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Shift AI PodcastAuthor: Boaz Ashkenazy
The Shift AI podcast explores how AI and ML is changing the way that we work in the digital age. The show's creator Boaz Ashkenazy interviews thought leaders who are redefining how businesses and employees will be impacted by emerging technology today and in the future Visit shiftaipodcast.com Language: en Genres: Technology Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it Trailer: |
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Agentic AI and the Future of Revenue Teams with Outreach CEO Abhijit Mitra
Thursday, 23 April, 2026
In this episode of the Shift AI Podcast, Abhijit Mitra, CEO of Outreach, joins host Boaz Ashkenazy for a wide-ranging conversation on how agentic AI is fundamentally reshaping the way revenue teams operate.Abhijit shares his journey from tutoring a seventh-grade student advanced math in India to spending 30 years building enterprise systems at Oracle, SAP, and ServiceNow before joining Outreach as head of product and engineering—and eventually stepping into the CEO role. From there, the discussion dives deep into how Outreach has evolved from a sales execution platform into a full agentic AI infrastructure for go-to-market workflows.The conversation explores the critical distinction between true autonomous agents and what Abhijit calls "fancy dashboards"—how Outreach's agents autonomously research accounts, personalize outreach, prep sellers for meetings, provide real-time coaching, and even submit forecasts without human intervention. Abhijit explains why the shift from SaaS seat licenses to hiring agents with skills and capacity represents the next evolution of enterprise software, and why companies that don't adapt will not survive.Boaz and Abhijit also dig into the governance challenge at the heart of enterprise AI adoption—shadow AI, role-based access control, and how to give individual sellers the autonomy to personalize their own agents while keeping everything inside trusted organizational guardrails. The episode closes with Abhijit's vision for self-adapting AI that learns best practices from every rep and distributes them across the entire team, making every rep your best rep.This episode is essential listening for sales leaders, revenue operators, and enterprise technology buyers who want to understand how agentic AI is moving beyond individual productivity tools to unlock fundamentally new go-to-market operating models.Chapters[00:00] Introduction: Abhijit's Career from Oracle and SAP to Outreach[01:26] First Job: Teaching 12th Grade Math to a 7th Grader in India[01:58] Outreach's Evolution from Sales Execution to Revenue Orchestration[03:42] 2025 Was the Launch—2026 Is When Agents Actually Happen[04:12] What Makes a True Autonomous Agent (Not a Chatbot or Dashboard)[07:46] The New Paradigm: Hiring Agents vs. Renting Software Seats[09:43] Personal Agents and the Case for Individual Autonomy[12:06] Enterprise Governance: Why Every Rep Needs Guardrails[12:34] Shadow AI, Sovereign AI, and What CISOs Are Actually Worried About[13:34] Role-Based Access Control for Agents: Match the Person, Not the Platform[14:20] Day in the Life: What Agents Do So Sellers Don't Have To[17:06] Outreach's Own 100-Person Sales Team as a Live Testing Ground[17:34] The Numbers: 39% Productivity Increase Measured Internally[19:17] Is SaaS Dead? The Real Transformation Happening in Enterprise Software[21:50] What's Next: Self-Adapting Agents That Learn and Spread Best Practices[24:30] Two Words on the Future of Work: Unleash Your Best Performance[25:38] Closing Thoughts on Augmentation, Fear, and Human PotentialConnect with Abhijit MitraLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mitrasaab/Connect with Boaz AshkenazyLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/boazashkenazy/Email: info@shiftai.fm
