For years, AI has meant tools—you command them, they execute. Now, a fundamental shift is underway: from reactive tools to proactive agents that pursue goals autonomously. Here's what it means for your business.
The AI Landscape Has Changed
For years, the conversation around AI for SMBs has been focused on tools. But now, a fundamental paradigm shift is underway, moving from reactive tools to proactive agents that can autonomously pursue complex goals. This shift changes everything about how operations can be automated.
Most AI tools are reactive. You give them a specific, isolated command ("extract this data," "summarize this text") and they execute it. The burden is on you to orchestrate all the different tools and manage the entire end-to-end process.
A recent article from EY, "Preparing for the Agentic AI Revolution," defines this new category differently. Agentic AI is designed with a degree of autonomy to pursue specified goals.
Think of it this way:
An AI Tool is a calculator. It waits for you to input the numbers and the operation (e.g., 2+2).
An AI Agent is a financial assistant. You give it a goal (e.g., "Review our monthly expenses and flag any anomalous spending"), and it autonomously plans and executes the necessary steps to achieve it.
As the EY article notes, these agents can "plan," "execute," "monitor," and "adapt." This ability to manage a complex, multi-step process is what separates them from the simple tools we've used so far.
💡 The Key Difference
Tools require you to orchestrate each step. Agents understand the goal and orchestrate themselves. This autonomy is the fundamental shift that's transforming operational efficiency.
Let's apply this to a universal—and often painful—process for SMBs: Accounts Payable (AP) Invoice Processing.
An SMB buys an "AI-powered" data extraction tool, likely built on a service like Azure AI Document Intelligence. The workflow often looks like this:
1. An invoice arrives in the ap@company.com inbox.
2. A team member (or a simple script) manually feeds the PDF to the AI tool.
3. The tool extracts the data—vendor, amount, due date—with 85% accuracy.
4. The AP clerk must now manually:
The Problem: The "AI tool" only automated one small piece of a much larger manual process. The human is still the central orchestrator, and their workflow is still full of friction.
Now, let's design an agentic workflow for the same process. The goal given to the agent is not "extract data," but "process this invoice for payment."
1. Ingestion & Planning
An invoice arrives in the inbox. A Microsoft Power Automate flow, acting as the primary "agent," immediately triggers. It identifies the attachment and its goal.
2. Autonomous Action (Extraction)
The agent sends the PDF to Azure AI Document Intelligence. The data is extracted.
3. Autonomous Action (Verification)
The agent takes the extracted vendor name and autonomously queries your Dataverse or ERP.
4. Autonomous Action (Reconciliation)
The agent, having extracted the PO number, autonomously queries the purchasing system. It finds the PO, compares all line items, and confirms the amounts match.
5. Intelligent Routing (Human-in-the-Loop)
The agent sees the total is over $10,000. Its rules state this requires VP approval. It autonomously sends a Microsoft Teams adaptive card to the VP with the invoice summary and PO attached, along with "Approve" and "Deny" buttons.
6. Execution
Once approved, the agent marks the invoice as "Ready for Payment" and automatically stages it in the accounting system.
The Result: The human team only gets involved for high-level, critical exceptions (like a new vendor or a final approval), not for the repetitive, manual tasks of data entry and verification. The agent manages the entire end-to-end process.
This is not just a technical upgrade. The shift from tools to agents changes the entire operational model. Humans are freed from orchestration duties and focused only on judgment calls that require expertise or context.
As a Forbes article ("10 Ways Agentic AI Is Unlocking Credit for Small Businesses") points out, this ability to automate complex, multi-step data gathering and verification is already unlocking immense value in the financial sector.
The same potential is now available for your internal operations. This shift from tools to agents is not just a technical upgrade; it's a strategic one. It allows SMBs, even those with challenged IT teams, to achieve a level of operational efficiency that was previously only possible with large, dedicated teams.
The key is to stop thinking about automating tasks and start thinking about automating goals.
You don't need to become an expert in Agentic AI. You just need a partner who already is.
If your organization is looking to move beyond point-solution AI tools and unlock genuine operational value—without taking on the complexity yourself—Shore Digital is ready to help.
The shift from tools to agents is transforming how organizations operate. If you're ready to explore how this could work for your business, let's talk.
Get in Touch