Ten Management Illusions About Agentic AI

The Sales Management Association hosts a one-hour open webcast on November 17, 2026, in which the authors of a new study present ten common management misconceptions about agentic AI. It is aimed at sales leaders and sales and revenue operations professionals who are deciding whether and how to deploy AI agents. The study surveyed 167 technical experts. The authors map the ten illusions across three stages: setting strategy, organizing to deploy agents, and running use cases day to day. They show which illusions respondents rated most common and most damaging, led by overestimated headcount cuts, and give field-tested fixes with examples from real programs. Attendees leave with a diagnostic framework, guidance on when agentic AI suits a sales process, and a realistic view of scaling agents in production.