Workday has announced a strategic partnership with Microsoft aimed at transforming the way companies manage their artificial intelligence (AI) agents. This collaboration combines the Workday Agent System of Record (ASOR) with Microsoft Entra Agent ID to create a seamless and secure experience for managing intelligent agents.
A response to a new business challenge
As AI agents become established in business processes, managing them is becoming a critical issue. How can organisations guarantee their identity, control their access, measure their effectiveness and prevent misuse? Workday and Microsoft aim to answer this question by providing a centralised and transparent view of all agents deployed by companies.
“Our commitment to an open ecosystem is about giving organisations the freedom to build their fleet of AI agents on the platform of their choice, while managing them securely in a single system,” explains Gerrit Kazmaier, President of Product and Technology at Workday.
In practical terms, what does this change?
Thanks to this integration, companies developing agents through Microsoft Azure AI Foundry or Copilot Studio will be able to register them directly in Workday ASOR. Each agent will therefore benefit from:
a verified identity through Microsoft Entra Agent ID,
a tailored business context,
and precise tracking of its usage and added value.
Business leaders will have access to analytics dashboards to measure ROI, monitor adoption and identify the productivity gains generated by agents.
Enhanced human-machine collaboration
Beyond governance and security, this innovation aims to streamline collaboration between humans and agents. One practical example: an employee using a Microsoft Copilot agent to update their career goals will be able to automatically switch to a Workday agent without leaving their work environment. A continuous, secure and contextualised experience.
“With Workday, we give organisations the confidence they need to adopt AI at scale,” says Charles Lamanna, President of Business & Industry Copilot at Microsoft. “This integration gives leaders complete visibility into their AI agent ecosystem and enables them to maximise its value.”
Towards the intelligent enterprise of tomorrow
With this partnership, Workday and Microsoft are laying another foundation stone in building the intelligent enterprise, where humans and agents work hand in hand. The goal: to secure, simplify and amplify the use of AI agents, turning them into genuine drivers of performance and innovation.
source: newsroom.workday.com
