What Is the Agentic Enterprise?

Businesses are always looking for innovative ways to optimize operations and maintain a competitive edge. While automation has long been a focus, a new paradigm is emerging: the "agentic enterprise."

The agentic enterprise envisions a future where human employees and intelligent AI agents work together. They can achieve a level of productivity and creativity that neither could reach alone. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, in a 2024 interview with Jim Cramer called AI agents “the beginning of an unlimited workforce."

This article will explore the core tenets of the agentic enterprise. We'll outline what it is, why it matters, and how businesses can create one.

An agentic enterprise is more than just a business that uses AI – it's a fundamental shift in how work gets done. At its heart, it's a collaborative ecosystem.

AI agents can reason, adapt, and act on their own. These abilities help them handle repetitive and time-consuming tasks. Agents can make decisions and take action to achieve the desired outcome, freeing up employees to focus on higher-value work. With their newfound time, employees can focus on tasks that benefit from creativity, strategic thinking, and emotional intelligence.

In the agentic enterprise model, AI is a powerful partner. It augments human potential and elevates job satisfaction. The ultimate goal of an agentic enterprise is to boost efficiency and streamline operations, allowing employees to focus on complex tasks while leaving routine work to intelligent agents.

By using AI agents for mundane tasks, companies can create better customer experiences. For example, an agent can handle the start of a customer service request. It can gather info and give basic solutions. If necessary, it can escalate the case to a human agent for help with complex issues. This speeds up response times and allows human agents to focus on more critical aspects of their j Jo obs.

When employees don't have to deal with tedious tasks, they can focus on their strengths. They can create new products, solve problems and build strong relationships. This leads to happier employees, better job satisfaction, and constant innovation.

An agentic enterprise isn't just a buzzword; it represents a new way of operating driven by the systematic adoption of autonomous agents throughout business functions. If you're wondering whether your organization is on the path to becoming one, look for these key factors:

• Autonomous agents: The hallmark of an agentic enterprise is the ability of its AI to act independently. Instead of simply providing information or following a rigid script, AI agents can make decisions, take initiative, and execute multi-step processes without constant human intervention.
• Goal-driven behavior: Agentic AI is not just a reactive tool; it is proactive and goal-oriented. The systems are designed to pursue a defined objective, breaking down a complex goal into smaller sub-tasks and strategically working to achieve the final outcome.
• Adaptability and learning: Unlike traditional automation that can break when faced with an unexpected scenario, agentic systems can adapt. Through machine learning, agents learn from past interactions, analyze new data, and adjust their plans and actions in real-time to handle dynamic environments and changing conditions.
• Orchestrated collaboration: An agentic enterprise thrives on a network of specialized agents that work together. Different agents, each with its own expertise, can communicate and collaborate under a central "orchestrator" to solve problems that would be too complex for a single system.
• Integrated tool use: Agents are not isolated systems; they are deeply integrated into the business's existing technology stack. They can securely interact with APIs, databases, and third-party tools, allowing them to take real action and move workflows forward.
• Human-in-the-loop oversight: In an agentic enterprise, the human role shifts from performing mundane tasks to overseeing them. Employees become "agent bosses," providing guidance, making final high-stakes decisions, and ensuring that the AI's actions align with ethical standards and business goals.

For the collaborative relationship between humans and AI agents to be effective, trust is paramount. Businesses must implement solutions that offer transparency, explainability, and control over their AI agents. The digital labor model is not about replacing the human workforce but augmenting capabilities and freeing up time for more creative and strategic work.
Building on the concept of a digital labor force, Agentic AI's power lies in its ability to handle specific, high-volume workflows. Here are examples of what AI agents can do across a variety of business functions.

• Lead management & qualification: An agent identifies, scores, and qualifies new leads by analyzing their digital footprint and engagement. It can then initiate personalized outreach and automatically schedule meetings with a human sales representative for the most promising prospects.
• Escalation management: An agent analyzes incoming support tickets for urgency and sentiment. It automatically prioritizes high-risk or complex cases and routes them to the correct human specialist, ensuring that critical issues are addressed immediately and with full context.
• Knowledge assistance: An agent acts as a central hub for all internal knowledge, able to analyze and summarize documents, research complex topics, and generate reports from unstructured data. It provides employees with instant, accurate information, reducing the time spent searching for data.

Creating an agentic enterprise takes time. It requires a strategic, phased approach. “The biggest challenge in all this today isn't the technology itself, but rather how companies and workers adapt to the unprecedented pace of digital transformation,” says Benioff .

Here is an agentic AI roadmap that businesses can follow. For more details, read our agentic enterprise playbook.

The first step is to look ahead and envision an AI-powered future for your business. This involves identifying potential use cases for agentic AI and developing a tangible strategy that aligns with your business goals. This is about more than just adopting a new technology; it's about reimagining your business processes and how work gets done.

The success of an agentic enterprise hinges on human-AI collaboration. To prepare for this transition, businesses must train their workforce. It's important to communicate the vision and address any concerns. Position AI as a partner that enhances roles and unlocks potential. Inspire employees by highlighting how this new model will benefit them.

Rather than attempting a massive, company-wide overhaul, businesses should start small. Identify a specific, yet impactful, use case that can demonstrate a quick return on investment. This could be anything from automating a specific customer service workflow to streamlining a marketing campaign. A successful pilot project builds momentum, trust, and provides valuable insights for future expansion. For example, see how a leading online job site built an agentic enterprise to accelerate hiring and free up their employees to focus on customer engagement and business growth.

Traditional business processes are often rigid and scripted. In an agentic enterprise, the focus shifts to creating intelligent workflows that are outcome-oriented rather than step-by-step instructions. These processes should empower agents to reason and adapt, finding the most efficient path to a desired outcome. Process design requires a flexible and adaptable approach.

The quality of an AI agent's output is directly tied to the quality of the data it has access to. Businesses must build a robust and high-quality data foundation, ensuring that their agents are grounded in trusted, reliable information. Instead of siloed information across the enterprise, an AI-powered knowledge foundation unifies all relevant data, ensuring agents operate from a single source of truth to deliver more accurate, reliable, and trustworthy results. This is critical for ensuring accuracy and for building trust with both employees and customers.

To truly realize the "dual dividend" of customer loyalty and empowered human potential, agents must be more than just technically accurate. They should be designed with emotional intelligence and a service mindset. This means they should be able to understand and respond to the nuances of human interaction, providing a more empathetic and personalized experience. Emotional intelligence is especially important for customer-facing agents.

The journey of an agentic enterprise is continuous. Businesses should look ahead to future innovations, such as agent ecosystems, robotics, and Enterprise General Intelligence (EGI). An agent ecosystem, for example, could involve multiple agents working in concert to complete complex tasks, while robotics could extend the capabilities of agents into the physical world.

While the potential of an agentic enterprise is great, businesses should be proactive. They can address potential risks to ensure a responsible and secure implementation.