AI transformation is moving at breakneck speed, but not only across larger enterprises with unlimited tech budgets.
Organizations of every size are now layering agentic intelligence on top of their SaaS tools and embracing the emerging agentic economy, where workplace tools and systems can operate autonomously to achieve business outcomes.
This transformation has definitely arrived – 62% of small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) recently reported that they’re using AI tools, with another 67% reporting they plan to increase budget for AI over the coming year.
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President and Chief Commerce Officer, Pax8.
SMBs of the past bought tools like CRMs, email suites, collaboration tools and accounting platforms to operate effectively – requiring constant human input to juggle these solutions, their outputs, and glean useful insights.
Fortune 500 organizations, conversely, have historically had more manpower and resources to devote to managing and funding these offerings (consequently contributing to their ability to power growth more quickly).
67% of SMBs also believe that AI will be required to help compete with larger enterprises. We’re now crossing into a new inflection point of AI-powered enablement, where the playing field is more even for SMBs to compete and grow – the agentic economy.
In this new landscape, SMBs are shifting from buying tools to buying outcomes. They’re deploying autonomous AI agents that act as a digital workforce, allowing them to achieve enterprise-scale outcomes.
Preparing for this shift isn’t just about unleashing agents on the digital workplace at once – it’s about fundamentally reshaping how your teams operate. Here’s how SMBs can capitalize on this shift with the right foundation of tools and strategies in place.
Strategic Shift – Focusing on Outcomes Vs. Shiny Features
Recent data shows that organizations globally are only using about 47% of their SaaS licenses, creating potential waste of up to $21 million on average. On top of this, businesses are still onboarding several new SaaS applications per month on average (as many as six).
To reduce tech waste while empowering better outcomes, SMBs must first look to eliminate their SaaS and process debt. Instead of evaluating tools based on their streamlined dashboard, employee experience and workplace insights, they must shift towards employing and evaluating agents based on their ability to deliver the final outcomes their teams need.
A good place to start is auditing which tasks take up the most of their lean teams’ thinly-stretched time beyond the obvious, basic administrative work like managing email and task tracking. Leaders should be adopting new agents closely aligned with their roadmap – seeking agents that can identify new leads, conduct in-depth market research, generate analytics and reports, and more.
Beyond automating baseline tasks, these agents should be employed to deliver full-scale business intelligence – alongside a streamlined SaaS tech stack that eliminates waste and streamlines this AI’s data foundation
Aligning with Managed Intelligence Providers
SMBs have long relied on Managed Service Providers (MSPs) to manage and provide IT and SaaS services – acting as a trusted tech advisor to guide tech implementation, adoption, and maintenance.
As SMBs shift into agentic AI adoption and integrations, they require MSPs who go beyond basic troubleshooting and tech integration, as these systems are highly complex (going far beyond basic AI chatbots) and require a dedicated strategic arm.
Enter the Managed Intelligence Provider (MIP) – serving as architects of intelligent infrastructure, builders of agentic systems and orchestrators of business outcomes for AI-oriented SMBs. These strategic partners handle orchestrating AI agents, curating industry solutions and guiding SMBs in agentic adoption strategy.
As 70% of SMBs also report that they would need an outside vendor to implement and fully benefit from AI, MIPs will serve as a critical partner in the shift to agentic systems, helping transform core processes and offering the unique intelligence needed to scale.
Securing the Human Element
AI tools are never a ‘set and forget’ solution. Agents have the power to crawl your organization’s entire data environment and make changes – requiring clear guardrails and governance to not only ensure data security, but that these tools are focused on the right objectives.
In the agentic economy, human employees evolve into agentic supervisors, providing the guidance and strategy needed for these systems to operate safely and efficiently.
Rather than training new hires on manual tasks, train them on how to manage agents, and how to prompt them. This builds on the creative input of employees that AI cannot replace – while establishing an automated infrastructure that frees up more time for human creativity.
This agentic transformation isn’t a distant prediction – it’s now our reality in 2026. With the power of agentic tools, and by partnering with the right MIPs, SMBs can now compete on the same level as larger enterprises.
This level playing field opens up a new chapter for SMBs – transforming how this sector drives growth, executes new initiatives and powers innovation.
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