Meet the 21 rising stars at Salesforce who are playing key roles in helping CEO Marc Benioff grow the cloud computing powerhouse

• Salesforce's executive suite got a shakeup in February, when co-CEO Keith Block suddenly stepped down.
• CEO Marc Benioff used the occasion of Block's departure to point out that Salesforce has a strong executive bench - including Bret Taylor, who joined in 2016 after the acquisition of his startup Quip, and quickly rose through the ranks to become chief operating officer.
• Taylor's not alone, many other executives who've joined the company through its various acquisitions are quickly rising through the ranks and playing key roles at the company as well, including key execs at Tableau.
• These are the 21 rising star executives at Salesforce that are expected to have an outsized impact on the company's future growth.
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Salesforce's executive suite got a big and sudden shakeup in February, when it was announced that co-CEO Keith Block would be leaving the company.

Marc Benioff, founder and once again sole CEO of Salesforce, used the opportunity of Block's departure to highlight the strength of the remaining executive bench, including cofounder and CTO Parker Harris, CFO Mark Hawkins, legal chief Amy Weaver, and Bret Taylor, recently named chief operating officer.

Taylor, especially, has risen to a place of prominence in the company, after joining the company in 2016 by way of the acquisition of his company Quip. Before that, he was Facebook's CTO and then a prominent engineering leader at Google, helping lead the creation of Google Maps.

Even before Block's departure, analysts and industry-watchers anticipated that Taylor could be heir apparent to Benioff- especially given persistent speculation that Benioff might one day step back as CEO in order to focus on political and social activism.

But Taylor isn't the only executive at Salesforce to see a heightened profile: Benioff particularly spotlighted Adam Selipsky, CEO of Tableau - which Salesforce acquired last year for $15.7 billion - and Gavin Patterson, Salesforce's new head of international business.

All of these execs, and more, are going to play a major role at Salesforce going forward, as it aims towards ambitious growth targets and fends off competitive threats from the likes of Microsoft and Oracle.

Here are the 21 rising stars at Salesforce that are expected to have an impact the company's future growth: