There are three key pillars of the ABC method;
A - Actual Question
B - Baloney
C - Caveat
Let's walk through them one by one and apply them to a question so we can see them in action. I generally run them in the order B, A, C but the ABC Method sounds much cooler than the BAC Method!
Here is the question we will use as our example so we can see the ABC Method in action!
“Super Big Sandals Limited is an e-commerce Organisation that specialises in selling high-quality bespoke Sandals, they are undergoing rapid growth, and the Salesforce Administrator is struggling to keep up with their duties. As a way to combat this, they have decided to allow a few certain Users to become “Super Users” who will need additional permissions such as Deleting Accounts, Deleting Contacts, Deleting Leads, and Exporting Reports. Permission Sets for these additional Permissions already exist in the Salesforce Org. What is the best option that the Salesforce Administrator can take?
- Create a New Profile with the appropriate Permissions
- Assign each Permission Set to the Users
- Create a Permission Set Group that contains all Permission Sets and assign the Permission Set Group to the Users
- Create and Assign the New Permission Sets to the Users”
What Baloney is in the question that makes no impact to us? What nonsense is there in that question that we don’t need.
The first part of getting to the crux of the question is to strip out any information that doesn’t serve us. We need to cut through the noise and get to the good stuff, so think about what actually matters. Does it really matter that Super Big Sandals sells amazing Sandals? Does it matter that they are in rapid growth or that the Admin is struggling to keep up with their duties? Not really, so we can get rid of the question's first part.
That leaves us with the following stripped-down version…
“As a way to combat this, they have decided to allow a few certain Users to become “Super Users” who will need additional permissions such as Deleting Accounts, Deleting Contacts, Deleting Leads, and Exporting Reports. Permission Sets for these additional Permissions already exist in the Salesforce Org. What is the best option that the Salesforce Administrator can take?”
What is the actual question?
The next step in the ABC Method is identifying the "actual" question. This means understanding what the question is really asking you. Is it about a specific concept, limitation, or capability? To do this, focus on the key terms and phrases in the question that indicate what we are being asked.
If we take a look at the question there is a lot of information in there to unpack, but we need to get to the actual question.
The question talks about Users who will become Super Users and as such they need additional permissions. It’s asking us what can we do to grant Users additional Permissions. Then at the end we are asked what the best option is. So it's not a question of what can be done, it's a question about what is the best action to take.
(I do want to point out that when you approach any Salesforce question, you should always pick the best answer, not just one that could be correct. We’ll explore that concept in another exam tip blog in a few weeks so don't worry about it too much now.)
Now we have a really refined version of the question, our question is now…
“What is the best way to apply multiple Permission Sets to Users?”
That is much easier to understand isn’t it?
The final part of this method is to look for any Caveats, also known as modifiers.
It means looking for any words or existing conditions that may impact our answer choice. This is a really important step and can mean the difference between picking the right or wrong answer.
You’ll often see these in questions when it talks about send email limits or data loading limits. One common example you see is when you are asked a question about importing a number of Records into Salesforce, everything on the question may point to the Data Import Wizard being the best option. Then right at the end they’ll mention that you need to import 60,000 records meaning that you need to use Data Loader - Data Import Wizard has a limit of 50,000 records at a time.
So if we take a look at our question, nothing stands out really. Its only when we look at our answers that we can spot the Caveat;
- Create a New Profile with the appropriate Permissions
- Assign each Permission Set to the Users
- Create a Permission Set Group that contains all Permission Sets and assign the Permission Set Group to the Users
- Create and Assign the New Permission Sets to the Users
We have options for creating New Permission Sets, or assigning Existing Permission Sets. So if we look back at our question again you will see that we have the clue of “Permission Sets for these additional Permissions already exist in the Salesforce Org.”, that means that we do not need to create them. We also have the “few certain Users” remark which means we need to look at the best solution when its only a small number of Users that will be affected, this is important because we have the option of choosing between using a Profile to do this, or Permission Sets and Permission Set Groups.
A big part of successfully passing your Certification Exams is the ability to reduce the risk of choosing the wrong answers and maximise the potential of choosing the right one. I use the process of elimination to do this and I’ll run you through what that looks like, and how you can apply it another day.
We now have everything we need to understand the question correctly and we are left with this…
“What is the best way to apply multiple Permission Sets to a small group of Users if existing Permission Sets can be used?”
That is much easier to understand isn’t it?
Before we reveal the answer lets take a look at the question before, and the question after the ABC Method…
Before…
Super Big Sandals Limited is an e-commerce Organisation that specialises in selling high-quality bespoke Sandals, they are undergoing rapid growth, and the Salesforce Administrator is struggling to keep up with their duties. As a way to combat this, they have decided to allow a few certain Users to become “Super Users” who will need additional permissions such as Deleting Accounts, Deleting Contacts, Deleting Leads, and Exporting Reports. Permission Sets for these additional Permissions already exist in the Salesforce Org. What is the best option that the Salesforce Administrator can take?
- Create a New Profile with the appropriate Permissions
- Assign each Permission Set to the Users
- Create a Permission Set Group that contains all Permission Sets and assign the Permission Set Group to the Users
- Create and Assign the New Permission Sets to the Users
After…
What is the best way to apply multiple Permission Sets to a small group of Users if existing Permission Sets can be used?
- Create a New Profile with the appropriate Permissions
- Assign each Permission Set to the Users
- Create a Permission Set Group that contains all Permission Sets and assign the Permission Set Group to the Users
- Create and Assign the New Permission Sets to the Users
Wow, thats a pretty big difference isn’t it.
The correct answer is...
- Create a Permission Set Group that contains all Permission Sets and assign the Permission Set Group to the Users
I hope you got that, if you didn’t let me explain my reasoning.
First we have the choice between Profiles and Permission Sets. While we could create a New Profile to achieve this, it isn’t best practice as it would require more maintenance by the Administrator and we want to make their lives easier, not harder. So we can rule this out. If a large number of Users needed these Permissions we could look at creating a New Profile, but in this case we do not need to. The Caveat that we picked out earlier “a few certain Users” has helped us rule this out as well as out knowledge about Salesforce Best Practices.
The other Caveat that we spotted was the Permission Sets that grant the additional Permissions already exist, so we do not need to create them. That rules out the answer “Create and Assign the New Permission Sets to the Users” as we don't need to create them.
That leaves us with 2 answers;
- Assign each Permission Set to the Users
- Create a Permission Set Group that contains all Permission Sets and assign the Permission Set Group to the Users
Remember, we are looking for the best solution. So what is going to make our Administrators’ life easier, maintaining multiple Permission Sets, or creating one single Permission Set Group that can be assigned to the Super Users?
Hopefully you said the Permission Set Group. A Permission Set Group allows the Administrator to combine the existing Permission Sets in one Group that they can manage easily. They can quickly add and remove it from Users should their status as a Super User change, if they need to edit what Permissions are granted they could too.
I hope you have found this useful and it helps you with your Salesforce Certification Exams.
