The evolution of machines and machine intelligence can be broken down into five epochs:

1. Assist: Hand-powered machines assisted us in leveraging our efforts to do tasks we otherwise would struggle to do with our strength and effort. Think typewriter, the printing press, and so on.

2. Administrate: Computers gave us the power to do knowledge tasks with incredible speed and accuracy. Think proposals, drawings, presentations, and so on.

3. Automate: With some intelligence, the machines could now do many administrative tasks allowing us to focus on our primary function (job). Think email auto-responders, auto-generated proposals, reports, texts, etc.

4. Augment: Intelligent machines can help people find answers faster, retrieve information quickly, and fulfill requests with simple voice or text commands. Think of virtual assistants that can answer questions via text or voice recognition systems that can find the information or content you need.

5. Autonomy: The fifth and final epoch in the evolution of Machine Learning is Autonomy. Here is where AI begins to blur the lines between humans and machines. Here is where the Master Algorithm or the deus ex machina comes in to solve the seemingly unsolvable problem of having a machine truly think AND ACT like a human being.

The 5th-level AI machine will change the world and continue to transform the world of 'modern selling'. With these innovations, or disruptions, come a multitude of questions:

• How will the sales functions be reshaped?
• Who will be impacted?
• How will sales functions be impacted?
• How will the role of the sales manager change?
• What tools are (and will be) available?
• How can you use AI to augment the sales process?
• At what point or in which function is having an autonomous AI possible?
• What applications are available or will be used?
• How will AI be used to help salespeople sell more?
• How will it help them manage their time?
• How will it help them achieve their revenues with more certainty and speed?

The power of selling is moving away from the individual and toward the machine (Sales Ex Machina = Sales from the Machine)—machines that can now prospect, follow-up, present, and propose without human intervention.  In some cases, not all, the machine will obliterate sales functions while in others, it will dramatically shift the locus of focus further into the sales cycle.To adapt to change, we must first seek to understand it. To adapt to AI, we must first seek to understand its short-term and long-term ambitions and how and where we fit in the new digital ecosystem of selling.

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