By Charles Lamanna
Publication Date: 2025-12-15 14:05:00
Across customers and industries, I am seeing AI agents move into the workflows that matter most, and they’re already beginning to transform how businesses work and lead.
Agents connect AI to tools, APIs, data, and organizational knowledge, and they can operate autonomously inside critical processes. Agents run continuously, escalate to people when needed, and deliver results at a speed and scale we have not seen before.
That represents a real shift, one that’s already visible across finance, operations, supply chain, and customer support. Agents are improving accuracy, reducing manual effort, and boosting customer experience. They’re emerging as a dependable layer inside the enterprise and are shaping how organizations will operate in the years ahead.
Expanding to outcome execution
At Microsoft, we started by bringing AI into the workplace as an assistant, something that could help with tasks, accelerate work, and lighten the load. Then came…
