In an X (Twitter) post, Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, announced the appointment of Denise Dresser as the new CEO of Slack. Dresser is the third CEO the company has had since it was acquired in 2020. The latest was Lidiane Jones, who recently announced she would move to Bumble to become its new CEO.
Benioff commented, “I couldn’t be more excited to share the news that Denise Dresser is our new CEO of Slack! Denise is an incredible business leader who has excelled at every level in her career at Salesforce. Her record of success, most recently as President of Accelerated Industries and before that as EVP Enterprise Sales, includes driving some of our most important customer success ever. Denise is a collaborative technology leader who brings teams together and has inspired me and so many of us with her deep commitment to our values and, to our customers and to the spirit of innovation.”
Dresser herself commented on LinkedIn saying, “I am incredibly humbled to share that I will be joining the team at Slack as CEO 🙇♀️.
“Well before Salesforce acquired Slack, I was a fan. Now that I’ve worked in the platform for three years and seen its transformational power, I’m its biggest advocate. It’s truly made work simpler, more pleasant, and more productive. I cannot wait to dive in with the team and help even more companies change the way they work with Slack.”
Who is Denise Dresser
Dresser has spent twelve years at Salesforce. Joining the company as the Regional Vice President Enterprise Business Unit before rising through the ranks. Before that, she worked at Oracle, joining the company after it acquired Hyperion, where she worked as a strategic account manager for over five years.
She is also a board director at the Ad Council and a certified public accountant from the California Board of Accountancy.
Benioff also highlighted the work that Dresser does for ALS Awareness both within and outside of Salesforce. She is one of the driving forces behind ALSForce, a Salesforce equality group focused on raising awareness about ALS. Benioff spoke about her being a champion of Ohana within Salesforce.
Dresser recently spoke to Brooke Eby, Principle, Partnerships, about her appearance on the Today Program to talk about living with ALS (MND) at the Salesforce Sales kickoff. That interview inspired a group within Salesforce to start the Levity Project. This initiative has already raised thousands of dollars, with Salesforce matching contributions. Eby talks about this in two recent YouTube videos that are both inspiring and emotional (part 1 and part 2). Sometimes, leading cultural initiatives is better seen by the impact it has on people.
Enterprise Times: What does this mean
An inspiring appointment by Benioff will see someone who has excelled in her roles at Salesforce and in making an impact for ALS. Slack will now benefit from her leadership. It will be fascinating to see how the organisation evolves over the next few months under her guidance.
Can Dresser provide the stability that Benioff wants to see within Slack? It is a challenge, with Slack working in an increasingly competitive market. It needs to develop the integrations with Salesforce and yet remain independent and work with other vendors to continue its growth separate from Salesforce.
