Dr. Gleb Tsipursky – The Office Whisperer
Nirit Cohen – WorkFutures
Angela Howard – Culture Expert
Drew Jones – Design & Innovation
Jonathan Price – CRE & Flex Expert
Sales organizations are no strangers to pressure. Quotas rise, pipelines tighten, and technology promises to fix everything. But new research suggests a far more human issue is draining performance at scale: generational conflict.
According to a new report from Clari + Salesloft on AI’s impact on sales productivity, uneven AI adoption and deepening divides between age groups are costing U.S. employers an estimated $56 billion in productivity every year.
The findings reveal how tensions over technology, communication styles, and work expectations are translating into burnout, missed opportunities, and stalled revenue growth.
Two Sales Teams Inside One Organization
As AI becomes embedded in daily selling workflows, it is not lifting all boats equally. Instead, the report finds that many organizations now operate with two parallel sales teams: those who actively use AI to move faster and hit quota, and those who barely touch it.
Sales teams stand to gain significantly from AI, but uneven adoption is turning it into a source of division that creates internal friction and weakens overall performance. When deployed intentionally, AI can standardize how work gets done and lift results across the entire team.
This divide is particularly pronounced across generations. Steve Cox, CEO of Clari + Salesloft, points to underutilization as the core issue driving friction across age groups.
“The biggest gap is underutilization. While 64% of employees in revenue-generating roles aren’t using the full capabilities of their AI tools, that number rises to 75% among Baby Boomers,” he explains. “That gap shows up in performance outcomes: 88% of Gen Z respondents report meeting targets, compared to 78% of Boomers.”
The friction comes from how each generation interprets that divide, he said.
Gen Z sees Boomers manually doing tasks that AI could complete in seconds (email sequencing, meeting prep, CRM updates, pipeline analysis) and interprets it as resistance to innovation.
Boomers, meanwhile, see Gen Z leaning too heavily on technology at the expense of relationship-building and strategic judgment.
The $56 Billion Productivity Drain
The financial impact is striking. Generational conflict is costing sales organizations an average of 5.3 hours per seller per week. Applied across the 8.24 million U.S. workers in revenue-facing roles affected by this issue, that time loss adds up to nearly $56 billion annually.
Importantly, that figure reflects time lost to friction, miscommunication, and internal conflict — not deals lost. And even then, it may understate the true impact.
“The $56 billion is the floor, not the ceiling. It doesn’t account for longer sales cycles, late-stage deal slippage, or the compounding cost of losing both high-potential younger talent (28% of whom are actively job hunting) and experienced employees (19% of whom are considering early retirement),” Cox told Allwork.Space.
When Communication Styles Cost Real Money
Beyond hours lost, sales teams are also paying for generational disconnects in lost revenue. More than eight in ten respondents say they have seen deals fall apart because sellers failed to adapt their communication style to customer expectations.
The report points to common scenarios: a senior rep insisting on an in-person close when a buyer prefers Zoom, or a younger seller relying too heavily on digital outreach and missing cues that a relationship-driven conversation is needed.
In both cases, momentum stalls — and opportunities slip away.
Burnout, Resentment, and the Exit Door
The human toll of these tensions is becoming harder to ignore. Generational friction is driving stress and burnout across age groups, with some sellers openly questioning whether they want to keep working together at all.
Thirty-nine percent of Gen Z sellers say they would rather be managed by AI than a Baby Boomer, while 25% of Boomers say they would prefer working with AI over a Gen Z colleague.
Nearly three in ten Gen Z reps are actively searching for a new job to avoid working with Boomers, and 19% of Boomers say frustrations with Gen Z are pushing them toward early retirement.
These trends threaten both ends of the talent pipeline: high-potential younger sellers and experienced veterans with deep institutional knowledge.
Technology as a Battleground
Nowhere is the divide more visible than around technology itself. Sixty percent of Baby Boomers say Gen Z’s tech-first approach is damaging customer relationships. Meanwhile, Gen Z sellers argue the opposite: 64% say Boomer resistance to technology is killing innovation, and 63% believe it is costing them deals.
Underneath these perceptions is a gap in how AI is positioned and supported. Boomers cite poor integration with existing workflows, limited customization, and usability issues as barriers to adoption. But the research suggests framing matters just as much as functionality.
When AI is introduced as a speed upgrade, experienced sellers hear a critique of how they work. When it is framed as a way to remove administrative burden and free time for higher-value judgment and relationships, adoption looks very different.
AI as a Bridge, Not a Wedge
Despite the tension, sellers overwhelmingly believe AI could help close generational gaps — if deployed intentionally. Eighty-six percent say AI can improve knowledge sharing, 80% believe it can help bridge experience gaps, and 79% say it can strengthen cross-generational communication.
According to Cox, three interventions consistently stand out in the data:
- Structured cross-generational learning. Nearly all respondents agree different generations can learn from one another, and most want formal mentoring or skill-sharing arrangements rather than leaving collaboration to chance.
- Using AI as a mediator rather than a replacement. Passive AI tools that capture how experienced sellers navigate complex deals and surface those insights to others can transfer knowledge without forcing cultural change.
- Gradual, supported adoption. High performers are not using different tools — they are using the same tools more fully. Organizations that focus on enablement and role-appropriate adoption see stronger results than those that force universal rollout.
The Floor, Not the Ceiling
The report’s central message is clear: generational conflict in sales is no longer a soft issue. It is a measurable drag on productivity, morale, and revenue. And as AI becomes more deeply embedded in how selling gets done, the cost of getting adoption wrong will only grow.
For sales leaders, the question is whether AI will widen divides or help close them.
