A successful rollout starts long before implementation
The strongest implementations begin by understanding the business problems an organisation is trying to solve. Regal Rexnord's experience offers three important lessons before implementation even begins.
Lesson one: Start by listening. Before evaluating vendors or building an implementation plan, Nicole spent time listening to leaders and sellers across the business. She called the process "going to Gemba" or going directly to the source to understand where teams were struggling, how enablement was perceived, and what success should look like. Those conversations uncovered challenges that extended well beyond content management and shaped an evaluation process focused on solving genuine business problems rather than comparing feature lists.
Lesson two: Build your business case around business outcomes. Regal Rexnord developed a weighted scorecard that evolved as stakeholder conversations uncovered new requirements, eventually comparing eight vendors against 20 carefully weighted criteria. The team then brought those criteria to life during an Innovation Day, tailoring demonstrations for different audiences across the business. Marketing explored governance, sales leaders focused on buyer engagement, and the CIO evaluated AI capabilities, security, and enterprise readiness. Each stakeholder experienced a demonstration built around their own priorities, making it easier to build alignment across the buying committee and establish a shared vision for success.
Lesson three: Find your executive champion. Every major transformation benefits from an executive sponsor who can connect enablement to broader business priorities. At Regal Rexnord, one of the strongest advocates wasn't was actually the CIO. By aligning on a shared vision for AI and digital transformation, Nicole gained a senior sponsor who helped build credibility across the leadership team and move critical decisions forward.
Build momentum before launch
Many organisations think about adoption as something that begins after implementation. Regal Rexnord viewed it as something that needed to begin months before go-live.
Lesson four: Create champions before launch. The team invited 70 sellers to participate in a hackathon where they built Digital Sales Room templates for real customer scenarios. The exercise produced 46 reusable templates while creating a network of internal champions who had already experienced the platform and could support colleagues throughout the rollout. By involving sellers early, the team created a sense of ownership that naturally encouraged adoption across the wider organisation.
Lesson five: Market your rollout internally. Regal Rexnord treated implementation like a marketing campaign rather than an IT project. Months before go-live, the team launched an internal awareness campaign built that introduced sellers to the platform and its AI capabilities before launch. By the time implementation finished, Schissel's colleagues understood what was changing and why it mattered, helping reduce uncertainty and build excitement before formal training even began.
Adoption is an ongoing process
Implementation is only one milestone in an enablement journey. Lasting adoption comes from consistently reinforcing new behaviours until they become part of everyday work.
Lesson six: Reinforce learning beyond launch. Following implementation, Regal Rexnord invested in live training sessions, office hours, team meetings, and company-wide town halls. Rather than relying on a single training event, the team created multiple opportunities to introduce new capabilities, answer questions, and build confidence over time. That continued investment helped sellers become more comfortable with the platform while ensuring new ways of working became embedded across the organisation.
Lesson seven: Teach people how to work with AI. Nicole quickly realised that successful AI adoption depended on helping sellers change how they interacted with the technology. Many initially approached AI as though they were searching for documents, entering keywords instead of asking complete questions. Once they began treating AI like a trusted subject matter expert, adoption accelerated naturally. As AI continues to evolve, building user confidence will become just as important as deploying new capabilities.
Measure what matters
The final lesson extends beyond implementation itself. Successful enablement teams think about measurement from the very beginning, ensuring they can demonstrate progress against meaningful business outcomes as adoption grows.
Lesson eight: Measure success from day one. From the outset, Regal Rexnord focused on understanding how sellers used content, how learning supported readiness, how buyers engaged with Digital Sales Rooms, and how enablement activities could ultimately be connected to broader business outcomes. Success was evaluated through a combination of adoption, behaviour change, buyer engagement, and strategic business impact rather than platform usage alone. Those insights demonstrated that enablement was helping the organisation execute more effectively against its strategic priorities.
That shift changed perceptions of enablement itself. As the team demonstrated measurable impact, enablement became recognised as a strategic partner capable of leading organisational change rather than simply managing content.
Technology provides the foundation for every enablement transformation, but lasting success comes from the people, processes, and behaviours that surround it. Regal Rexnord's rollout succeeded because it invested in all three, creating an environment where customer-facing teams could adopt new ways of working with confidence and consistency.
As Schissel puts it, "The purpose of sales enablement is to make the sales team more effective and more efficient. Anything and everything we can do to accomplish, that's our job."
Every successful rollout creates an environment where customer-facing teams are better prepared, better supported, and better equipped to succeed. That's how enablement delivers lasting value long after implementation is complete.
Planning your own Seismic rollout? See how Seismic Professional Services helps organisations build adoption strategies that drive long-term business impact from day one.
