Why Gartner’s new AI report confirms what Gladly knew all along—human empathy isn’t optional, it’s essential
For the past few years, a tempting but dangerous narrative has dominated boardrooms––AI will replace customer service agents and slash costs. At Gladly, we’ve always known this was a flawed premise.
A recent Gartner report predicts that by 2027, 50% of organizations will reverse their plans to reduce their customer service workforce with AI. High levels of customer dissatisfaction and system breakdowns are some of the main reasons behind this backtrack.
This isn’t a surprise to us. It proves what we’ve always said. The future of customer service isn't about choosing between AI and real people. It's about using AI to help people do a better job.
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Where organizations are using AI wrong
Gartner’s report is clear about why companies are rethinking their AI strategy. Businesses rushed into automation expecting dramatic cost reductions and faster work. But they underestimated AI’s limitations, especially in handling customers who have complex problems and real feelings.This matches what PwC’s AI Jobs Barometer found––humans are still a very important part of the workforce. PwC said that companies that tried to cut their workforce with AI often ended up with unhappy customers, increased churn, and rising hidden costs.
Klarna’s story is a case in point. After replacing 700 employees with AI, the fintech giant behind the buy-now-pay-later platform, found itself rehiring humans just two years later. Like other findings, declining customer satisfaction, performance issues, and increased complaints were just some of their problems.
In a different part of the country, Carnegie Mellon was running an experiment staffing a fake company with fake AI agents to test their performance in the real-world. It was a disaster. Tasks were incomplete, complex requests ran into issues, and agents routinely misinterpreted conversations. The conclusion was simple. When companies prioritize replacement over empowerment, they inevitably run into critical failures. Watch out for some of the biggest pitfalls:
Losing customer trust. Customers are smart. They know when they’re talking to a bot that can’t understand nuance, and they feel devalued when they can't reach a human for a complex issue. Trust is hard-won and easily lost.
Losing institutional knowledge. When you let go of experienced agents, you lose more than just headcount. You lose their deep product knowledge, their understanding of your customers, and their ability to solve novel problems—things no large language model can replicate.
Agent burnout. The agents who remain are left to clean up AI’s messes, handling only the most escalated, frustrating customer issues. This leads to burnout, high turnover, and a toxic work environment.
"While agents may be used to accelerate some portion of the tasks that human workers are doing, they are likely not a replacement for all tasks at the moment," said Graham Neubig, a computer science professor at CMU and one of the study's authors.
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What Gartner’s findings mean for the future of CX
Gartner’s report signals a broader industry shift–– businesses are realizing that technology designed solely to cut costs often compromises customer satisfaction. Instead, sustainable growth relies on a thoughtful balance of human insight and AI efficiency.
The model at Gladly is designed to solve these exact problems. Our Customer AI ensures agents have full context and real-time insights, so they have all the information they need instead of reading from a script.
Our innovations such as unified customer timelines, integrated AI workflows, and context-rich agent experiences enable human agents to engage more deeply, quickly, and meaningfully.
For organizations reconsidering their AI strategy, the following steps offer a practical, people-centered way forward—strategies that Gladly was built on.
5 tips for using AI right this time
1. Redo your AI strategy. Ask the hard question. Is your technology designed to help your agents, or to make them obsolete? The goal should be to reduce agent effort, not agent headcount.
2. Redefine the AI role. Clearly position AI as a supportive tool designed to empower agents. At Gladly, AI handles repetitive tasks, freeing agents to focus on complex, relationship-driven engagements.
3. Invest in your AI. Your AI should go beyond simply completing tasks. It needs to give you intelligent context around your customer while feeling seamless and natural.
4. Blend channels seamlessly. Customers today move fluidly between communication channels. AI should seamlessly integrate conversations across voice, messaging, chat, and email into a single cohesive thread.
5. Prioritize continuous learning. Continuously refine AI performance through agent feedback and customer insights, ensuring the technology grows more emotionally intelligent over time.
AI as an empowering force
The true power of AI is in its ability to amplify human talent. As the customer experience industry moves forward, businesses must rethink their AI strategies. AI technology is incredibly powerful, but its real potential lies in enhancing human capabilities, not replacing them.
AI that works for you doesn’t just present data, it provides intelligence. It frees the agent to do what humans do best. Listen with empathy, build rapport, and provide a truly personal resolution. The result isn't just a closed ticket; it's a strengthened customer relationship. This is how you become radically personal and radically efficient.
This isn't a futuristic vision; it's what our customers are achieving today.
Ready to apply Gartner’s findings and explore AI solutions that empower rather than replace your team? Connect with Gladly today to transform your customer experience.
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