Why Flex Credits, internal licenses, and flexible agreements signal a future where work looks very different

Salesforce just dropped some fascinating news about their AI pricing, and even if you're not living in Salesforce Land every day, the implications here are profound for how we all think about work.

At OpenTent, our mission is simple: Make Work Suck Less. And Salesforce's new pricing model points towards a future that could dramatically change what "work" looks like. 

Here's what caught our attention and why it matters...

1. Flex Credits: lower-priced and action-based

"Flex Credits" emphasize action and outcomes rather than conversations and transactions. And they're way cheaper to get started with: $500 for 100,000 actions versus the previous $2 per conversation.

Our take: This is great. We love seeing barriers to entry get lower because it means more organizations can actually start playing around with these tools without needing executive approval for every experiment. (And honestly? We bet it'll get even cheaper next year.)

2. Internal Agentforce: Unlimited AI for Your Team

Internal Agentforce per-user-per-month licenses give companies unlimited use for employees internally. Think of it as giving every team member their own AI assistant without worrying about usage caps.

Our take: This is where it gets really exciting for our "Make Work Suck Less" mission. Getting to deploy Agentforce internally like this could be transformative for how teams actually get stuff done. Despite Salesforce not sharing pricing details yet, we think this will likely be a worthwhile add-on for many of our clients.

3. Flex Agreements!

Here's where it gets mind-bending: "Flex Agreement" means Salesforce customers can easily shift spending between user licenses (humans) and Flex Credits (AI) as they see fit.

Why this is WOAH-level important:

Salesforce is anticipating that workforces are going to start looking very different, very quickly. They're talking with leaders who don't want to commit to annual contracts for user licenses because they're genuinely considering shifting labor to digital resources—as in, AI—within the next 12 months.

Salesforce has historically been notoriously inflexible about changing contracts within an annual term, so this change is both welcome and wise. We live in a "Flex"-y time, after all.

What This Really Means: The Blended Future Is Here

All of this points to a "blended" future with both human and digital labor working together, with resources shifting between the two as leaders figure out their processes and approach. This has been Salesforce's stated goal for a year now, and the pricing finally reflects that vision.

Personally, we think that vision is powerful and exciting.

But Let's Talk About the Feelings (Because Someone Should)

Here's what we're not talking about enough as a field: the emotions around all of this.

Change this significant brings up a LOT of feelings for everyone involved:

• Excitement about possibilities
• Anxiety about job security
• Confusion about where to start
• Overwhelm about keeping up

These feelings are valid and normal. Transformation always comes with complex emotions.

The Reality Check: Most Organizations Aren't Ready

While the vision is compelling, let's be honest about where most organizations actually are right now:

Low data quality: Your AI is only as good as your data

Low user adoption: If people aren't using your current tools well, adding AI won't magically fix that

Low organizational agility: Shifting how work happens requires cultural change, not just new software

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The gap between what's possible and what currently exists feels like it has never been bigger.

So What Do We Do With All This?

At OpenTent, we believe in meeting organizations where they are, not where we wish they were. Here's our advice:

1. Start small and learn: Use those lower-cost Flex Credits to experiment without big commitments
2. Focus on internal use first: Get your team comfortable with AI assistance before deploying it externally
3. Address the fundamentals: Clean up your data and improve user adoption before layering on complexity
4. Have the emotional conversations: Talk openly about what this change means for your team

What Others Are Saying

The Salesforce ecosystem has been buzzing about these changes, and we're not the only ones seeing the bigger picture here. SalesforceBen recently analyzed how the ecosystem is reacting to these pricing changes, and the responses range from cautious optimism to genuine excitement about what this means for AI adoption.

The Bottom Line

Salesforce's pricing changes signal that the future of work is arriving faster than many of us expected. The companies that will thrive are those that thoughtfully blend human creativity with AI efficiency.