Salesforce and Lime Connect are Redefining the Path from College to Career

The hardest part of starting a career isn’t always getting the degree. Oftentimes, it’s figuring out what comes after graduation and navigating a transition filled with uncertainty. 

For students with disabilities, it can feel even more complex. As Lucia Rios, Workforce Navigators Senior Analyst at Salesforce puts it: “Students often have strong support systems while they’re in school. But after graduation, those resources can be harder to access. That transition can be intimidating.”

But what if that gap didn’t exist? That’s the idea behind the growing partnership between Salesforce and Lime Connect — a collaboration designed to help students and early-career professionals with disabilities move from education to employment with confidence, support, and real opportunity. And in just under a year, it’s already making a difference.

Over the last 20 years, Lime Connect has built a global network of high-achieving students and professionals with disabilities, connecting them with companies committed to inclusive hiring.

“We partner with great companies that people are excited to build careers with,” says Susan Lang, Founding President and CEO of Lime Connect. “Hiring people with disabilities is an important first step. However, the real impact comes from investing in their personal development, growth, and long-term success.”

When Salesforce and Lime Connect began working together, that shared commitment was immediately clear.

“Salesforce is a company we’re proud to work with,” Lang says. “This partnership came together in a matter of weeks. That doesn’t always happen, but Salesforce really walks the walk.”

Today, that partnership spans multiple touchpoints designed to support talent at every stage. Students prepare for their internship and career search through one-on-one coaching, career development webinars, and corporate partner networking opportunities. Lime Connect also offers leadership programs, such as the Lime Connect Fellowship, that supports a select cohort of approximately 25 rising juniors each year. 

The program includes a multi-day symposium in New York City, where Fellows build professional skills, connect directly with leading companies, and identify strategies for communicating their strengths and framing disability as an asset. Fellows also benefit from connections to a broader alumni network and the opportunity to build strong relationships within their peer cohort.

Lime Connect corporate partners also engage with Lime Connect’s experienced professionals and the broader Lime network at every stage of their careers through recruiting and networking events and targeted outreach to participants. Together, these efforts create a more complete pathway — connecting students to opportunity while equipping them with the tools, support, and confidence to succeed once they get there.

The Workforce Navigators component of the Lime Connect partnership combines broad career exploration with hands-on mentorship and skill-building.

At the center of that experience is mentorship. Participants are paired with Salesforce employees who provide personalized guidance on resumes, interviews, career paths, and professional growth.

Participants feel that impact directly. “It’s really helpful to have that one-on-one relationship with a mentor who can help you identify what you might be interested in,” said participant Ari Drake. “Having people look out for you is huge.”

“My mentor really helped me improve my resume, which was the area I needed the most improvement in,” said Shea Hawkins, who also participated in the Lime Connect partnership with Workforce Navigators. “I already feel stronger.”

Alongside mentorship, participants use Trailhead, Salesforce’s free, self-paced learning platform, to build technical skills and explore new career paths.

“It’s nice that I can do it on my own time,” Drake adds. “Trailhead gives you a taste of different areas to explore and helps inform career decisions.”

Together, mentorship and hands-on learning help participants build confidence, gain direction, and see themselves in the future of work.

That sense of belonging is especially important for those with nonvisible disabilities. “One in six people has a disability, and many of those are invisible,” says Lang. “It’s meaningful to work with a company that truly understands that experience.”

As the workplace evolves, so do the skills needed to succeed.

Through Workforce Navigators, participants are introduced to Salesforce’s vision for the future — including AI and the agentic era, where humans and intelligent systems work together.

“Everyone in the mentorship program gets introduced to AI. It gives them a glimpse into how Salesforce is thinking about the future of work,” says Rios.

Participants don’t just learn about AI concepts like large language models and Agentforce—they also engage with these technologies hands-on.

“Doing different modules, especially about AI, helped me understand areas I might be interested in,” said Hawkins. “It’s also really exciting to see how AI can be used to make technology more accessible for people with disabilities.”

As the Salesforce and Lime Connect partnership approaches its one-year anniversary, it continues to demonstrate what’s possible when inclusion is intentional, and when opportunity is paired with action.

What began as a fast-moving collaboration has quickly evolved into a powerful model for supporting early-career professionals with disabilities, combining access, mentorship, and skill-building in a way that creates real, lasting impact. Still, this is just the beginning.

Looking ahead, the focus is on expanding mentorship opportunities, growing program cohorts, deepening Salesforce employees’ volunteer impact, and continuing to invest in participants’ AI and future-ready skills. And for Lime Connect, the momentum is only building.

“It made my year partnering with Salesforce,” says Lang. “We’re very excited about what’s ahead.”