# AI automation for business, by team and industry Updated October 2026 We graded 18,796 tasks across 923 occupations for how much of each one AI can do today, then grouped the jobs into 10 business teams and 15 industries. Customer service has the most AI can take on, about 1,126 hours a year per person. Sales has the least, at 790 hours. Hours AI can take on, average office job 918 hours a year per full-time person Share of a working year 46% of 2,000 working hours Teams and industries ranked 25 10 teams, 15 industries ## Teams by AI opportunity Ranked by the share of a working year AI can take on per person. Customer service leads at 56%, sales trails at 40%. 1. [Customer service, 1,126 hours a year per person, exposure 66 of 100, share of a working year **56%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/customer-service/) 2. [Finance and accounting, 1,030 hours a year per person, exposure 60 of 100, share of a working year **52%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/finance/) 3. [Data and analytics, 1,016 hours a year per person, exposure 64 of 100, share of a working year **51%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/data-and-analytics/) 4. [HR and recruitment, 976 hours a year per person, exposure 58 of 100, share of a working year **49%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/hr/) 5. [Procurement and supply chain, 952 hours a year per person, exposure 53 of 100, share of a working year **48%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/procurement/) 6. [Marketing and content, 932 hours a year per person, exposure 59 of 100, share of a working year **47%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/marketing/) 7. [Operations and admin, 912 hours a year per person, exposure 55 of 100, share of a working year **46%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/operations/) 8. [Legal and compliance, 898 hours a year per person, exposure 53 of 100, share of a working year **45%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/legal-and-compliance/) 9. [IT and software, 892 hours a year per person, exposure 58 of 100, share of a working year **45%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/it/) 10. [Sales, 790 hours a year per person, exposure 51 of 100, share of a working year **40%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/sales/) ## Industries by AI opportunity The same ranking for 15 industries, from the mix of roles each one employs. Finance and insurance lead at 49%. [All industries](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/). 1. [Finance and insurance, 977 hours a year per person, exposure 58 of 100, share of a working year **49%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/finance-and-insurance/) 2. [Accounting, consulting and advertising, 919 hours a year per person, exposure 56 of 100, share of a working year **46%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/professional-services/) 3. [Software and IT services, 918 hours a year per person, exposure 58 of 100, share of a working year **46%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/software-companies/) 4. [Legal services, 898 hours a year per person, exposure 53 of 100, share of a working year **45%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/law-firms/) 5. [Media and publishing, 811 hours a year per person, exposure 51 of 100, share of a working year **41%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/media/) 6. [Telecommunications, 784 hours a year per person, exposure 49 of 100, share of a working year **39%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/telecoms/) 7. [Real estate, 744 hours a year per person, exposure 44 of 100, share of a working year **37%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/real-estate/) 8. [Government, 690 hours a year per person, exposure 41 of 100, share of a working year **35%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/government/) 9. [Education, 681 hours a year per person, exposure 43 of 100, share of a working year **34%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/education/) 10. [Healthcare, 657 hours a year per person, exposure 38 of 100, share of a working year **33%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/healthcare/) 11. [Retail, 655 hours a year per person, exposure 41 of 100, share of a working year **33%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/retail/) 12. [Manufacturing, 621 hours a year per person, exposure 35 of 100, share of a working year **31%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/manufacturing/) 13. [Gambling and gaming, 555 hours a year per person, exposure 34 of 100, share of a working year **28%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/gaming-and-gambling/) 14. [Transportation and warehousing, 551 hours a year per person, exposure 31 of 100, share of a working year **28%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/logistics/) 15. [Hospitality and food service, 457 hours a year per person, exposure 28 of 100, share of a working year **23%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/hospitality/) ## How we rank Each task in each job gets a score for how much of its time AI can remove today, and a team's figure weights every job by how many people do it in the US. Hours are that share of a 2,000-hour working year. [Read the full methodology](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-exposure/methodology/), or see [the score for any job](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-exposure/). ## Adoption path Three steps, in this order, for any team. Each team page names the tasks that fit each step. 1. ### Quick wins Give each team an approved AI assistant and a written policy on what data it may see. People keep doing the work, faster. [AI governance](https://www.aigentcy.com/services/ai-governance/) 2. ### Workflow automation Automate the high-volume tasks AI can do end to end, such as data entry, matching and routing, and send the exceptions to a person. Customer service has the most to automate: 1,126 hours a year per person. [Process automation](https://www.aigentcy.com/services/process-automation/) 3. ### Agents Hand whole workflows to agents that work across your systems, with a person approving what they produce. [Private AI](https://www.aigentcy.com/services/private-ai/) ## Questions about AI automation for business Which teams should we automate first? Start where AI can take on the most hours per person. That is customer service (1,126 hours a year), finance and accounting (1,030 hours a year) and data and analytics (1,016 hours a year). Each team's page lists the 15 tasks that give back the most time. How much time can AI automation save a small business? Across the 10 office teams on this page, weighted by how many people work in each, AI can take on about 918 hours a year per full-time person, 46% of a working year. A business of 20 office staff has about 18,360 hours a year to win back. Which industries are most exposed to AI? Finance and insurance (58 of 100), software and IT services (58 of 100) and accounting, consulting and advertising (56 of 100) score highest, because more of their staff do office work AI can take on. Hospitality and food service score lowest, at 28, because more of the work is physical or face to face. How is this different from the AI exposure scores for jobs? The job scores answer how much of one job AI can do. These pages add up those scores across the roles in a team or an industry, weighted by how many people do each job, and rank the tasks by the hours AI can take on across the whole team. ## Next steps ### Find the tasks to automate first in your team We map the tasks in your teams, score each one the way these pages do and build the automations that pay back first. [Book an AI audit](https://www.aigentcy.com/audit/) Occupation data from the O\*NET 30.3 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and modified by Aigentcy. O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. Wage, employment and projection data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. EU occupation names from ESCO, European Commission. AI usage signals from the Anthropic Economic Index (CC BY) and Microsoft Research (CC BY 4.0). [Methodology and sources](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-exposure/methodology/). Scores © Aigentcy. Quote them with a link to the page.