Agentic AI is moving from testing to real business use, with major changes happening in how companies work this week. Around 65% of companies are now testing AI agents, and 99% plan to put them to work soon. These are special AI tools that can do work on their own, not just answer questions. Big companies like the Big Four consulting firms (Deloitte, EY, PwC, and KPMG) are already using them to handle boring tasks, which helps them save money and free up workers for more important jobs.

However, change is happening fast, and it comes with challenges. In professional services, AI use almost doubled to 40% of companies in 2026. At the same time, companies are cutting thousands of jobs - Amazon cut 16,000 workers and Dow cut 4,500 workers, both mentioning AI as a reason. The good news is that companies using AI tools are making workers 6 times more likely to reach their money goals, and agentic AI could increase worker productivity by 30% by 2027.

But there's a problem: workers are getting burned out. When AI makes people more productive, they often end up doing even more work instead of working less. Companies are also discovering they need new types of managers called "agent managers" to oversee AI workers. In contact centers, 2026 is becoming "a year of reckoning" where companies must figure out how to balance human workers with AI agents. The takeaway: AI agents are powerful tools that help businesses, but companies must be careful about how they use them and how they treat their human workers.