Prepare for NPSP and Salesforce Releases

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

State the frequency of release cycles for both NPSP and Salesforce.
Identify what to do after NPSP and Salesforce releases.

Time to Update

An NPSP admin hard at work on an update

Salesforce's constant change is one of its biggest benefits, but it can also be hard for admins to keep up. This is especially true for those who are also-admins and have other jobs at their company.

Establishing a strategic and workable habit around new releases is one of the most valuable things you can do as an admin. A good release strategy will help you and your users stay on top of all the changes and take full advantage of your investment in Salesforce. Make it a priority!

In this unit, we’ll review the release cadence for NPSP and Salesforce and provide tips on how to manage innovations.

Prepare for NPSP Releases

Knowing what's included in an NPSP release and when the release is happening will help you:

Know when a troublesome bug has been addressed.
Take full advantage of new features and your investment in NPSP.
Think through how new features may affect existing customizations.
Test updates in sandboxes before they hit production.

Salesforce releases new NPSP features three times each year—Winter, Spring, and Summer—to give you time to learn about, implement, and test these new tools. These changes are pushed to sandboxes first and into production two weeks later.

NPSP bug fixes are also pushed to your production org automatically every two weeks after a week-long preview in sandboxes.

As an admin, you have control over most new NPSP features made available because you turn them on before they’re visible for your users. You’ll get to test features in your sandbox and determine the right time to introduce new functionality to your users. We’ll discuss sandboxes in the coming two units.

Triggers and Classes in a given release are always added automatically, but this won't matter much to you unless you're a developer.

Components of an NPSP Release

The exact timing of all Salesforce for Nonprofits sandbox and production updates, along with which issues have been addressed, are announced in the Nonprofit Release Readiness group in the Trailblazer Community. The group is where you can find all release announcements, updates, and resources for nonprofits.

Unless you've been directly affected by a particularly nasty bug—which is very rare—bug fix announcements can usually pass by without you doing anything. The three releases each year that include new features or functionality, however, will require dedicated time from you and your organization to review the changes and consider their impact on your users. Salesforce will give you plenty of advance warning when a great new feature is coming your way in NPSP.

Let’s check in with Gorav Patel, admin at the nonprofit No More Homelessness (NMH), as he prepares for a big NPSP feature release.

Take Full Advantage of NPSP Releases

Gorav follows the Nonprofit Release Readiness group in the Trailblazer Community.

Whenever he gets a new release announcement, Gorav first looks for anything that impacts his org. With new feature releases, Gorav follows this checklist, a best practice for any admin.

Review the release notes in detail.
Use a sandbox to test the new features before enabling them in production. Any new fields and objects included in a release are by default not visible to anyone, including system administrators. Admins must make these new fields and objects available—even in a sandbox.
Connect with key users to determine how the organization can take advantage of new features.
Evaluate whether any new features conflict with customizations in the org.
Evaluate whether any new features necessitate an update to security settings.
If you decide to implement a new feature, develop a communication and training plan for staff to learn about the new features.

By following this checklist, Gorav is able to stay on top of new features, from release to training. But NPSP’s aren’t the only major releases he needs to follow.

Salesforce Platform Seasonal Releases

Like NPSP, the Salesforce platform is constantly evolving. Salesforce also delivers new functionality to customers three times a year in the Spring, Summer, and Winter releases. Salesforce platform releases arrive about a month before each of the seasonal NPSP and Salesforce for Nonprofits releases.

We get that this might seem a little confusing. What’s NPSP and what’s Salesforce? It isn’t always easy to distinguish. When people talk about Salesforce or the Salesforce Platform, they’re usually talking about Sales Cloud Enterprise Edition. NPSP uses Sales Cloud Enterprise Edition licenses, so you’re positioned to take advantage of all of the new Salesforce features available for both.

While the Salesforce Platform release itself happens automatically, most admins put in some work before and after the upgrade. Salesforce auto-enables some features (release notes point these out), so be sure you know what’s coming if you don’t want your users to be surprised. In this case, “Surprise!” isn’t as fun as it might sound.

A great way to learn about seasonal releases and to start your release plan is to take the Prepare for Salesforce Releases trail. Each seasonal release also comes with its own Trailhead module, which helps you learn specifics of the features included in the new release.

You can also attend the free—yes, free!—Salesforce Release webinars, in which an intrepid guide from Salesforce will introduce you to new, important features and give you an opportunity to ask questions. Watch the Trailblazer Community for announcements and information on how to sign up.

The Importance of Releases

Keeping up with NPSP and Salesforce releases might seem like just one more thing that you don’t have time to do. However, understanding when releases happen and what steps to take is critical to getting the most out of the technology and, ultimately, helping you better meet your mission.

When you’re prepping for a release, you’ll be doing that important work in a sandbox org. In the next two units, we’ll learn more about this helpful tool and best practices for how to use it.

Time Estimate

Topics

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