Business transformation is AI’s great promise, but according to Deloitte, deploying new tools is the easy part. To define and achieve true long-term value from their AI, leaders must redesign the way work gets done. For ‘frontier firms’ – which have moved beyond experimentation to embed AI across their organisation – it starts with empowering people.
“Frontier firms are redefining how work gets done in the era of AI,” says Kees Hertogh, vice president of global industry marketing at Microsoft. “They enrich employee experiences by making AI part of everyday work; reinvent customer engagement by using AI to deliver more responsive and personalised service; reshape business processes so work moves faster and decisions improve; and bend the curve on innovation by helping teams test, learn and scale new ideas faster.
“As a result, frontier firms see tangible benefits: higher productivity, better outcomes across areas like customer service and product development, and more engaged employees. Yet the biggest advantage is agility. These firms are better equipped to adapt because they have both the technology and the culture to keep evolving.”
Putting people at the centre of AI strategy is the way to unlock these results.
“Efficiency, cost reduction and streamlining processes are real AI benefits, but the bigger opportunity is about how AI empowers individuals, not just organisations,” says Hertogh. “The long-term value comes from elevating the role of every employee – giving them tools that help them operate at a higher level and empower them to achieve new ambitions.”
At its core, Hertogh says, AI changes the relationship people have with work.
“For the first time, you have technology that can act as a true assistant – helping you think, create and solve problems. It can take on repetitive tasks, summarise complex information and help generate ideas. This means individuals can spend less time on routine work and more time on what really matters – and we consistently see that this leads to better and more fulfilling work. People can focus on creativity, judgement and collaboration. A marketer can spend more time on strategy. A clinician can spend more time with patients. A government worker can focus more on outcomes rather than administrative tasks. There’s also a confidence aspect. When people have access to AI that is grounded in the organisation’s data, they can make decisions faster and with greater clarity. It reduces friction in the day-to-day.”
Kees Hertogh, vice president of global industry marketing at Microsoft
It’s this investment in people that ultimately makes the enterprise more innovative, adaptive and competitive.
“Organisations today are operating in a much more dynamic environment, whether that’s evolving regulations or increasing customer expectations,” says Hertogh. “The challenge has often been that the signals are there, but they’re fragmented across systems, teams and data sources. AI brings the ability to connect those signals and surface them in real time. For example, in areas like security and compliance, AI can continuously monitor large volumes of data, identify potential risks earlier and help the business respond proactively rather than reactively.
“Meanwhile when it comes to customer expectations, the bar has simply moved. Customers expect responsiveness, personalisation and consistency, and AI allows companies to better understand customer intent and anticipate needs to respond in a much more tailored way.
“In healthcare, for example, we analysed more than 500,000 real conversations with a generalist chatbot for health queries, and the pattern is very consistent. People are not asking for generic information. They are looking for personalised guidance, help interpreting complex information and support navigating systems that are often difficult to use. They also expect this support to be available whenever they need it. Many of these interactions happen outside of traditional hours, especially in the evening, when access to services is limited.”
Fashion brand Ralph Lauren has also put this principle to work. It introduced an AI-powered assistant – called Ask Ralph – to help improve how customers shop online while reducing the effort required to find the right items.
“In simple terms, Ask Ralph acts like a digital stylist,” says Hertogh. “A customer can describe what they’re looking for, then the system recommends outfits matching their preferences. Customers find the right products faster, with more confidence in their choices. That improves conversion and engagement while reducing friction for the customer, so the experience feels more personal and less like searching through a catalogue. The company can also scale personalised recommendations without adding manual effort for teams. AI handles the initial guidance, while the brand still defines the style, rules and experience.”
Ask Ralph is an AI-powered app that provides personalised, conversational style inspiration for Ralph Lauren customers
Hertogh stresses that the right data foundation, governance and human oversight are essential to ensure services like these provide accurate and responsible responses.
“When those pieces come together, organisations become far more agile,” he says. “They’re able to sense, decide and act much more quickly – which is a critical advantage in today’s environment.”
As these examples suggest, deploying AI is only one part of a successful strategy. Different levels of human intervention will be needed to ensure the technology delivers positive outcomes across different industries. Ultimately, trust is the glue that will cement solid human-AI teamwork.
“Increasingly, work will happen through human-agent teams, where AI helps with execution and people guide the process,” says Hertogh. “The level of human involvement should match the level of risk. In high-stakes scenarios such as clinical decisions, financial approvals, safety or compliance, a person still needs to review the output and make the final call. In lower-risk workflows such as drafting, summarising or routine process automation, AI can do more with lighter oversight.
“Trust is the key. Organisations need to understand what AI is doing, whether the output is accurate and when someone needs to step in. That is why governance, transparency and monitoring matter. When firms are confident their data is secure, governed and under their control, they can move faster. They can unlock the value of AI at scale, without introducing unacceptable risk. As this evolves, people will spend less time on repetitive tasks and more time guiding, validating and improving how work gets done. Those that align oversight with risk will be the ones that scale AI with confidence.”
Cooper University Health Care illustrates how trust between humans and AI delivers results.
“Clinicians were spending one to two hours after their shifts finishing documentation, which was taking time away from patients and driving burnout,” explains Hertogh. “They introduced Microsoft Dragon Copilot, which listens during the patient visit and automatically creates a draft of the clinical notes, which then gets reviewed. Clinicians save just over four minutes per patient – totalling about an hour per day. That time goes back into patient care, but it also allows clinicians more space in their day. Burnout is coming down, and some can see more patients.
“What matters is how the work changed. Documentation moved into the visit; the clinician stays in control and AI handles most of the administrative effort. That pattern of freeing up time and improving quality by redesigning the workflow is what we are now seeing more broadly.”
Microsoft and its partners are focused on enabling the confidence that supports transformations like this. It starts with the platform, infrastructure, models, security and compliance capabilities – which Microsoft deploys across its own enterprise.
“People need trust in the platforms they’re using – that those platforms provide the safeguards to protect sensitive data and critical workloads,” says Hertogh. “Before we bring AI capabilities to market, we use them ourselves at scale. That means embedding Copilot into daily work across tens of thousands of employees and measuring the impact. In our sales organisation, for example, teams using Copilot more frequently saw higher productivity. For some, that translated into more deals closed and measurable revenue lift. Importantly, we manage this as an operating model, not just a tool rollout. We run structured programmes to build habits and we continuously refine where AI adds the most value in each workflow.”
Microsoft’s Work Trend Index data shows less time is being spent on step-by step execution, while more is being invested in setting direction
Microsoft’s partner ecosystem transforms those tools into solutions tailored to individual organisations and industries.
“In many ways, our partner ecosystem is what turns AI from a capability into a competitive advantage,” says Hertogh. “Their real strength is in helping customers drive business transformation and, in many cases, cultural transformation. It’s a relationship that moves quickly beyond technology, into education and enablement. Strong partners help customers redesign processes, build new habits and drive change through the organisation. They understand the nuances of healthcare, financial services, public sector, manufacturing – how work gets done, the regulatory constraints and where the real inefficiencies sit. That context makes it possible to apply AI in a way that delivers real value, not just technical capability.
“In addition, partners play a critical role in connecting legacy systems, fragmented data and complex processes and embedding AI into existing workflows, systems and data estates so that it works in the flow of the business. It’s not just that you have access to AI – it’s how quickly you can apply, operationalise and differentiate with it. Partners help customers do that faster.”
With these resources to support organisations, Hertogh sees a robust focus on long-term value creation emerging.
“What comes next is about how work gets redesigned around AI,” he says. “The organisations that will move fastest over the next year won’t be the ones that deploy AI everywhere. They will be the ones that are clear about where it adds value, and match the right work to the right way of working with AI.
“We are also seeing a shift in how people contribute. Our Work Trend Index data shows less time is being spent on step-by-step execution, while more is being invested in setting direction, making decisions and checking the quality of outputs. People are already producing work they could not create a year ago. This leads to a different kind of workplace where work will be coordinated across people and AI systems and the operating model defines who does what. Organisations that get this right will move faster and make better decisions. That is what we mean by a frontier firm.”
Partner perspectives
Selected Microsoft partners told Technology Record how they are harnessing agentic AI capabilities to help organisations enrich individual workers’ experience and support greater success across the workforce
Richard Conway
Group Chief Technology Officer, Acora
“Acora is making it easier for organisations to take advantage of Microsoft’s agentic AI, using Microsoft Foundry alongside Azure tools and services. We work with businesses across different industries to simplify complex, time‑consuming workflows by ‘agentifying’ processes that once relied heavily on people. This helps teams work more efficiently and reduces the burden of manual tasks. Rather than focusing on what AI is, we help customers see what value it can bring them. The result is more time back for individuals so they can focus on meaningful work, achieve more in less time, and drive better outcomes for their business.”
Ed Rogers
Founder, President and Chief Product Officer, Akumina
“The number one reason employees use an intranet is search. The number one reason they stop using it is search. Once trust is lost, adoption disappears. The same is true for AI.
Trust drives adoption, and trust is built on three things: relevance, delivering the right AI experience to the right person at the right time; quality, ensuring AI has access to trusted knowledge, tools and agents through governed AI domains; and guidance, helping users get value immediately through managed prompts and curated experiences.
AI is not just a chatbot or an agent. It is an experience. Akumina manages that experience natively on Microsoft 365.”
Kevin Ryan
Senior Director, Partner Marketing, Arm
“Arm is using Microsoft AI capabilities to power both workforce productivity and software innovation. Microsoft Copilot supports everyday work through meeting recaps, translation and workflow assistance, helping global teams stay aligned and focused. In parallel, GitHub Copilot and emerging agentic AI workflows are helping technical teams accelerate software development, code modernisation and porting across platforms. By combining coding agents with Model Context Protocol integrations, Arm can connect AI assistance to relevant tools, repositories, documentation and enterprise workflows, making support more contextual and actionable. Together, these capabilities reduce friction, accelerate delivery and empower employees to focus on higher-value engineering, creativity, and collaboration.”
Arm is connecting AI assistance to relevant tools, repositories, documentation and enterprise workflows
Jan van Houtte
Executive Vice President, Barco ClickShare
“Agentic AI is transforming hybrid collaboration by quietly removing administrative noise that distracts from productive discussion. Facilitator agents provide discreet, real-time assistance, guiding discussions, taking notes and turning insights into actionable tasks.
ClickShare brings powerful videoconferencing hardware to Microsoft’s agentic AI ecosystem, with full support for Microsoft 365 Copilot and meeting recap features. Its intuitive design allows employees to walk into any meeting room and immediately start a hybrid meeting with AI-enhanced collaboration.
By combining ClickShare’s simplicity with Microsoft’s advanced AI capabilities, meetings start seamlessly, run intelligently and conclude without follow-up work. The result is focused and effortless collaboration for all employees.”
Kevin Pawsey
Chief Technology Officer, Conga
“At Conga, AI is central to how we compete, innovate and operate, both in our products and in how our people work every day. As a Microsoft partner, we’re harnessing agentic AI to automate complex tasks and workflows, giving employees the freedom to focus on higher-value, more meaningful work. To accelerate this, we’ve structured our approach around four core pillars: AI in product, AI in engineering, AI in the enterprise and AI governance. Each pillar is designed to drive impact across the entire organisation, ensuring AI doesn’t just improve our processes, but genuinely elevates the experience and success of our entire workforce.”
Brian Barnes
Chief Technology Officer, Coretek
“Coretek harnesses Microsoft’s agentic AI ecosystem – Copilot Studio, Azure AI Foundry and autonomous multi-agent frameworks – to reimagine how individual employees work and whole workforces succeed. We deploy role-specific AI agents that eliminate repetitive tasks, surface real-time insights and orchestrate complex workflows without human intervention. A large professional services firm in Michigan embedded Copilot agents across human resources, finance, and operations, cutting onboarding cycle times by 40 per cent while lifting employee satisfaction measurably. These agents don’t just automate – they amplify human judgement, freeing every worker to focus on strategic, high-value contributions that drive enterprise-wide outcomes.”
Joel Mulpeter
Senior Director, Product Marketing, Crestron
“Organisations are at different points in their journey towards adopting agentic AI features. Having said that, the wave of AI in the meeting room is just beginning to crest and employee demand will drive it. If an employee has experience using their individual computer with Microsoft Facilitator or Copilot, losing those tools in a meeting room is a major negative. People now expect those experiences. Assisting Microsoft in deploying those tools means we need the right AI processing in place to leverage them across every space. It’s much easier to do that for one individual than it is for a dozen collaborators, and those larger-scale solutions are the ones we’re really focused on.”
Bojan Dusevic
Senior Vice President of Product Management, Intermedia
“Microsoft’s advancements in agentic AI are bringing more intelligence into the flow of everyday work, particularly within platforms like Microsoft Teams. By integrating Intermedia’s enterprise-grade calling, contact centre capabilities, and AI-driven insight into Teams, we enable organisations to make it a more complete communications and collaboration hub.
Our AI supports real-world workflows, from real-time agent assistance and intelligent routing to automated summaries and performance visibility. Our AI agents extend this further, all underpinned by Microsoft Azure’s AI and large language model capabilities. As organisations adopt AI more broadly, platforms like Intermedia play a key role in helping manage interactions, maintain visibility and support consistent experiences across both collaboration and customer engagement.”
Chad Scheller
Area Vice President, Partner Management, Global Microsoft, ServiceNow
“The shift with agentic AI is real, and it is different from the last wave. This is not another assistant bolted onto the desktop. With Microsoft, we are bringing Copilot and ServiceNow’s Now Assist together as a single motion, so an employee can start a request in Microsoft Teams and have the work completed across the platform without the hand-offs and the waiting. That is what changes the day for an individual worker. For the workforce, the gains compound. The companies getting this right are not chasing technology. They are giving their people time back to do work that matters.”
Jonathan Boaz
Director, Strategic Alliances, Shure
“At Shure, we see every meeting as a source of rich conversational data. As a Microsoft Teams Rooms provider, we’re leveraging Microsoft’s agentic AI to transform that data into real-time insights. By pairing high quality audio capture with Microsoft’s Facilitator, we can turn that data into meaningful action. Facilitator helps structure discussions, generate real-time summaries, and track decisions and next steps with accuracy. By ensuring every voice is clearly heard, we enable more inclusive, intelligent collaboration. The result is a more empowered individual experience and a more effective workforce, where conversations directly drive progress and better business outcomes.”
Shure is leveraging Microsoft’s agentic AI to transform conversational data into real-time insights.
Stefan Prestele
Senior Vice President, Partner Marketing, TeamViewer
“We’re leveraging Microsoft Azure’s AI infrastructure to reduce friction for digital workplaces. Every remote support interaction with TeamViewer becomes part of a continuous learning loop: TeamViewer AI documents how issues are resolved, transforms those insights into reusable knowledge, then feeds them back into the system so Tia, the TeamViewer Intelligent Agent, becomes smarter with every session. Much like an experienced colleague who never forgets a solution, Tia helps IT teams resolve recurring issues faster while reducing digital friction for the whole organisation. It also integrates with Microsoft 365 Copilot, allowing customers to access TeamViewer intelligence directly from their daily productivity platform. This creates the foundation for autonomous endpoint management.”
Robbie Morrison
CEO, Velosio
“AI helps individuals and teams to meet their potential by taking care of mundane tasks that often get in their way. But change management is vital to help people understand the vision and make it work for them.
We began our own Microsoft AI deployment by looking at how we could automate the jobs our employees didn’t enjoy doing – tasks that were routinely delayed or passed to someone else. If we couldn’t fully automate a task, we focused on making it easier for the person doing it.
Prioritising those least-favoured tasks gave us some early wins because people quickly realised AI made their jobs more enjoyable.”
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