Clutch Report: Employees Are Quietly Building Their Own AI Agents, Most Have Access to Company Data

Washington, D.C. — September 15, 2026 — Clutch, the leading B2B ratings and reviews platform, today released new research on employee-built AI agents. Sixty-four percent of full-time workers surveyed have built their own agent, and 91% of those agents have access to company data, including customer or client records and financial information.

While employee experimentation with AI is growing quickly, oversight may not be keeping pace. Eleven percent of workers say their agent has already exposed or mishandled sensitive information.

“Employees no longer need to be technical experts to build and experiment with AI agents, which means adoption can spread much faster than companies may expect,” said Hannah Hicklen, Clutch analyst. “The opportunity is clear, but businesses need to make sure their safeguards evolve alongside these tools, especially when employees are giving them access to sensitive company and client data.”

Key findings include:

• Low barrier, fast build. 71% built their agent in under a week, and 89% took a fully experimental, learn-as-you-go approach.
• It's not just IT. IT and operations (32%) lead in building agents, followed closely by marketing (29%).
• The payoff is real. 90% say their agent saves them several hours of work weekly, and 80% say it helps them complete tasks faster.
• Client-facing exposure. 88% of employee-built agents are client-facing in some way, raising the stakes when something goes wrong.

The full report is available at Clutch.

About Clutch 

Clutch powers how businesses discover, evaluate, and hire the right B2B service partners. Through verified reviews, structured comparisons, and intelligent matching, Clutch helps business leaders make confident decisions about the expertise they rely on, wherever their search starts. As B2B discovery evolves across marketplaces and AI-driven search, Clutch delivers the credibility signals and visibility that both buyers and providers need to navigate an increasingly complex decision environment. Today, over 400,000 service providers across more than 1,900 categories trust Clutch to connect them with buyers ready to hire.

Media Contact: 

Emily Fulcher
Brand Marketing Manager
press@clutch.co