AI supports sales by automating outreach and prospecting but cannot replace the human touch needed for closing deals.
UserGems’ Sara Angell views AI as a complement to human skills, enhancing rather than replacing personal interactions.
Despite AI’s benefits, Angell stresses the importance of human judgment in areas like hiring and sales.
Continuous learning and adapting existing tools with AI can unlock new efficiencies and opportunities.
AI can’t sell like a human can. It can automate outreach, surface prospects, and save hours of manual work. But it still struggles with the one thing that closes deals: genuine human connection.
Sara Angell, Director of Account Development and AI GTM at UserGems, is helping her team navigate the surge in AI adoption without losing the personal touch that drives results. To Angell, AI is fuel, not a stand-in. It’s there to amplify what humans do best, not replace it.
Failing to feel: AI’s value lies in supporting what humans can’t do easily, not imitating what they already do best. “They keep trying, but they keep failing,” says Angell, of attempts to replicate real human connection. “I just don’t see that being the value. I don’t think that’s where AI engineers should be spending their time.” Her philosophy is simple: “What does AI do that humans struggle with? Let’s use AI there. What it cannot replace—and will not replace—is that human connection, that human creativity,” says Angell.
Skeptic turned supporter: That belief is shaped by firsthand experience. Angell didn’t start out excited about AI—she was cautious. “I had to figure out how to work with it and look at it as another tool and stop looking at it as something so foreign,” she says. But as UserGems leaned further into AI, her thinking evolved. “Once I started to really work with it and understand what it was, all of my resistance and kind of fears and anxiety surrounding it went away.”
Goodbye, grunt work: For Angell, that means letting automation handle the heavy lifting—but only the kind that doesn’t need a human touch. Their internal AI agent “does all of the manual prospect work. It finds the accounts, it finds the prospects, it looks for various different buying signals, and then prioritizes,” explains Angell. That shift, she notes, has “saved them all of that time,” freeing her team to focus on what actually moves deals forward: the calls, the emails, the conversations.
New tricks: Constant learning is key, even—or especially—with familiar tools. “The biggest opportunity is to look at the products you’re already using and learn about how AI can augment,” Angell advises. “We’re all kind of old dogs, and we get used to using products in the way that we’re used,” she says. “We can really miss those advantages.” Looking at the old tech stack with fresh eyes makes a world of difference.
Organizing chaos: Beyond team applications, Angell also uses AI for her own varied role, citing “the organization of thoughts” as a major benefit. “I’m all over the place as far as what I’m doing each week,” she says. “I use it to prioritize, it’s really good with that kind of logic,” Angell explains. “It helps me spend my time in the places I should be.” Her personal use mirrors a broader trend where AI is used by business leaders for personal productivity.
Irreplaceable humans: Despite AI’s power, Angell highlights its limits, particularly in areas needing deep human judgment. When hiring for her team, for instance, she states, “I would not trust that to AI. I would not hand the interview process off to AI.” Her reasoning is straightforward: “There’s something in that human interaction. The same goes in sales.”
Quality time: “You’ve got to feed it the right things to expect quality to come back out of it,” Angell advises. “You need to spend some time on it. It’s not magic.” When applied thoughtfully, she adds, “AI can help us do a better job at what we do as humans best. We can do it faster, smarter and with more results.” Angell sees AI not as a cure-all, but as a potent instrument requiring skill.
AI supports sales by automating outreach and prospecting but cannot replace the human touch needed for closing deals.
UserGems’ Sara Angell views AI as a complement to human skills, enhancing rather than replacing personal interactions.
Despite AI’s benefits, Angell stresses the importance of human judgment in areas like hiring and sales.
Continuous learning and adapting existing tools with AI can unlock new efficiencies and opportunities.
UserGems
AI can’t sell like a human can. It can automate outreach, surface prospects, and save hours of manual work. But it still struggles with the one thing that closes deals: genuine human connection.
Sara Angell, Director of Account Development and AI GTM at UserGems, is helping her team navigate the surge in AI adoption without losing the personal touch that drives results. To Angell, AI is fuel, not a stand-in. It’s there to amplify what humans do best, not replace it.
Failing to feel: AI’s value lies in supporting what humans can’t do easily, not imitating what they already do best. “They keep trying, but they keep failing,” says Angell, of attempts to replicate real human connection. “I just don’t see that being the value. I don’t think that’s where AI engineers should be spending their time.” Her philosophy is simple: “What does AI do that humans struggle with? Let’s use AI there. What it cannot replace—and will not replace—is that human connection, that human creativity,” says Angell.
Skeptic turned supporter: That belief is shaped by firsthand experience. Angell didn’t start out excited about AI—she was cautious. “I had to figure out how to work with it and look at it as another tool and stop looking at it as something so foreign,” she says. But as UserGems leaned further into AI, her thinking evolved. “Once I started to really work with it and understand what it was, all of my resistance and kind of fears and anxiety surrounding it went away.”
Goodbye, grunt work: For Angell, that means letting automation handle the heavy lifting—but only the kind that doesn’t need a human touch. Their internal AI agent “does all of the manual prospect work. It finds the accounts, it finds the prospects, it looks for various different buying signals, and then prioritizes,” explains Angell. That shift, she notes, has “saved them all of that time,” freeing her team to focus on what actually moves deals forward: the calls, the emails, the conversations.
UserGems
New tricks: Constant learning is key, even—or especially—with familiar tools. “The biggest opportunity is to look at the products you’re already using and learn about how AI can augment,” Angell advises. “We’re all kind of old dogs, and we get used to using products in the way that we’re used,” she says. “We can really miss those advantages.” Looking at the old tech stack with fresh eyes makes a world of difference.
Organizing chaos: Beyond team applications, Angell also uses AI for her own varied role, citing “the organization of thoughts” as a major benefit. “I’m all over the place as far as what I’m doing each week,” she says. “I use it to prioritize, it’s really good with that kind of logic,” Angell explains. “It helps me spend my time in the places I should be.” Her personal use mirrors a broader trend where AI is used by business leaders for personal productivity.
Irreplaceable humans: Despite AI’s power, Angell highlights its limits, particularly in areas needing deep human judgment. When hiring for her team, for instance, she states, “I would not trust that to AI. I would not hand the interview process off to AI.” Her reasoning is straightforward: “There’s something in that human interaction. The same goes in sales.”
Quality time: “You’ve got to feed it the right things to expect quality to come back out of it,” Angell advises. “You need to spend some time on it. It’s not magic.” When applied thoughtfully, she adds, “AI can help us do a better job at what we do as humans best. We can do it faster, smarter and with more results.” Angell sees AI not as a cure-all, but as a potent instrument requiring skill.
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