part of a Salesforce roll-out. And every one of them has made her job feel harder. In this talk, Dan introduces Thea (a real person, with a real job) and uses her story to ask the question every implementation team needs to sit with: what if the user isn't the obstacle to value, but the source of it? We know change and adoption are the keys to successful projects, are we ready to change ourselves in the way we engage with our user teams?"

Dan Godden

Dan Godden

CEO

12:15 pm - 1:15 pm

Lunch

1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

Tales from the Career Crossroads

"Career journeys in tech are rarely linear. This session brings together women and non-binary professionals who have navigated pivotal career transitions — from user to admin, admin to architect, individual contributor to people leader, and technologist to executive. Panelists will share honest reflections on what prompted their change, how they approached it, the challenges they faced, and the support systems that helped them succeed. Expect practical insights, real-world advice, and candid conversations about navigating growth, uncertainty, and opportunity. This session is designed to inspire, connect, and support others who may be considering their own next step."

Zoe Lai-Ladomery

Zoe Lai-Ladomery

Co-Lead

Karen Hendrickx

Karen Hendrickx

founder and transformation lead

Michelle Orbach

Michelle Orbach

Digital Solutions Manager - Good Friday Appeal

Lakshmi Pavani Sistla

Lakshmi Pavani Sistla

Anuja Parashar Pandey

Anuja Parashar Pandey

National Capability Lead for AI and Agentforce

2:00 pm - 2:30 pm

Are We There Yet? – 6 Years, 10 Programs, and 700 Users Later

Scaling a Salesforce footprint from a team of one to six—serving 700 users across 10 completely different programs—is a trip across the Nullarbor, not a quick trip to the beach. This is an honest look at the failures, wins, and false dawns of delivering case management across a diverse NFP workforce. Many system iterations later, I’m pausing to ask: Are we there yet? Join me as I share the reality of tackling the "cursed" projects that took 6 years to finally launch, emergency 4-week deployments and everything in between. You’ll walk away with a few laughs, validation of how brutal NFP transformation can be, and strategies to help you manage stakeholders and pull off complex change in your own organisation.

David Aitken

David Aitken

Group Business Applications Manager

2:30 pm - 3:00 pm

Afternoon Tea

3:00 pm - 3:30 pm

From Stall to Sprint: Navigating the Messy Middle

The hardest part of transformation isn’t the launch or the finish line; it’s the messy middle, where complexity, competing priorities and stakeholder fatigue stall progress. Drawing on 20+ years of enterprise transformation and three recovery engagements, this session diagnoses the common failure modes that trap programs mid‑flight and presents a practical, repeatable recovery playbook. Through a focused case study of a Local Council (omni‑channel re‑architecture that delivered $10M savings and cut service times from weeks to seconds) and integrate examples from an Airline and an Aged Care Provider, I’ll share three rapid recovery patterns: governance reset, operating‑model simplification and adoption sprints. The session combines a concise, evidence‑based presentation with a facilitated roundtable where attendees workshop a current “messy middle” challenge and leave with a 30–90 day action checklist to restore momentum and realise benefits.

Ashley Slee

Ashley Slee

Transformation and Program Manager

9:00 am - 9:30 am

Registration and Networking

10:45 am - 11:15 am

Morning Tea

11:15 am - 11:45 am

AI + Human Workforce

Current Trends from customers/consumers How to keep up with the ever-changing demands How have our customers implemented AI Natterbox are bringing some customers for a fireside chat to share their experiences now that they are in year 2 of their AI + Human workforce and can share the outcomes they have achieved whilst touching on any hurdles or obstacles internally or externally they faced including - how their customers evolved and new perceptions when calling or messaging AI + Humans in combination

Negar Khamsi

Negar Khamsi

Head of Sales & Alliances, APAC

11:45 am - 12:15 pm

Who Moved Your Customer?

"For years, CRM has been about digitising work. Agentforce changes the question entirely — it's no longer just about how work gets done, but who does it. As AI agents begin occupying roles alongside humans, organisations face a strategic inflection point. The businesses that thrive won't be those that simply deploy agents — they'll be the ones that redesign their operating model around them. In this session, Ian Sampson explores how Salesforce customers can make the transition from traditional CRM operations to becoming truly agentic enterprises. The result is a new way of thinking about customer-centricity — one where humans act as conductors, orchestrating agents across sales, service, marketing, and operations to deliver outcomes that neither could achieve alone. This isn't a session about AI features. It's about what it means to run a business when the ""who"" doing the work is no longer necessarily human — but accountability still is."

Ian Sampson

Ian Sampson

founder & author

12:15 pm - 1:15 pm

Lunch

1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

Built by People, Guided by Strategy: From First Pitch to Business as Usual

"Maximizing the ROI of technology transformation demands a shift in mindset: doing less, doing it better, and ruthlessly proving its worth. To achieve this, organisations must align their two most valuable assets, their strategy and their people, across the entire project lifecycle. This session offers a comprehensive look at the four stages of engagement: Sales, Discovery, Build, and Business as Usual. Led by four industry experts, each presenting a 5-to-8-minute targeted brief, we will explore prioritisation frameworks, successful intervention stories, and value-measurement methodologies. The session concludes with a comprehensive storyboard illustrating how the roles of strategy and people must adapt over time to guarantee successful, high-value delivery. What will attendees learn? - The Power of 'No': Practical prioritisation frameworks to stop low-value work before it starts. - Lifecycle Adaptability: Understanding how the roles of strategy and people shift from pitch to BAU. - Proving the Point: Methods for measuring and demonstrating tangible business value to stakeholders."

Nicole Aebi-Moyo

Nicole Aebi-Moyo

For Purpose Practice Lead

Wyan Carter

Wyan Carter

Founder and Lead Mentor

Lauren Stewart

Lauren Stewart

CEO

Mrudula Vaddem

Mrudula Vaddem

Salesforce Consultant

2:00 pm - 2:30 pm

A seat at the table: Why your Salesforce lead belongs in the leadership team

In a lot of for-purpose organisations, the Salesforce admin sits three or four layers below the decisions that shape the platform. Requests arrive, get built, and the system slowly drifts away from anything resembling a strategy. The fix is rarely a different person. It is a different role. Lauren Stewart and Sarah Bonelli look at what changes when a system administrator becomes a product owner. Not the job title, but the actual shift: from processing requests to assessing their impact, from reacting to prioritising, from being told what the organisation needs to being in the room when that gets decided and driving that decision. Drawing on their own experience inside nonprofit organisations, Lauren and Sarah will cover what the product owner role looks like in practice, the skills and habits admins can start building now, and what managers and leadership teams need to change so that role can exist. Admins will leave with a clear sense of how to grow into this. Managers will leave seeing the role differently.

Lauren Stewart

Lauren Stewart

CEO

Sarah Bonelli

Sarah Bonelli

Salesforce Consultant

2:30 pm - 3:00 pm

Afternoon Tea

3:00 pm - 3:30 pm

How to Win Board Support for Your Digital Project

Getting a board to approve a CRM investment trips up many organisations. Not because it's hard. Because most approaches misread the audience and get them what they need. This session is about understanding your board and the process they need to feel confident. We'll build a customer journey map specifically for the board, mapping what directors already know, where the pain points are, what they're feeling but not saying, and what moves them from skeptical to signed off. We'll also hear directly from board members who've been on the other side of these presentations, what made them say yes, what nearly made them say no, and what they wish they'd been shown earlier. If you're a CIO, CEO, CRM Manager, Architect, or vendor preparing a technology investment case, this session gives you a framework and understanding that works.

Daniel Howell

Daniel Howell

CEO

9:00 am - 9:30 am

Registration and Networking

10:45 am - 11:15 am

Morning Tea

11:15 am - 11:45 am

I've Audited 70+ Salesforce Orgs. Here's What's Putting Yours at Risk

Is your Salesforce org as secure as you think? Drawing on insights from more than 70 security assessments, this session uncovers the most common vulnerabilities, how to fix them, and the practical steps every admin, architect and leader can take to better protect their Salesforce data.

Doug Merrett

Doug Merrett

Founder

11:45 am - 12:15 pm

Salesforce to Finance: The True Customer 360

"Most Salesforce projects ""stop at the finish line"" with the Closed-Won Opportunity. But for the business, that’s just the beginning. Without connecting Sales to Finance it can lead to data silos. Sales reps asking Finance about payment statuses and Finance chasing Sales for missing GST details. In this session, we'll explore both why you would want to connect Salesforce to your ledger and the options available to do so. We will break down these options with the lens of cost to implement, time to value and long term maintenance with a few 'in-the-field' examples. Our lead to ledger options will include: - On platform and native built applications (eg Revenue Cloud, Certinia and Accounting Seed) - Connectors (available on the app exchange eg Breadwinner) - Custom integrations Attendees will leave this session with an understanding of the benefits of connecting Salesforce and Finance as well as several practical options to achieve this"""

Jo Swadling

Jo Swadling

Managing Director

12:15 pm - 1:15 pm

Lunch

1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

AI Is Easy. Readiness Is Hard

AI is Easy. Readiness Is Hard - How organisations move from AI curiosity to trusted adoption. Getting access to AI is easy. Building an organisation that can trust it, govern it and actually use it well is much harder. In this co-presented session, Hanzel Nillo and Jason Lawrence explore both sides of AI readiness: the foundations organisations need before they scale AI, and what happens when those principles meet the reality of an actual rollout. Drawing on lessons from hundreds of data, CRM, AI and transformation programs, Hanzel will unpack the role trusted data, clear ownership, organisational alignment and practical governance play in moving beyond AI pilots and experimentation to sustainable business value. Jason then puts those principles to the test, sharing a candid account of rolling out Claude across the SalesFix team. He'll share what worked, what didn't, and what they would do differently, covering training requirements that slowed adoption, an AI policy already on its third iteration, documentation challenges and a leadership transition that tested the approach. Attendees will leave with a practical framework for assessing AI readiness, real-world lessons from an AI rollout, and the questions every organisation should be asking before moving from AI experimentation to adoption at scale.

Jason Lawrence

Jason Lawrence

Chief AI Officer

Hanzel Nillo

Hanzel Nillo

Founder and Principal Advisor

2:00 pm - 2:30 pm

Using a Chess Mindset to Solve Solution Architecture

What can solution architects learn from the world's most enduring strategy game? In this session, William and Karan will explore the striking similarities between high-level chess and solution architecture, highlighting the mindset, decision-making frameworks, and strategic thinking required to succeed in both disciplines. Drawing on lessons from competitive chess, they will demonstrate how skills such as anticipating change, evaluating trade-offs, managing complexity, and thinking several moves ahead can enhance architectural decision-making. The session will also examine how AI has transformed the landscape of chess and use these insights to consider the future impact of AI on the solution architect role. Attendees will leave with practical ideas for developing the skills and mindset needed to succeed in an increasingly AI-driven technology landscape.

Karan Gogna

Karan Gogna

Director

William Leahey

William Leahey

Senior Consultant

2:30 pm - 3:00 pm

Afternoon Tea

3:00 pm - 3:30 pm

Unlock free tools - Set up Marketing Cloud Foundations

"In this practical, zero-hype session, we will demystify the new core-native Marketing features. We will walk through exactly how to activate the features, configure the Data Cloud backbone, and launch your first campaign using what you already own. No extra licenses, no external APIs, and no third-party data syncing required. Attendees will learn: 1 - The ""What Do You Actually Get?"" Audit: A breakdown of the free tier boundaries 2 - Step-by-Step Activation: The exact permission set groups, email verification steps, and Quick Settings cogs you need to flip to get the Marketing app live. 3 - The Consent & Privacy Trap: How to properly map the Privacy Consent Status fields on Leads and Contacts before hitting ""Send"" to stay compliant. 4 - Data Cloud for Beginners: How to build simple real-time segments using your native CRM data without needing a data engineering degree"

Jo Swadling

Jo Swadling

Managing Director

9:00 am - 9:30 am

Registration and Networking

10:45 am - 11:15 am

Morning Tea

11:15 am - 11:45 am

Workshop It with a Change Manager

This session is a working workshop, not a talk. Bring a real change issue from your own work: stakeholder buy-in, resistance to a new tool or process, low engagement, a project that's stalled, team dynamics getting in the way, unclear sponsorship, whatever's live for you right now. We'll group people by similar issues, then run each one through one of Change Made Simple's live AI diagnostic tools to surface what's actually going on underneath it. From there it's over to the room: what's the tool telling you, what's it missing, and what would you actually do next. The AI behind the tool will give you an analysis and a set of actions, the discussion will allow you to ask questions and make sure you understand your next steps. You'll leave with a clearer view of your own situation and a practical next steps from a people / change angle.

Sheena Karim

Sheena Karim

Founder, AI-Powered Change Management Specialist

11:45 am - 12:15 pm

High Impact Teaming: Building a Culture of Innovation

High-performing teams don’t happen by accident. They’re intentionally designed, nurtured, and continuously evolved. In this session, I’ll share practical ways to create a culture of psychological safety and innovation within teams, based on real-world experience working across complex organisations and transformation programs. We’ll explore what enables teams to speak up, experiment, and collaborate effectively — and what gets in the way. The session includes simple, actionable activities attendees can use immediately to improve team dynamics, build trust, and unlock new ideas. This isn’t a theory-heavy or “perfect team” story. It’s an honest look at what works in practice, what doesn’t, and how small changes can have a significant impact on how teams operate and deliver together.

Karen Hendrickx

Karen Hendrickx

founder and transformation lead

12:15 pm - 1:15 pm

Lunch

1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

The Power of Why: Smart Salesforce Delivery

Behind every smart Salesforce solution is someone brave enough to ask, “But do we really need to do it?” This session reveals why Business Analysts, Delivery and PMs are the unsung heroes of scalable, human-centred delivery - and how you can think like one.

Kristyna Turner

Kristyna Turner

Marketing Technology Practice Lead

2:00 pm - 2:30 pm

The Modern Marketing Team: Building the AI Workforce Your CMO Will Soon Expect

"The best marketing teams of 2028 won't look anything like the best marketing teams of today. Artificial Intelligence isn't replacing marketers—but it is fundamentally changing the skills, roles and operating models that successful marketing organisations need. In this session, Salesforce Marketing Champion Tammy Begley and Bluprintx Capability Lead Mandy Pearson share what they've learned from helping organisations implement Marketing Cloud Next, Data Cloud, Agentforce and AI across APAC. Through real customer stories—including the mistakes, surprises and lessons learned—you'll discover how leading organisations are redesigning their marketing teams for an AI-first future. Together we'll explore: • Why marketers are becoming AI orchestrators rather than campaign builders • Which work should be automated—and where humans continue to create the greatest value • Why trusted customer data and governance matter far more than writing better prompts • How to introduce AI into your marketing organisation without overwhelming your people • Practical frameworks you can take back to your own team immediately This isn't another AI product demo. It's a practical roadmap for building the marketing team every organisation will soon need."

Tammy Begley

Tammy Begley

Director Alliances APAC

Mandy Pearson

Mandy Pearson

Capability Lead APAC

2:30 pm - 3:00 pm

Afternoon Tea

3:00 pm - 3:30 pm

Simple Steps to Solo Salesforce Admin Success

"This session explores the realities of working as a solo Salesforce Administrator, where one person is responsible for support, platform stability, and ongoing improvement. It focuses on practical ways to manage the workload, reduce risk, and make the role more sustainable — and enjoyable — over time. The session covers how to prioritise work when requests come from everywhere and everything feels urgent, including how to create a prioritisation matrix that works for both admins and stakeholders. It explores ways to separate reactive support from longer-term improvement work, ensuring effort is focused on genuine business value while minimising constant context switching. Attendees will also learn practical approaches to reducing the risks of being a single point of failure, including lightweight documentation habits, measuring success and failure, and implementing platform best practices that prevent recurring issues without creating unnecessary overhead. Finally, the session explores how solo admins can approach upskilling and problem-solving when there is no internal team to rely on. This includes learning with purpose, deciding when to deepen technical skills, and using the Salesforce community as a realistic extension of a team of one. Think of this session as a practical playbook for successfully running a Salesforce platform solo, from someone who transitioned from a large team to being a team of one for nearly two years. Attendees will leave with realistic, actionable strategies they can implement immediately to simplify and improve their day-to-day work."

Courtney Cole

Courtney Cole

Salesforce Administrator

9:00 am - 9:30 am

Registration and Networking

10:45 am - 11:15 am

Morning Tea

12:15 pm - 1:15 pm

Lunch

2:30 pm - 3:00 pm

Afternoon Tea

3:30 pm - 4:30 pm

Demo Jam

Fast demos. Real solutions. A little friendly competition. Get ready for the True Blue Blazing Demo Jam, where our sponsors and ISV partners take to the stage to show what their solutions can actually do. Each participant gets a short, high-energy demo to showcase their technology, tackle a real-world challenge and give you a taste of what they've built. No lengthy presentations, just straight to the good stuff. And because it's a Demo Jam, there'll be a little friendly competition too, with spot prizes for both our demo teams and attendees throughout the session. Come along to discover new solutions, see technology in action, support our sponsors and partners, and maybe walk away with a prize of your own. Short. Sharp. Practical. Fun.

4:30 pm - 5:00 pm

Conference Wrap Up

One day. A lot of ideas. What will you take with you? Join us as we bring True Blue Blazing to a close by reflecting on the conversations, ideas and standout moments from across the day. But this isn't just our wrap-up. We want to hear from you. We'll invite attendees to share their biggest takeaways, unexpected discoveries and ideas they'll be taking back to their teams and organisations. Together, we'll revisit some of the day's key themes, celebrate our community and reflect on what we've learned from each other. Then it's time to carry those conversations into networking and drinks. Your highlights. Your takeaways. Our community.

5:30 pm - 7:30 pm

After Party - Location TBC

The sessions might be over, but the conversations don't have to be Join us after True Blue Blazing for drinks, conversation and a chance to unwind with speakers, sponsors and fellow attendees. No presentations. No agenda. Just an opportunity to continue the conversations from the day, make new connections, catch up with old ones and celebrate with the Salesforce community. Location:TBC Stay tuned for more details. Come for the conference. Stay for the community.

Tickets

Free
9:00 am -5:00 pm (Australia/Melbourne)
October 20, 2026 -October 20, 2026

Venue Info

Map location not available
740 Bourke St, Docklands VIC 3008
October 20, 2026 - October 20, 2026
9:00 am - 5:00 pm

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Tickets

Free

Event Attendee

Catherine Donaldson

Catherine Donaldson

Tom Putan

Tom Putan

Dina De Rose

Dina De Rose

True Blue Blazing

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