Salesforce Loses Its Head of Agentforce: What Happens Now?

Salesforce’s EVP and GM of AI, Adam Evans, has officially announced his departure from the company after two and a half years. For the last year and a half, he has played a pivotal role in the inception and development of Salesforce’s proprietary AI tool, Agentforce. 

This comes after three other Salesforce executives left within three months, sparking conversation over what the future of Agentforce and AI in Salesforce will look like.

Who Is Adam Evans?

Evans joined Salesforce in October 2023 as the company’s SVP of Product on the Salesforce AI Platform. Arguably considered the driving force behind the CRM giant’s push toward agentic AI, Adam led the creation and scaling of Agentforce and allowed Salesforce to promote the positioning of AI not just as automation, but as something that enterprise businesses could use and trust.

Evans was also often seen at some of Salesforce’s largest events, including TrailblazerDX and Dreamforce, providing the community with insights into how Agentforce worked, how businesses could get value from it, and what was coming next.

Yesterday, Evans announced on LinkedIn that he would be stepping down from his position in order to “start [his] next chapter outside Salesforce”.

To those who know Evans’ background, this is perhaps not a surprising move. The former SVP’s career trajectory at Salesforce is tied to two of its earlier startup acquisitions: RelateIQ and Airkit.AI – both of which he co-founded. In fact, he is one of the few founders in tech to sell two companies to the same acquirer and then return to lead that acquirer’s major strategic initiative.

However, Evans’ departure does still raise questions about whether this has any connection to rumored layoffs within the company or the three other senior Salesforce executives who have also recently left.

Four Strikes

Evans’ resignation comes just days after we published a piece on the departure of Ryan Aytay, Brad Arkin, and Denise Dresser, all of whom left within a three-month period. Although the reasons behind these departures don’t point toward anything sinister – given executive churn is to be expected within a company of this scale – this fourth strike throws up more questions than answers.

A Salesforce spokesperson provided further clarification on this, stating that this is part of a wider effort to bring Agentforce and Slack together under the leadership of Joe Inzerillo, the President of Enterprise AI and Technology at Salesforce. 

As Agentforce and Slack have both just had breakout years, Joe, who has already been at the company for a year, is uniquely positioned to help Agentforce and Slackbot scale – an important focus for the CRM giant going forward. 

He will also be working closely with Rob Seaman, the CPO of Slack, as part of this initiative.

For the former SVP/GM, his departure will undoubtedly open more doors for him, especially if he does head back into startups. Expertise within AI – especially at Evans’ level – is still valued at a premium, and there is no doubt that there are several companies now eager to snap up his talent. 

Last month, Forbes reported that compensation for AI employees is “skyrocketing”, with a significant talent shortage boosting the surge. AI roles are also the highest-paid in tech, according to new data from the UK, so compensation outside of Salesforce could very well have been an influential factor.

What Are the Next Steps for Agentforce?

As Salesforce prepares for its next set of earnings results and the end of its 2026 full fiscal year, investors will be looking to see where Salesforce’s priorities lie. AI will evidently remain a crucial pillar within the company’s wider strategy, but what happens now and who will lead the charge?

Salesforce has now confirmed that Madhav Thattai is the new EVP and GM of Agentforce, moving on from his role as COO of Agentforce. He will be building upon his existing knowledge of both the product and customer base, bringing Agentforce to new heights.

Final Thoughts

Madhav undoubtedly has big shoes to fill, even with his experience. As Adam was seen by many as the ‘Head of Agentforce’ and a poignant force behind what has become Salesforce’s brightest, shiniest product, the foundational work has been laid – now, the next steps of the journey lie ahead. 

It will be interesting to see where Adam’s continual pursuit of tech startups takes him, especially as it was startups that brought him to Salesforce in the first place.