The digital workplace refers to the modern, technology-enabled work environment where employees can collaborate, communicate, and perform tasks remotely or on-site using digital tools and platforms. The digital workplace integrates hardware (such as computers and mobile devices) with communication and collaboration software. The digital workplace can also include office productivity tools such as email, spreadsheets, and document management, as well as managed desktop services to support device management, software upgrades, and the like.
Regardless of the components, team collaboration and communication platforms remain the cornerstone of a digital workplace portfolio. With those platforms increasingly becoming saturated with GenAI and agentic AI, the stage is set for noteworthy developments in 2026.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Access deeper industry intelligence
Experience unmatched clarity with a single platform that combines unique data, AI, and human expertise.
Agentic AI features agents that perform tasks independently on behalf of users. It can adjust its approach based on new information or changing circumstances. Agentic AI can also learn from experience. In 2025, agentic AI supplanted GenAI as the ‘marquee’ technology on team collaboration platforms. However, there is still a lot of runway left, and in 2026, vendors will continue to implement agentic AI capabilities rapidly. The downside is that workers will develop the same ‘love-hate’ relationship with agentic AI that they have had with GenAI, appreciating the productivity benefits while also fearing that their skills will become obsolete.
The rapid ascent of team collaboration platforms in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic drove rounds of ‘feature wars’ with competitors rapidly adding capabilities in a race to have the most robust platform. The latest round came recently with the advent of GenAI and agentic AI. However, cooler heads are beginning to prevail, and a ‘truce’ has been taking hold in the form of interoperability between rival platforms. In 2025, rivals began integrating their platforms to support the multi-platform environment in which their customers operate. In 2026, competitors will open their platforms to even greater degrees, encompassing more functionality while expanding the roster of third-party applications with which their platforms can operate.
In 2026, AI will further empower contact centre agents by accelerating a trend that has been slow to take hold – dissolving boundaries between the contact centre and back-office workers to better serve customers. Those workers consist of subject matter experts whose knowledge can be tapped when and if needed to help resolve customer inquiries. AI agents will be increasingly relied upon to cultivate, analyse, and interpret customer interactions and funnel the details to the subject matter experts so that they can assist. With this mechanism in place, 2026 will be a year of far richer customer experiences.
In a nascent trend, vendors are offering sales support capabilities. The wealth of information gathered on customers and their interactions with an organisation through currently available contact centre capabilities, combined with the ability of AI to mine and analyse that information make tools that generate sales leads and manage the funnel a natural progression. In 2026, look for rivals to quickly expand the volume of sales support features on their platforms.
US Tariffs are shifting - will you react or anticipate?
Don’t let policy changes catch you off guard. Stay proactive with real-time data and expert analysis.
By GlobalDataThe part-time return-to-work policies issued by many companies have made mobility central to team collaboration and communication. Given the need to oscillate between the office and remote locations, workers desire the convenience of a single phone number with the ability to make and receive calls through either their smartphone’s native dialer or desk phone, and enterprises like the efficiency it delivers. In 2026, there will be strong adoption of collaboration solutions that enable workers to communicate seamlessly between mobile and landline devices, as well as pivot between calls and meetings.
