Lenovo

Client: Lenovo
Industry: Technology
Services: Sales Kickoff

Background

Lenovo has a long history of evolving its sales organization to meet the demands of a rapidly shifting market. In recent years, the company doubled down on an enterprise-wide strategy designed to break down silos, strengthen collaboration across the business, and deliver more integrated value to customers.

As part of this transformation, Lenovo began rolling out a new global sales methodology to help sellers become trusted advisors and create a more consistent customer experience across the organization.

The North America Sales Kickoff (SKO) became a critical milestone in bringing that strategy to life. More than an annual meeting, the event serves as a strategic accelerator for three priorities:

• Alignment: Establishes a common sales language and consistent customer approach

• Collaboration: Strengthens team-based selling motions across portfolios and business segments

• Customer impact: Helps sellers identify value, engage stakeholders, and pursue more strategic account opportunities

To maximize the impact of the SKO, Lenovo needed a high-impact learning experience that could engage more than 1,100 sellers and leaders while remaining relevant to different roles, business segments, and customer conversations. The experience also needed to build momentum beyond the event and support broader rollout across EMEA, North America, Latin America, and APAC. 

Solution

To support this transformation, Lenovo partnered with RAIN Group to design and deliver a learning journey that extended beyond a single event.

At the center of the initiative was a four-hour workshop on Building Value-Based Customer Relationships, delivered live at the SKO.

RAIN Group facilitated 12 concurrent, segment-specific workshops focused on the capabilities most critical to the company’s strategy: understanding customer priorities, building compelling value cases, identifying stakeholders, initiating strategic conversations, and using Value Labs to grow accounts. Sessions followed a clear learning progression that helped participants apply concepts immediately through the Value Lab, Value Case, Stakeholder Map, and Engagement Strategy.

Manager enablement was also a core part of the solution. Sales managers received training and preparation to support implementation, refine seller skills, and help embed the methodology in the flow of work.

Learning continued beyond the SKO through Mini Reviews, short manager-led reinforcement modules designed to drive activation, consistency, and behavior change. 

What made the experience unique was the combination of enterprise scale, business-specific customization, live collaboration, hands-on application, tailored case studies, and structured reinforcement designed to sustain learning beyond the SKO.

Results

The SKO experience created strong momentum for Lenovo’s broader sales transformation. Sellers left with a common language for value-based selling, practical tools for account growth, and a clearer approach to building more strategic customer relationships.

Participant feedback reflected the strength and relevance of the experience:

• Training content will help me do my job better: 4.23/5

• Training content was relevant to my role: 4.29/5

• Facilitator provided meaningful examples: 4.48/5

• Facilitator kept me engaged: 4.59/5

• Will apply learning on the job: 4.32/5

Tools like the Value Lab and Value Case sparked new thinking and helped sellers re-engage with their accounts in more strategic, value-focused ways.

The workshop became the launchpad for broader change in how teams sell, speak, and collaborate. This was not a one-off event. It was a catalyst for ongoing transformation in how the organization approaches value-based selling.

The success of the SKO led Lenovo to expand its partnership with RAIN Group, continuing with a focus on high-priority roles and skills to further embed the methodology and elevate seller capability across the organization.

The Executive Director of Learning and Development shared, “The sales methodology workshops at our sales kickoff combined interactive, cohort-based learning with real-world application. RAIN Group’s strong collaboration and delivery made this event impactful for our sales teams. It was amazing the consistency of the facilitation delivery across the geos and cohorts. With 30+ facilitators, that is unprecedented for us and very impressive.”