What happens when AI moves beyond answering questions and starts getting work done?
That was the big question at WebexOne 2026 in Texas, where i joined industry leaders to explore how AI is changing the way we work, communicate and serve customers.
The message from Cisco was clear: the era of AI pilots is ending, and the era of putting AI to work at scale has arrived.
Customers like American Eagle Outfitters, United Airlines and Western Digital, alongside partners such as AWS, Google and Glean, shared how they’re putting AI to work across their teams, operations and service.
For IT and technology leaders, the announcements highlighted an important shift. The question is moving from what AI can do to where it can deliver practical value, how it will fit into existing environments and what controls organisations will need as it takes on a more active role.
Here are the developments that stood out to me, and the implications for organisations considering their next steps.
Cisco’s Connected Intelligence strategy brings people, devices and AI together to create workplaces ready for the workforce of tomorrow.
Last year, that vision came to life through intelligent devices and workspaces. This year, it’s about AI agents that don’t just assist, but take action.
Cisco isn’t simply adding AI features to Webex. It’s turning Webex into an agentic work platform where agents listen, takes action and collaborate with people across meetings, calls, messaging and customer interactions.
Consider the work that follows a meeting: capturing actions, updating systems and chasing follow-ups. Or the time spent screening calls and directing routine enquiries. These are the kinds of tasks AI agents could help manage, freeing people to focus on higher-value work.
The opportunity is significant, but so are the considerations around access, security and oversight. For me, the starting point is identifying workflows where agents can solve a clear business problem, with appropriate controls in place.
One of the headline announcements was the new Webex App experience. It’s a personalised workspace that brings your daily briefing, priorities and meeting preparation together in one place, with AI agents that work across spaces, calls and meetings.
What I found most significant was the emphasis on choice. Rather than locking organisations into one AI model or approach, Cisco is opening up the platform to a broader ecosystem.
For customers, these developments change the conversation from “which AI tool should we buy?” to “which workflows should AI be doing for us?”. This is a much more useful starting point – then work through the practicalities.
Phone calls remain an important part of how organisations work, but managing incoming calls can consume a surprising amount of time.
Webex Calling now serves more than 20 million users across 200+ markets with a 99.999% Service Level Agreement (SLA). This year, Cisco introduced Personal Agents for Webex Calling to help users maange incoming calls more intelligently.
These agents screen calls, talk with callers to understand what they need and how urgent it is, then prioritise and take action on the user’s behalf.
For users juggling competing demands, this could mean fewer interruptions and more time to focus on what matters.
Another announcement worth noting for many Australian organisations is the general availability of Cloud Intelligence for Cisco UCM. It brings AI-powered experiences to existing UCM environments without forcing customers onto a fixed migration timeline. Modernisation doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing, and customers can protect their existing investments while deciding when and how a broader migration fits their technology strategy.
AI isn’t just changing what happens on a screen. It’s also changing how people interact with the physical spaces around them.
RoomOS 27 introduces the voice-enabled Cisco AI Assistant which allows users to control room amenities, book spaces and perform other tasks using natural language.
Other highlights include:
The common thread is flexibility: making workplaces easier to use and manage, while supporting different ways of working.
The contact centre is another area where AI is moving beyond simple assistance towards managing more complex tasks. Cisco’s latest announcements build on its previous announcements for AI agents, with a stronger focus on customer context, orchestration and oversight.
Cisco also announced general availability for AI Routing, Webex Contact Center for ServiceNow and Salesforce, and new healthcare templates, providing more ways to connect AI-enabled customer service with existing platforms and industry workflows.
The goal isn’t simply to automate more interactions. It’s to improve the customer experience while giving employees better tools, maintaining service quality and ensuring AI operates within appropriate boundaries.
As AI takes on more responsibility, trust becomes even more important.
It’s one thing to use AI to summarise a meeting. It’s another to give an agent access to business information, allow it to communicate with customers or authorise it to take action across connected systems.
Cisco’s announcements addressed several aspects of this challenge:
These capabilities are particualarly relevant for government, health and financial services customers with strict regulatory and data sovereignty requirements.
The consistent thread through Cisco’s announcements was that AI is moving from assisting people to working alongside them. Highlights of this approach include:
For IT leaders, this means faster time to value from AI, less risk, and technology that fits around how they already work.
My biggest takeaway from WebexOne 2026 is that moving beyond the pilot is not simply about enabling more AI capabilities. IT leaders need to consider where AI can deliver a practical outcome, how it will connect with existing systems and what governance is needed as agents take on a more active role.
At Data#3, we bring experience across collaboration, networking, security and observability to help organisations assess their options, understand the implications and plan their next steps.
If you’d like to explore what the WebexOne announcements could mean for your workplace or AI strategy, get in touch with our team using the form below to start the conversation.
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