What is a Salesforce Certified Technical Architect?
A brief look into the life of a faux Salesforce CTA
The short answer is…not Brian Thornton.
For close to a decade now, Brian has been advertising himself as a sort of guru in the Salesforce ecosystem. He claims to hold several certifications through Salesforce.com, but a simple lookup on their website will confirm that he holds no certifications (Salesforce Credentials Lookup).
Brian has claimed to work directly for Salesforce and even has on his resume that he is a CTA. At one time, he even went as far as to screenshot legit credentials on their site and photoshop his information into them.
We took it a step further though. We were able to get into contact with an employee who worked directly with the architects and confirmed the following:
Brian hasn’t ever worked for Salesforce
He’s never held any Salesforce credentials
The company is aware of his false claims
Brian uses his false credentials to prey on small businesses and non-profit organizations for employment or contract work because they are less likely to validate credentials and work history
Over the past two years, we’ve spoken to a handful of employers or recruiters who have hired, worked with, or attempted to recruit Brian. For the places he managed to get employed by or was contracted to work for, the results included:
Being employed for a short period of time and having nothing to show for it
Agreeing to start with a company, accepting equipment necessary for his work, but never starting and never returning equipment such as a computer.
Brian continues to use this lie and take advantage of vulnerable employers, but the good news is that due to our page and the work of others, recruiters and potential employers are starting to use Google to search for his name and are stumbling across our pages.
In 2020, Brian started a new Salesforce related scam in which he registered a book that he claimed to have published, posted it on Amazon, took the money of many consumers, but either never provided them with the supposed book, or sent them a different book entirely. A quick ISBN search shows the author name and supposed publisher info.
The Amazon seller account “Salesforce Publications”, can be traced back to Brian because it was registered using his last known address in Fort Wayne, IN. A quick check of that account just now shows a 12% positive rating.
The reviews given by his customers were quite horrendous. Here are a few, but have a look for yourself using the link above.
In addition, the registered publisher of the book, “Salesforce Publishing, Inc” comes back to an address in Toledo, Oregon which is where Brian’s wife, Britney, lived with Brian while they were married in 2020. Both of them no longer live at this address.
Even with all of the scams Brian has committed using his Salesforce lies, he continues to scam businesses today and is still traveling the world, living his lie. It will all catch up to you one day, Brian. It’s a promise.
Below is a link to Brian’s LinkedIn page, but click at your own risk. Depending on your settings, it will notify Brian of who is visiting. Link