The contact center is ground zero for agentic AI, and most enterprises have an infrastructure gap they haven't fully reckoned with yet. In this episode, Shawn sits down with Brandon Teegen, VP of Solutions at Cresta AI, to explore what happens when AI stops just answering questions and starts taking action on your customers' behalf. They dig into how to build an AI agent strategy before the volume tsunami hits, why the Klarna story is less about a bad decision and more about a missing playbook, what Cresta's "Agent Operating Center" model reveals about the future of human-in-the-loop supervision, and why agent-to-agent interactions will force enterprises to rethink authentication, brand governance, and margin models from the ground up. If you're a CIO or CTO with a contact center in your portfolio, this is the briefing you didn't know you were missing.

What You'll Learn:

• Why the shift from AI answering questions to AI taking actions is the CX infrastructure gap most enterprises aren't prepared for
• How to sequence your contact center automation strategy — internal use cases first, customer-facing second, and why the order matters
• What the Klarna story actually teaches us about AI deployment risk (and why "dip your toe in" beats "flip the switch")
• Why personal AI assistants like Siri and Claude are weeks away from driving 2-3x your current contact center volume — and what to do about it
• How Cresta's Agent Operating Center model redefines the supervisor role when AI agents are handling the floor
• Why agent-to-agent interactions will require entirely new authentication, discount thresholds, and brand governance policies
• How AI agents are becoming an extension of brand identity — and why marketing needs a seat at the contact center table
• What the CFO conversation about AI token costs needs to look like before spend outpaces the savings