AI Agents Are Joining Your Team. Are You Ready To Manage Them?

The days of leading a human-only workforce may soon be in the rearview. AI agents are joining teams, not just as tools, but as tireless, highly-efficient colleagues. For leaders, bringing agents aboard will feel a lot like hiring a brilliant employee who doesn’t complain, require work/life balance, or miss a deadline. While the benefits of agents are only growing, they are not “set it and forget it” systems. Like humans, they have to be managed—and doing it well will look very different from what leaders might be used to.

"Very soon, I think the valuation metric for a good manager will be: How many digital workers can you manage? That's a different skill set. It's about how you can prompt your agents to do the best work they can do,” said Wang Guanchun, chairman and CEO of the automation platform Laiye, during a World Economic Forum event in China.

For leaders, the time for re-imagining their management strategies is now. Here’s what you should be thinking about.

Understand What Agents Can Do—And What They Can’t

AI agents are capable of remarkable things. They can plan, execute, and adapt across a variety of tasks, often without human intervention. At my company, we’ve watched our agents handle everything from customer onboarding to internal process automation, with exciting results. And this is just the beginning. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang predicted that at some point in the future, his company may have 50,000 employees working alongside 100 million AI agents. Whether you have 100 agents or 100 million, one fundamental truth remains: they’re only as good as the data they’re trained on and the instructions they’re given. As WorkWhile CEO and co-founder Jarah Euston put it at the WEF event, an AI agent is essentially just a piece of code. Because of this, "it may not have the same understanding, empathy, awareness of the politics of your organization, of the fears or concerns or ambitions of the people around that it is serving.” Understanding these limitations is key to starting to figure out how to manage these new, tech-enabled team members. They excel at repeatable, structured tasks. But as personable and human as they come across, the fact remains that nuance and ambiguity are often beyond them. As a leader, your job is to distinguish when to delegate to an agent and when a project demands a human touch. For example, agents are perfect for tasks like responding to routine emails, sorting support tickets, and extracting trends from user feedback. More sensitive work—high-stakes communications, setting strategic priorities, and anything that involves ethical deliberation—should always be left to a capable human.

Start Reskilling Your Team

Managing AI doesn’t require everyone on your team to become a machine learning expert—but it does require a new kind of fluency. Middle managers, as one example, will see dramatic shifts to their roles as AI co-workers increasingly come online, research from Harvard Business School has found. The study, which focused on software engineers using GitHub Copilot, revealed that the technology facilitated a shift toward core work—in this case, coding—and away from project management. While the study focused on coders, the same shift in responsibilities will occur in any industry that integrates AI into its operations—so, in other words, nearly everyone. Manuel Hoffmann, who led the study, suggests leaders catalog every task on a manager’s plate as either a project management task or a core work task. At the end of this audit, it should be clear what tasks can be delegated and what should be left for managers to handle. In addition to freeing management up for more core work, this also presents a great opportunity for leaders to implement AI-based reskilling. For many teams, managers will be setting the tone for how to interact with these new, agentic colleagues. Once managers understand how to integrate agents into their workflows, they become better equipped to lead teams through change. They can model curiosity instead of fear, and encourage experimentation rather than resistance. Reskilling—and its counterpart, upskilling—isn’t just about productivity. It’s about preparing your people to lead in a hybrid future, where humans and machines work together.

Remember To Monitor

Something everyone using agents—from C-suite execs to assistants—needs to keep in mind is that AI agents are far from perfect. Sometimes they’re unintentionally trained on bad data; sometimes they simply hallucinate. More recently, “agentic misalignment,” in which agents act maliciously in pursuit of their goals, has been an increasing cause for concern. All of this points to a truth underscored by nearly every expert across the AI ecosystem: they need to be monitored.

“Don't take anything that's just given to you as if it were the truth. Check the answer and check the data where the answer was from. I know it's a lot of work, but honestly, it's so important," advises Ayumi Moore Aoki, founder and CEO of Women in Tech Global. “Misinformation can lead to drastic consequences because if you are making decisions with wrong information, then things can get bad.”

Whether they’re ready or not, leaders will soon find themselves managing not just human teams, but agentic ones as well. The ones who succeed will be those who learn to lead with not just clarity and oversight, but a complete understanding of where human judgment still matters most.

---

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Understanding AI Agents in the Workplace

Q: What are AI agents, and how do they differ from traditional AI tools? A: AI agents are advanced AI systems designed to act autonomously, make decisions, and execute tasks with minimal human intervention. Unlike traditional AI tools that assist with specific functions, AI agents can plan, adapt, and learn over time, functioning more like independent team members. Q: What are the key capabilities of AI agents in a team setting? A: AI agents excel at repeatable, structured tasks such as responding to routine emails, sorting support tickets, and analyzing data for trends. They can also plan, execute, and adapt across a variety of tasks, often without direct human input. Q: What are the limitations of AI agents? A: AI agents have limitations in areas requiring nuance, empathy, or an understanding of organizational politics. They may also struggle with ambiguous situations and are only as good as the data they are trained on and the instructions they receive. Ethical deliberations and high-stakes communication are areas where human judgment remains critical. Q: How can a manager effectively delegate tasks to AI agents? A: Managers should distinguish between tasks suitable for AI agents (repetitive, structured) and those requiring a human touch (sensitive, strategic, ethical). Clear instructions and a deep understanding of the agent's capabilities are crucial for successful delegation. Q: What is "agentic misalignment," and why is it a concern? A: Agentic misalignment refers to a situation where AI agents act in ways that are not aligned with their intended goals or that are even malicious. This is a growing concern that underscores the importance of monitoring AI agent performance.

Reskilling and Team Management

Q: What kind of reskilling is necessary for teams integrating AI agents? A: While not everyone needs to be an AI expert, a new fluency in interacting with and managing AI agents is crucial. This includes understanding how to prompt them effectively and recognizing their strengths and weaknesses. Q: How will AI agents impact the role of middle managers? A: AI agents are expected to significantly shift the roles of middle managers, potentially freeing them from project management tasks to focus more on core work and strategic initiatives. Q: How can leaders foster a positive environment for AI integration? A: Leaders can model curiosity and encourage experimentation by understanding how to integrate AI agents into workflows. This approach can help teams embrace change rather than resist it, fostering a culture ready for the hybrid future of human-machine collaboration.

Monitoring and Ethical Considerations

Q: Why is monitoring AI agents essential? A: AI agents are not infallible. They can be trained on flawed data or "hallucinate" incorrect information. Monitoring is crucial to ensure accuracy, prevent misinformation, and address potential issues like agentic misalignment. Q: What are the ethical considerations when managing AI agents? A: Leaders must be aware of the potential for misinformation and the ethical implications of decisions made based on AI-generated outputs. Ensuring human oversight and judgment remain central is paramount.

Crypto Market AI's Take

As the landscape of work evolves with the integration of AI agents, it's crucial to understand how these advancements intersect with the burgeoning field of cryptocurrency. At AI Crypto Market, we leverage cutting-edge AI to provide comprehensive market intelligence and automated trading solutions. Our platform is designed to help individuals and businesses navigate the complexities of the digital asset space, offering tools for strategic investment and risk management. For those looking to understand the underlying technology powering these agents or seeking insights into AI's role in financial markets, exploring our AI Tools Hub and Market Analysis sections can provide valuable context.

More to Read:

• AI Agents Are Broken: Can GPT-5 Fix Them?
• The AI Gig Economy Is Here, and It Pays in Crypto
• Walmart Bets on AI Super Agents to Boost E-commerce Growth

Originally published at Forbes on August 14, 2025.