For the first time in history, five generations of workers will converge with the rise of generative AI and AI agents. According to Gartner, 33% of enterprise applications will incorporate agentic AI by 2028. Some predict we’ll see billions of agents working alongside people, performing routine tasks and freeing up time for higher-value work. This change requires everyone—from junior sales reps to veteran sales leaders—to become students of AI and apply it to their daily workflows in the new year.
As someone who has managed sales teams for 25-plus years, I see AI’s potential to free up high-performing employees to spend more time with customers and less time on administrative work.
AI is already hard at work: summarizing information, drafting RFP responses, and helping sales teams stay current on developments that make us more responsive to customers. AWS used Amazon Nova, a foundation model, to automate the creation of 81 industry and use case prospecting guides, saving more than 300 hours of manual work and delivering them to sales teams two months faster.
As we apply this technology more deeply and broadly in 2026, it will fundamentally reshape daily sales operations. AI agents will autonomously research prospects across multiple data sources, social media, and company databases to identify high value leads and create personalized outreach strategies. In customer relationship management, these agents will analyze conversation patterns, email exchanges, and meeting notes to predict customer sentiment and recommend optimal next steps for each deal. They’ll handle scheduling follow-ups, send personalized content, and escalate urgent opportunities based on buying signals.
To navigate this transformation successfully, leaders must focus on three critical areas:
First, take a people-centric approach to AIÂ by investing in talent development fueled by a culture of innovation. The World Economic Forum projects that by 2030, 39% of workers’ core skills will change, with 77% of businesses needing to reskill their workforce for AI collaboration. This means creating a learning culture and providing opportunities for everyone, from early-career professionals to seasoned veterans. AWS has seen an 87.6% increase in AI course completions by customers in the first seven months of 2025. Just like cloud migrations, AI adoption will only succeed if leaders and employees have the right attitudes, values, and behaviors that prioritize using AI to drive innovation.
Second, establish robust security and governance frameworks backed by responsible AI practices. Sales teams handle extremely sensitive information—customer financial data, strategic business plans, competitive intelligence, and proprietary pricing models. Unlike traditional automation, agentic AI makes independent decisions that could commit to pricing beyond approved parameters, share confidential information inappropriately, or make promises companies cannot fulfill. Organizations must establish AI programs with strict access controls, ensuring agents only access data relevant to their specific tasks while maintaining clear data lineage tracking for compliance with regulations like GDPR and CCPA. Transparency measures should inform customers when they’re interacting with AI versus human representatives. New roles like AI auditors will become crucial for ensuring data accuracy, intellectual property protection, and preventing bias in lead scoring or customer prioritization. Critical decisions involving major deals or contract negotiations should require human approval, even with AI recommendations.
Third, optimize human-AI collaboration by focusing AI deployment on back-office operations and routine tasks, freeing your workforce for high-value activities like customer relationships and strategic decision-making. As more organizations adopt AI services and agents, we’ll discover many ways to enhance this collaboration. Since this will be the first time we’ll have a workforce consisting of both humans and AI, there will be significant learning along the way. Leaders must reward experimentation, continuous learning, and calculated risk-taking.
The future belongs to organizations that can orchestrate the delicate balance between human ingenuity and AI. By embracing this transformation thoughtfully this year, we can build sales teams that thrive in the age of AI while delivering unprecedented value to customers.
Read More:Â The Psychology Of Sales Enablement: How Tools Are Designed To Empower And Motivate Sales Reps?
