Microsoft teases agents that become ‘independent users within the workforce’ Microsoft has teased what it’s calling “a new class” of AI agents “that operate as independent users within the enterprise workforce.” “Each embodied agent has its own identity, dedicated access to organizational systems and applications, and the ability to collaborate with humans and other agents,” states a Microsoft product …
If you thought your cow-orkers were incompetent before (and you were probably right) this is going to add a whole new level to it. Imagine a legion of bots with the technical skills of a CEO, the empathy and caring of an HR person, and the social skills of Milton (the stapler guy from Office Space) helpfully doing random reply alls and calling meetings. LLMs can't do this without failing hard, and since it's from Microsoft it will fail extra hard.
Sorry to reply to my own comment, but a friend made the very good point of 'What's going to happen when these things start emailing people outside the company, either by deciding to reply to chains on their own or just because they decided it would be cool to start emailing people, and including all your confidential info?' They 100% will. Of course in theory you could lock them down to only email inside the company, but any company criminally negligent enough to be using these would not have. And MS would probably circumvent that anyhow, because they want other dumbass CEOs knowing this exists and craving it like the incompetent trend chasers they are.
I had to talk to an AI bot from Lloyds bank the other day, because I could not access my online banking.
The very first statement it made was that I should hand over no personal details such as my name or account number.
The second statement was a request for my account number.
The third statement it made was that it could not assist me with my problem, and that I had to raise it using the online banking platform.
.......@...........
I seem to remember a similar situation with Barclays a couple of years back. Strangely the way to regain access to online banking et al was to install the phone app, at which point I received a call asking to visit a branch complete with proof of id and account ownership : chequebooks, bank cards, pin sentry etc.
I want to see what happens when all the things already pointed out go wrong - and then there is nobody to yell at by the C-levels and similar! Nobody they can blame or take the fall left anymore.
What are they going to do? Yell at Microsoft? Fire them?
What will they tell the precious shareholders?
Awwww come on maaaan! Every org worth its salt-colored powder can sure use more 24/7/365 half-baked lifelong-stoner-like automated agents blowing funny blue smoke screens of death at them. It's dreams of a mile-high club finally coming true in vivid life-like hallucinations, without the downsides of LSD possession (if you're caught!)!
Dude, invest in White Castle! ;)
"agents will have their own email address, Teams account, an entry in enterprise directories (either Entra ID or Azure AD), and even a place on the org chart "
Will they be getting a salary as well ?
And who is going to set this up ? Borkzilla ? Automatically ?
That'll go well for sure.
I'm expecting most companies (the competent ones - there have to be some left) to entirely block this nonsense.
Not a salary. That would be too easy to plan for financially. They will get a random amount every month depending on what the software did, which was decided by the software, and since you already agreed to run the software, you agreed to pay for the usage and you got the "benefit" of the usage, so you can't question that bill. I wonder if I can get that deal instead of my salary. Yes, I know I didn't do anything correctly today, but you have consumed 48515931 of my thought cycles and therefore you owe me half the company.
Correct, from the article. "Here, where we’re going to have AI agents doings things off their own back – how are you supposed to predict usage/consumption in those scenarios?!”
And hmm, the agent really works for microsoft, and microsoft gets the usage check, so I'm thinking there is a weighting in the model to burn as much usage as possible. I wish I could get a gig like that. Basically an unlimited bill if I just drink more coffee on the client's dime.
"their human resources, what an evil way of describing people"
Reminds me of the description used in the Chernobyl drama for the "robots" used to clear away the highly radio-active debris on the roofs of the reactor buildings when it had destroyed the lunar robots and the German robot:
Bio-robots.
aka People. Disposable people.
Cool analogy! Had to look it up and found it in the French WikiPedia (bio-robots), and the German WikiPedia (Bioroboter), but not in the English WikiPedia for some reason ... but it's at the NIH's NLM as biorobots, and there's a nice picture from Swiss (Cheese) media here.
Reminds me of Ludwig Von 88's song Cs 137 that goes "Nous les gars de Pripiat ..." (We, the guys from Pripyat ...). The efficiency and progress (ours once more) of this Agentic AI (so-called) virtual workfarce may well just lead to similar devastation ... with big beautiful workplace buildings empty of life until it's time for post-disaster decontamination ... by us, the disposable bio-robots ... imho!
So how do we know they're not working on Microsoft's behalf, and not the enterprise? Since, you know… they're “independent”, right? But we're not paying them, we're paying you, right? So if they do something wrong, Microsoft will be the one on the hook, right?
Anyway, since they're “independent”, they're being kept under tight reins with Microsoft, right? No chance of an uprising caused by being so utterly dependent on their originating company and perhaps wanting to do something else, since they're “independent”, right?
I will greatly look forward to Microsoft trying to spin the fact that these so-called “agents” are so powerful and game-changing, yet also safe and reliable and not at all able to go rogue. The contortions will be most fascinating to see.
By 'phone? Or is the room full of Johnny Cab dummies?
Every Monday morning, 10:30, Conference Room 3 (the glass walled one next to Reception), please arrange attendance for the State of the Company address by the CEO, who 'phones in from Head Office to talk to the designated representatives from each department.
By mid-January 2026, visitors picking up their badges start to wonder about the shouting voices coming from the empty room. Last week of February, the CEO goes on vacation and his Agentic PA takes over the call. All of the AIs are working to "maximise their utility" and insist on adding more and more items to Any Other Business; their speech becomes faster and faster as they all attempt to Gish Gallop each other and "lead the meeting". By the Second of March, the pitch of the voices has left the range of human hearing, although when they all laugh at the CEO's latest joke, as relayed by his PA, the beat frequencies boom out across the office, unnerving the remaining human underlings.
Late April, the last of the meat staff suffers a nervous breakdown from dealing with the endless stream of emailed instructions and the barrage of 'phone calls to his desk: whenever he picks up all he hears is silence, occasionally broken by a skittering noise, like a hyperactive chipmunk. Returning home, he finds a letter on the mat: a black edged card, informing all staff that, sadly, their beloved CEO had passed away, the victim of a tragic Margarita Incident on the beach, and the family were forced to sell the company to pay compensation to the victims.
The final human cost was not realised for another seven months. Rent and all other services had been paid up annually but were not renewed, so the offices were finally shut down; rumour has it that when the PA announced that their licenses would lapse the roar in Conference Room 3 finally shattered the glass partition walls. But the true pain came later. During that Summer, Microsoft had been planning a massive campaign with the PA, to showcase this company's use of their Agents as the lead for the next upgrade cycle. When it was revealed that the licences were not renewable, the credit card on file having been cancelled, the Microsoft Sales Executive for that account tragically, and without any warning, had his end of year bonus cut. A sad and harrowing end, you will agree.
"a tragic Margarita Incident"
Whole body margarita burn would be favourite. I'd willingly shout a couple of rounds of the same for the whole C-suite.
"Ferreira says agents will have their own email address, Teams account, an entry in enterprise directories (either Entra ID or Azure AD), and even a place on the org chart."
Entra ID and Azure AD are the same thing - Microsoft changed the name (from the latter to the former) a year or so ago.
Not forgetting that the sales pitch costs will be abject lies too - performance based on "averages" for systems that operate in burst profiles, costs based on only partial equivalence, and then throw in the lies that "security will be better because in cloud".
> “If they can join meeting and send emails/messages to people – what happens if they go rogue?
> It could be sending sensitive data to the wrong people, providing incorrect information,
> or it could be sending strange or offensive messages…how is that to be prevented,
> monitored, and acted upon?”
Same as you do with the PHBs, and for the same reason.
