Beyond Comfort Zones: Where Human Magic Meets AI Innovation in Pega's 2025 Vision

I feel so energized by our first Regional Kick Off of 2025, celebrating our achievements of 2024 and the start of what promises to be another ground-breaking year for Pega and the clients who entrust us with their business.

Pega’s GenAI-powered technology continues to grow in power and impact. Since the launch of GenAI Blueprint in March of last year, there have been enhancements released every week that continue to revolutionize the way our clients design and develop enterprise applications. And this year, we will equip our clients with even more amazing technology that will reduce the time and effort required to bring world-class experiences to their employees and customers. Our Chief Product Officer Kerim Akgonul ignited the crowd sharing incredible new capabilities we are adding to our portfolio, and inviting our of our best Account Executives Jen O. on stage for a real demo, we all experienced first hand, and it was fun to see them playing basketball while making key points on our key differentiators in technology.

As I reflect on everything that’s changed over the past year, and everything that’s coming in 2025, I think it’s important that we don’t lose sight of the human element that will be the difference between simply surviving amidst the changes or thriving in the opportunities they present.

Comfort and growth do not coexist

Under the theme of “Ready, Set, Grow,” we asked our audience of Pega and Partner sellers to leave their comfort zone and enter the challenge zone, where collaboration, growth and greater sales success are waiting.

Your comfort zone, as explained by Jackie McKinley Head of Americas Sales during her fabulous keynote, “is the biggest obstacle standing between you and extraordinary sales success.” As our sellers embark on mastering Pega’s latest AI innovations, she urged us to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. She wasted no time giving us a taste of how that feels, and how amazingly empowering it is once you embrace it.

The entire audience was treated to a surprise line dancing lesson in the middle of Jackie’s keynote address. In case you haven’t two stepped and shuffled in front of 700+ people in your business casual, believe me when I say you could feel the discomfort oozing from every direction. And while some people would like to quickly forget this ever happened, I’m willing to bet they won’t. Because Jackie created a highly memorable, immersive experience, which is exactly what the best salespeople do.

When virtual and asynchronous communication are so commonplace, we can get comfortable having a screen to protect us from the risks of face-to-face experiential selling. But as the saying goes, with great risk comes great reward.

Mastering the experiential sale with emotional intelligence

Pega is in the business of enterprise workflow and decisioning software, powering many of the world’s largest banks, telecommunications companies, government agencies, and healthcare providers. These are complex organizations that are servicing millions of customers in often high-stakes interactions. Their c-suites certainly aren’t asking a chatbot to make their purchasing decisions. And while GenAI tools expedite data gathering and content creation like never before, selling in the AI era can’t ignore that humans are emotional beings who make emotional decisions. Prioritizing, nurturing, and growing in that mindset will empower us to respond rather than react and differentiate us as we go to market.

As our Chief of Clients and Markets, Leon Trefler says, we are in the middle of an “AI tornado.” The promises of what GenAI can do are coming fast and furious. Pega’s GenAI Blueprint has made it faster and easier than ever before for our clients to experience what Pega can do for their business.

Even so, the experiential sale requires a level of critical thinking, engagement, and empathy that AI can’t replicate. Investing time, energy, and focus here will create our human foundations for success. As John Higgins Chief of Clients and Partners Success said, we have to be able to tap into what matters most to a client and their customers in order to make the experiential sale meaningful – showing them how we orchestrate AI agents in a way that solves their most complex challenges. ?There’s no magic, just a trusted center-out architecture that brings the governance and security that our clients rely on to run their business.

Supercharging our function and performance

Amid our magic tools and technology, the simple truth is this. Human potential shapes our Pega magic. Our 2025 Manager’s Meeting focused on the human side of our business. Leaders learned how to coach to strengths and look for moments of greatness in themselves, their peers, and every member of their team because this is what we want more of as we look ahead.

We explored how #GrowthMindset, intention, attention, and emotional intelligence ignite individual and collective potential. Our Leadership team was delighted by a super engaging and memorable session led by our stellar coaches Cole Baker-Bagwell and Thomas Payne, MAPP, ACC . Our leaders said yes to their own growth, and they embraced discomfort. They turned off their devices, engaged with presence, and felt the energy created by human connection. They learned and supported one another in peer-to-peer discussions, group discussions, and play that surfaced creativity and deeper thinking. They left with the awareness that human potential creates Pega magic. And, by working to our strengths as One Pega, we will supercharge our human potential, team function and performance in 2025.

The power of experiential, in-person learning

To help our sellers master experiential sales, our enablement and effectiveness teams created innovative learning experiences at RKO. Over the course of the three-day event, we took advantage of being together in person to deliver engaging workshops and hands-on labs, where our sellers put themselves in the shoes of our clients and their customers, I'll tell you more about these sessions in my next blog...stay tuned!

We were delighted to have almost 100 sellers from the ecosystem of Pega Partners join us this year. They too are embarking on a growth journey alongside Pega, learning new skills that will make selling and delivering Pega easier and faster.

When asked about the value of coming to the event, Joseph Walsh from Virtusa explained that RKO is “essentially, the best vehicle for partners to get excited about what’s going on at Pega, validate their choice about where they spend their time, and validate that Pega continues to be a thought leader in technology and changing people’s lives.”

There was a sense of urgency in the air – not out of panic or fear but from an understanding that the pace of change in the software industry has never been faster. The message was clear: we won’t rest on our laurels. We must continue to push ourselves and lean into what I would argue is the most important characteristic of an AI-driven company: continuously learning and adapting.

As John Higgins put it, “AI is not only core to what we sell, but how we operate.”

We are making data-driven decisions, learning as we go, and utilizing the latest and greatest technology to not only improve our skills but also continuously improve our clients’ experience.

I’m incredibly proud of the team for executing another top-notch experience. We will embrace the challenge zone, and we can’t wait to do it again in Madrid with our EMEA and APJ teams!

Many incredible people participated to lift this amazing experience, with their expertise and passion, from content creation to delivery, to planning and solving onsite every challenge with agility, confidence and a great smile! I may miss someone here, so feel free to tag along :-)

Kerim Akgonul Jen O. Don Schuerman Michael Brenner Cole Baker-Bagwell Thomas Payne, MAPP, ACC Anna Kaiser Ed Chase Sofie Bjorksten, PMP Colleen Pearce Chastity Schobert Colm Daly Damon Lockwood Andrew McGlone Samantha Paquin Jackie McKinley Carly Underwood Smerz, CMP Venessa Azar, CMP Sean Hedenskog Kate Jacobsen Oscar Grobbenhaar Brooke Halloran Denis Lacassagne Luigi Leo Anna Maitland Liz Monroe McCormick Sheena Morett Sandra Nangeroni Chris Nittle Tara Pottebaum Kristine stevens, Rene van der Laan Michael Tocci Jason Wilhelm Chris Young Lisa Mattivi Kylie McCue Rupy Chana Angel C. Max Rodrick Lauren Deignan Jessica Genatossio Matt Healy Clarence Lewis Danielle Tambini, CMP Helen Gallick Deborah Bianculli Keri Burnett Marc Van Baar Michael Box Stacy Wise Tomás Mac Seáin Wasim Khan Robert Bry Wanda Droz Jillian Irizarry Jackie Flynn Carie Whalen Suraj Victor Peter Welburn Laurence Doody Renata Alencar Del Sarto Paul Barnes Baruch Sachs Annette Kerlin Drake Carmody Alaina Herfindal Alec Taylor Evan Braun Christy Wezowicz