(Despite record AI investment)

That’s not a typo.

A Clari survey published last week found that 87% of enterprises missed target last year. If you lead a sales team, that stat should make you uncomfortable.

Because AI spend isn’t the problem.

Investment is at an all-time high. But almost half of companies admit their revenue data still isn’t AI-ready. 57% say AI agents haven’t been fully deployed across revenue ops. And the role most impacted by AI?

Not SDRs.
Not AEs.
Sales leaders.

You’re accountable for the productivity and revenue gains AI promises. But here’s the hard truth - saving time doesn’t close deals.

Time saved ≠ revenue gained.

I’ve seen this play out repeatedly. Teams adopt AI tools, increase email volume, make more calls, and still miss target. Because more activity without relevance is just noise.

Productivity gains help the bottom line.
But they don’t drive top-line growth.

And top-line growth is what sales leaders are measured on.

The real opportunity: do better at scale, not just more

January is the biggest month of the year for senior HR appointments.

So far this month:

• 1,900+ new HR leaders have been hired
• HR decision-makers are being promoted at their highest rate of the year
• Budgets are being reset and mandates rewritten

Now layer in:

• 800+ companies expanding internationally
• 900+ growing headcount significantly
• 150+ that have just raised funding

Each one is a buying signal. Each one is a window for a relevant conversation.

And next month there's going to be thousands more companies entering buying mode.

And most sales teams miss them - not because they’re lazy, but because no human team can track, prioritise, and act on all of this in real time.

These aren’t cold leads. They’re warm moments.

And they expire daily.

Why we built Bernard

Bernard isn’t a generic AI SDR. And to be blunt, you can forget most of the demos you’ve seen in this category.

Bernard is a specialist new business agent for HR. He's turns your sales team into pipeline machines, helping them target at scale based on real-world buying signals.

He’s trained on the realities of selling into HR, backed by a knowledge base covering the benefits and software used by 200,000+ companies.

He:

• Researches the background of every new HR appointment
• Reads millions of suporting job ads and posts in seconds
• Uncovers existing benefits, L&D programmes, HR software providers and employee engagement scores
• Surfaces the insight you need to start the right conversation

One-to-one or at scale.
Always on brand.
Always relevant.

The real question for 2026

If you’re under pressure to hit target this year, ask yourself:

Are you using AI to do more of the same?
Or to do something genuinely better?

Plenty of teams that missed target last year were “investing in AI”. The difference wasn’t whether they invested - it was what they invested in.

Tool choice matters.

The right AI doesn’t just save time. It creates better conversations, with the right people, at the right moment.

If you want to see what this looks like for your business, drop me a message or email clients@honch.co.

We’ll show you how to train Bernard, point him at the right decision-makers, and scale outbound - without losing relevance. 👊