At Workday Rising 2026, the conversation moved beyond AI assistants that answer questions to agentic capabilities that can execute governed work across HR, finance, and IT. The message was clear: organizations are entering a new phase where AI is becoming embedded in business processes, accelerating productivity, decision-making, and service delivery.
For business leaders, success will depend on more than technology adoption. Real value realization requires strong data foundations, governance, process orchestration, workforce readiness, and a clear approach to risk and controls. This creates an opportunity to rethink how work gets done while strengthening operational resilience and time-to-value.
What We Heard
Clients consistently focused on five key questions:
- AI transformation succeeds when employees are engaged from the start to identify where AI creates value and to redesign workflows around an enhanced employee experience – not simply to implement a new technology.
- How can agentic AI and Sana drive measurable outcomes across HR, finance, and other business functions?
- What data, process, security, and governance foundations are required to scale adoption responsibly?
- Which capabilities are available today versus those still on the Workday roadmap?
- How are leading organizations redesigning work across people, process, and technology to realize value from AI?
Key Messages
Sana Becomes the New Workday Experience
Workday positioned Sana as a conversational, action-oriented experience spanning HR, finance, and IT, with Sana Concierge currently in early access.
Why it matters: Organizations have an opportunity to modernize employee services, improve experience, and increase self-service adoption. Success will depend on governance, operating model design, and adoption strategies that deliver measurable outcomes.
Sana Extends into Everyday Work Tools
Workday announced planned access to Sana through Microsoft Copilot, Teams, Slack, Gemini Enterprise, and Claude.
Why it matters: Employees increasingly expect workflows to be accessible where they already work. Organizations should evaluate channel strategy, digital workplace experience, identity management, and change adoption to maximize value.
Anthropic Partnership Expands AI Interoperability
Workday and Anthropic announced deeper integration between Sana and Claude, enabling broader context-sharing and agent experiences.
Why it matters: As organizations deploy multiple AI platforms, governance becomes increasingly important. Leaders should establish clear policies around model usage, information boundaries, approvals, and third-party risk management.
Work Intelligence Connects Skills and Work
New capabilities provide deeper visibility into how AI is reshaping tasks, skills, and roles across the workforce.
Why it matters: People transformation is becoming a strategic priority. Organizations should assess how roles evolve, identify emerging skill needs, and develop measurable workforce planning and reskilling strategies.
Autopilot Agents Move from Assistance to Action
Workday introduced additional agents designed to automate routine activities across recruiting, payroll, accounting, and compliance processes.
Why it matters: Agentic AI has the potential to improve efficiency and accelerate time-to-value, but organizations should begin with focused use cases supported by controls, exception management, human oversight, and defined success metrics.
Workday Candidate Profile
Workday introduced a reusable, candidate-controlled profile designed to reduce repetitive job applications and enable a more streamlined candidate experience. The capability is expected to become available in early 2027.
Why it matters: While not an immediate priority for all organizations, this signals a broader shift toward more consumer-grade recruiting experiences. Talent acquisition leaders will use the opportunity to evaluate candidate journeys, improve recruiting data quality, and prepare for future capabilities that can reduce candidate friction, strengthen employer brand, and improve hiring outcomes.
Decision Intelligence Expands Enterprise Planning
Decision Intelligence capabilities continue to advance governed analysis across workforce, financial, and planning data.
Why it matters: Organizations can improve planning accuracy and decision-making by connecting workforce and financial insights within a stronger governance framework.
Trusted Agent Platform and Data Cloud Establish the Foundation
Workday expanded its Trusted Agent Platform, Data Cloud, and Extend AI capabilities to support secure, governed development of AI-powered workflows and applications.
Why it matters: Scaling AI requires more than deploying agents. Organizations need a foundation that includes data governance, integration architecture, security controls, and application lifecycle management.
Looking Ahead
Workday's planned acquisition of C1.ai signals continued investment in agent identity and governance capabilities.
Why it matters: As organizations expand the use of AI agents, identity, authorization, auditability, and control frameworks will become critical components of enterprise AI governance.
Bottom Line
Workday's vision is increasingly centered on orchestrating intelligent work across people, processes, and systems. For organizations evaluating their next steps, the challenge is no longer whether to adopt AI, but how to engage employees at the onset and operationalize it responsibly while balancing innovation, governance, operational resilience, and business value.
Explore what's next for Workday and agentic AI.
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