Businesses around Australia are unlocking a piece of the potential $6 trillion digital labor market opportunity using AI agents. This rise in use of agentic AI – systems that can work alongside human teams and perform tasks within set guardrails – represents not just an incremental technological advancement but a fundamental reshaping of the business landscape.
The possibilities for enhanced productivity and innovation are immense. In Australia, we’re already seeing firsthand how local businesses are using this digital labour to solve productivity bottlenecks and build better relationships with customers.
El Jannah is a prominent example. Using Salesforce and its digital labour platform Agentforce, El Jannah has been able to support its growth from a family-run business to an iconic home for Lebanese charcoal chicken and Middle Eastern cuisine. Accommodation provider Urban Rest is also using agents across a unified Salesforce Platform to automatically handle 30% of guest queries 24/7, while health-tech business Magentus is using agents to reduce customer wait times by up to 60%.
In this new era of human-AI collaboration, business leaders need to be proactive to avoid disruption, supporting employee reskilling and establishing a trustworthy AI ecosystem in the process.
Reskilling for the agentic AI era
With just 15% of workers saying they have the education and training necessary to use AI effectively, reskilling must be a priority for every business leader. It’s little wonder that Australia’s Productivity Commission recently put forward a plan to provide grants or tax credits to SMEs for work-related training expenses.
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Employees must be given access to learning opportunities so they can adopt human-AI collaboration skills, including a foundational understanding of agentic AI and prompt engineering — a way to provide clear and effective instructions to AI systems. That was the experience of the team at Venture Crowd, who started working with agentic AI months before they implemented Agentforce.
In addition to technical abilities, cultivating human and business skills is vital for fostering a trusted environment where teams feel comfortable experimenting with AI. Take a look at the work of NightOwl Entertainment, which recently implemented agentic AI with Agentforce to help its team deliver more meaningful experiences to customers. As CEO David Heaton noted: “Hospitality is built on trust, energy and a high level of care, and any use of AI and automation should amplify this hospitality, not dilute it”.
Identifying the skills is just the first step. To succeed in the agentic AI era, businesses need to develop a comprehensive strategy that incorporates these skills into their workforce plan. This includes setting clear, measurable goals and actively tracking progress. Recent Salesforce research found that up to 81% of senior HR executives around the world are either already reskilling, or plan to reskill their employees for roles with better future opportunities.
Managers need to provide active guidance and support to employees throughout this transformation, ensuring the workforce remains relevant and engaged, especially to overcome concerns about the pace of technological change.
Adopting trusted AI across the ecosystem
As AI capabilities expand, managing risks becomes crucial. To benefit from AI, businesses must focus on trust and safety from start to finish. This includes robust security and ethical practices to protect data and users. AI agents should follow clear guidelines on when to escalate tasks to humans. Proactive steps for data privacy and bias prevention are essential through secure protocols and clear communication.
Australian SMBs are ahead of their global counterparts in this consideration. Salesforce research into how local SMB leaders are adapting to an AI future found that 79% of local business leaders are incredibly data-conscious, well aware of the need to improve the quality of their data to truly take the best advantage of AI tools.
Equally important are tools that foster transparency and empower users to make informed decisions regarding task delegation to AI. Employees need a clear understanding of the capabilities and limitations of the AI agents they collaborate with, alongside having control over the tasks being automated. The future of work is still human, and Australian business leaders need to build an AI mindset early to help drive innovation across their workforces.
The power of reskilling and trust to drive innovation
The transition to an AI-powered future will bring challenges, particularly ensuring employees have access to the right infrastructure, high-quality data, and relevant skills.
However, by investing in reskilling and comprehensive training programs, Australian businesses can empower teams to work effectively alongside AI agents, adapt to the evolving nature of work, and ultimately drive innovation in this age of digital labour.
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