B2 Awards Top Jury

JENNIFER DOWNES

Head of Global Digital Marketing Transformation
Lenovo

BIO

Jennifer Downes is a senior marketing executive with deep experience leading global marketing organizations and driving enterprise-scale transformation within the technology sector. She has held executive leadership roles, including Chief Marketing Officer, and has built and led teams responsible for growth, brand, demand, and digital strategy across complex B2B and B2C environments. 

At Lenovo, Jennifer serves as Head of Global Digital Marketing Transformation, where she leads the strategic evolution of digital marketing across the company’s global customer ecosystem. Her mandate focuses on modernizing digital and content-led engagement, with a strong emphasis on B2B customer journeys, performance, and scalable growth. She works across functions and regions to embed customer intelligence, align digital strategy to business outcomes, and enable sustainable revenue impact. 

Over more than 15 years at Lenovo, Jennifer has played a central role in shaping marketing strategy for multi-billion-dollar businesses, delivering transformation initiatives that drive measurable growth, operational excellence, and long-term profitability. 

Prior to Lenovo, Jennifer held senior marketing leadership roles at NXP Semiconductors, where she led the transformation of demand generation into a personalized, data-driven, cross-channel model supporting global business objectives. 

Jennifer holds a master’s degree in psychology and an MBA in marketing. 

Q&A with Jennifer Downes

Please provide one word that defines great B2B brand leadership today. 

Clarity: In increasingly complex buying environments, brands that win are the ones that make their value unmistakable—across audiences, channels, and the entire customer journey. 

Please share one trend you are watching closely. 

I’m watching how organizations are moving from experimenting with AI to operationalizing it—embedding it into strategy, workflows, and decision-making. The competitive advantage won’t come from tools alone, but from how thoughtfully they’re integrated. 

In one sentence – What will it take to make an entry worthy of a B2 Award? 

An award-worthy entry will demonstrate clear strategic intent, strong creative execution, and measurable business impact—showing not just what was done, but why it mattered. 

What advice would you offer to teams preparing submissions for the B2 Awards? 

Be explicit about your choices. The strongest submissions don’t just show results—they explain the insight behind the strategy, the trade-offs that shaped execution, and the metrics that prove it worked. Judges are evaluating decision-making as much as outcomes. 

Why do awards programs like the B2 Awards matter to the health and progress of the marketing industry? 

Awards programs help define what excellence looks like. They raise the bar for the industry, spotlight ideas that move the discipline forward, and reinforce marketing’s role as a strategic driver of business growth. 

What distinguishes exceptional B2B marketing from work that is simply “good”?  

Exceptional B2B marketing demonstrates disciplined focus and clear strategic intent. It’s grounded in a specific, meaningful insight, executed consistently across the customer journey, and accountable to real business performance. “Good” work may be creative or well-produced—but exceptional work shifts perception, influences real buying decisions, and creates impact that endures beyond the campaign itself. 

How have your expectations of great marketing evolved over the past few years— and how does that shape how you evaluate work today?  

My expectations have evolved toward greater integration and accountability. Marketing can no longer operate in silos. Today, great work connects brand, demand, and experience seamlessly—whether through digital, experiential, or traditional channels—while demonstrating clear business impact. When I evaluate work, I look for strategic coherence and evidence that marketing is contributing to sustained growth, not just short-term results. 

How do you balance creative ambition with commercial accountability when assessing great B2B work? 

Creative ambition and commercial accountability should reinforce one another. The most effective work pushes boundaries in a way that strengthens relevance and differentiation, while remaining grounded in clear objectives and measurable outcomes. I ask a simple question: did the creativity move the business forward? If the answer is yes—and the results support it—that’s where real excellence emerges. 

Risk taking and effectiveness—sometimes friends, sometimes foes. How have you handled the balance, and how will you weigh these elements as a juror? 

Risk and effectiveness are most powerful when they’re intentional, not impulsive. In my own leadership roles, the strongest results have come from taking calculated risks—anchored in clear insight, aligned to business objectives, and supported by disciplined measurement. As a juror, I won’t reward risk for its own sake. I’ll look for bold ideas that were thoughtfully grounded and executed with accountability. When ambition is paired with clarity of purpose and measurable impact, risk becomes a driver of meaningful growth. 

What lessons from your own leadership journey most influence how you assess excellence? 

One of the most important lessons I’ve learned as a marketing leader is that clarity drives performance. The organizations and teams that achieve excellence align insight, strategy, and execution around a shared objective—and stay disciplined about measuring what truly matters. That perspective shapes how I assess work today: I look for focus, intentionality, and impact, not just ambition or scale. 

Get to know the 2026 B2 Top Jurors.