Monthly Research Recap | April 2026

Posted on May 1, 2026May 1, 2026 by 3Sixty Insights Editorial Team

Upcoming Events: PrismHR Live 2026 | June 14 – 16th, 2026 PrismHR LIVE brings together HR service providers, PEOs, payroll organizations, and HCM technology leaders for a focused exchange on workforce management, compliance, benefits administration, and platform innovation. Representing 3Sixty Insights, Dylan Teggart will be on site engaging with industry leaders, participating in key discussions, and capturing insights that reflect where the market is heading, making this a valuable opportunity for both learning and meaningful connection across the HR services ecosystem. Recent Research: Benchmark Report: State of HR Compliance 2026 – Benchmark Findings on Confidence, Complexity, and the AI Effect The State of HR Compliance 2026 Benchmark Report examines how organizations are navigating an increasingly complex compliance landscape shaped by regulatory change, workforce evolution, and […]

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Benchmark Report: State of HR Compliance 2026 – Benchmark Findings on Confidence, Complexity, and the AI Effect

Posted on April 29, 2026April 29, 2026 by Dylan Teggart

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Across a survey of 500 U.S. professionals involved in HR and HR-related decision-making, organizations report strong confidence in their ability to manage HR compliance. Nearly three-quarters of respondents say they’re satisfied with how well their organization stays on top of compliance requirements, and overall sentiment regarding HR performance and organizational health remains positive. Still, this confidence masks a growing tension. Over the past two years, more than half of respondents (71%) say their HR compliance needs have increased, and nearly one in four report that keeping up with compliance has become harder. This disconnect between perceived readiness and rising complexity reflects a familiar risk management challenge. Organizations are effectively managing the compliance issues they can see, while new risks emerge in less visible […]

The Quiet Death of the SDR: Why Some GTM Teams Are Letting Marketing Reclaim the Pipeline

Posted on April 27, 2026April 27, 2026 by Kyle James

The Signal People buy from people they trust. That’s not new. What is changing is when that trust gets built, and who is responsible for creating it. In a growing number of go-to-market teams, that responsibility is shifting earlier in the process. Not to sales, but to marketing. The SDR function is not disappearing overnight. In many organizations, it remains a critical part of the revenue engine. But in a specific and increasing subset of companies, we are seeing something more subtle unfold. The work SDRs used to do is being absorbed. Not eliminated, not replaced, but absorbed into marketing. And in that shift, ownership of the early pipeline begins to move with it. Why This Is Happening Now This shift does not come from a single decision. It is the result of several pressures converging at […]

The Hamster Wheel of Reorganization: Why Solution Providers Are Struggling to Win

Posted on April 22, 2026April 22, 2026 by Nicholas Biron

In today’s software and technology landscape, one question continues to surface in our conversations with vendors and service providers: who is truly winning? Historically, this was a relatively straightforward question to answer. There were always clear market leaders, organizations that consistently differentiated themselves through sharp strategy, compelling messaging, and disciplined execution. Over the past 12 to 24 months, however, that answer has become increasingly difficult. Outside of a handful of pure-play AI organizations, infrastructure leaders and a small handful of solution providers, the market is no longer defined by clear breakout winners. Instead, many providers appear to be locked in a competitive stalemate, winning their share of business but failing to establish sustained momentum. At 3Sixty Insights, we believe one of the most significant contributors […]

Anatomy of a Decision: When Marketing Owns the Pipeline – How Fuel50 Rebuilt Its Go-to-Market Operating Model

Posted on April 22, 2026April 22, 2026 by Kyle James

From Alignment to Elimination For years, B2B companies have tried to solve the same problem: how to get sales and marketing aligned. Fifteen years ago, when I was at HubSpot, we called it smarketing. Weekly meetings, shared definitions, handoff agreements. The goal was straightforward. If both teams could operate against the same metrics and communicate consistently, the system would perform better. And in many cases, it did. But even at its best, alignment still assumes something fundamental. It assumes that sales and marketing are separate functions, coordinating across a boundary. Leads are generated, qualified, and then passed from one team to another. What if that boundary is the problem? That is the question Fuel50 has answered, not through theory, but through how they operate. Continue […]

The Growing Gap Between Vendor Messaging and Organizational Reality

Posted on April 21, 2026April 21, 2026 by Nicholas Biron

At 3Sixty Insights, we have a dedicated practice focused on HR, Benefits, and Payroll. Over the past several years, we have seen a clear shift in how organizations in this space position themselves in the market. The messaging has evolved beyond helping companies become more effective and efficient, expanding into themes centered on improving employee experience and building stronger workplace cultures. Conceptually, this evolution makes sense. There is no shortage of research supporting the idea that engaged and satisfied employees are more productive and contribute more meaningfully to organizational success. It is a logical progression in messaging, and one that resonates with buyers. However, over time, I have found myself increasingly questioning whether some of these organizations are truly operating in alignment with what they […]

Case Study: Turning Time & Attendance into a Strategic Asset

Posted on April 8, 2026April 8, 2026 by Nicole Roberts

What You Need to Know Mergers and acquisitions are a powerful growth strategy, particularly from a workforce perspective. Acquiring an established business allows a parent company to inherit an experienced workforce in a new territory rather than building one from scratch. Yet acquisitions also introduce significant complexity. Policies differ. Pay structures vary. Benefits and scheduling practices may conflict. Long-tenured employees who have earned preferred schedules or enhanced vacation accruals can suddenly feel penalized for circumstances outside their control, putting retention and morale at risk during a critical transition period. Many organizations approach this challenge by rapidly standardizing policies across locations. While consistency can support fairness and compliance, moving too quickly can erode trust and disrupt the employee experience. The organization featured in this case study […]

Why Some Restaurants Win and Others Struggle

Posted on April 2, 2026April 2, 2026 by Nicholas Biron

For the better part of the last decade, Wednesdays have followed a simple pattern in my household. Somewhere between the workday winding down and the week feeling just long enough, my family and I head out to dinner. It is not a special occasion, not a celebration, just a routine. And over time, that routine has turned into something more valuable than I expected. It has become a lens into the restaurant industry at its most honest point. Wednesday is not a peak night. There are no built-in excuses. No surge of weekend traffic to mask operational issues. What you see on a Wednesday evening is, more often than not, the reality of a restaurant’s performance. What stands out is how stark the contrast has […]

Monthly Research Recap | March 2026

Posted on April 1, 2026March 31, 2026 by 3Sixty Insights Editorial Team

Recent Research: Research Agenda: Bridging Leadership and Labor – 3Sixty Insights’ 2026 Combined Workforce Agenda This Combined Workforce Agenda outlines the key research priorities for 2026 from 3Sixty Insights, focusing on how organizations can bridge leadership strategy and employee experience in the modern workplace. The agenda integrates perspectives from two analysts — Nicole Roberts and Dylan Teggart — each with complementary emphases on organizational leadership capability, workforce strategy, labor market dynamics, and technology-enabled work execution. Analyst Insight: California Labor Laws and Compliance: Burden, Benchmark, or Competitive Advantage? This Analyst Insight examines the widely held perception that California’s labor laws make the state unusually difficult for businesses to operate in. While the analysis finds that California does impose more complex compliance requirements than most U.S. states, […]

Why AI Governance Requires Narrative Alignment

Posted on March 30, 2026March 30, 2026 by Kyle James

A Simple Example That Isn’t So Simple Pulling on another thread from Conga Connect 2026, one of the more interesting conversations I had during the week was with Geoff Webb, VP Product and Portfolio Marketing at Conga. While much of the event focused on pricing, workflows, and AI embedded into revenue systems, our discussion kept circling a deceptively simple example that revealed a much larger issue. We started talking about NDAs. Not complex contracts or pricing strategy. Just NDAs. As Geoff pointed out, these are among the most common documents in any deal process, and yet they regularly slow things down. A rep sends one over, legal reviews it, questions come back, revisions happen, and what should be routine turns into delay. This is exactly […]

Market Alert: Inside Conga’s Purple Pivot – A B2B Rebrand Done Right

Posted on March 17, 2026March 17, 2026 by Kyle James

I was at Conga Connect 2026 last week and had the chance to witness something you don’t see very often in B2B technology. A brand redesign revealed live to customers. Not teased on social media. Not rolled out quietly through a press release. But introduced directly from the keynote stage to the people who use the platform every day. I had heard some hints that a brand update might be coming, but like everyone else in the room, I got to see how it unfolded in real time. And looking back, the clues were there from the beginning. Before the keynote even started, something felt slightly off as I walked through the venue. Customers wore the standard conference badges, but Conga employees throughout the event […]

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Research Agenda: Bridging Leadership and Labor – 3Sixty Insights’ 2026 Combined Workforce Agenda

Posted on March 17, 2026March 26, 2026 by Dylan Teggart

The future of work is no longer a theoretical concept touching artificial intelligence, remote work or skills transformation. Instead, it has become an operational reality at a time when managers are stretched beyond capacity, employee engagement is declining, compliance complexity is growing, labor markets are leaning toward employers even as companies struggle to find talent, and technology systems are expanding faster than organizations can implement governance. Across industries, leaders recognize that their primary challenge is not adopting new tools, but learning how to operate differently. The next phase of workforce transformation is defined less by innovation itself than by execution—how organizations translate technology, strategy and people practices into measurable outcomes. Research emerging from 3Sixty Insights, informed by the work of analysts Nicole Roberts and Dylan […]

Three Signals About the Future of Revenue Execution from Conga Connect 2026

Posted on March 16, 2026March 23, 2026 by Kyle James

I spent this past week at Conga Connect 2026, speaking with customers, executives, and operators across the revenue ecosystem. The brand reveal will likely be the moment most attendees remember from the event. I covered that story separately. But in conversations with operators and revenue leaders throughout the week, a different set of signals stood out. They all pointed to the same underlying challenge: revenue teams are still struggling with friction inside the deal process. During the opening session, Conga CMO Celia Fleischaker shared several statistics that framed the scale of the problem. Only 8% of organizations report strong confidence in their pricing decisions. 45% say they lose deals due to slow quote approvals. 72% report that slow contracting increases risk and compliance exposure. […]

Infographic: How One Company Rebuilt a Fragile SDR Engine with Apollo.io

Posted on March 12, 2026March 12, 2026 by Kyle James

This 3Sixty Insights infographic examines how one organization rebuilt a fragile SDR engine after realizing that its outbound motion had become overly dependent on email and weighed down by a costly “Franken-stack” of tools such as ZoomInfo, Groove, and Gong. What began as an attempt to fix declining email deliverability quickly evolved into a broader transformation, as the company consolidated data, engagement, and automation into a single sales operating environment with Apollo.io. The shift eliminated tool-hopping and manual list management, allowing SDRs to spend significantly more time on calls and active selling. The result was a step-function improvement in performance, including an 80 percent reduction in technology spend, a 95 percent increase in daily activities, and a threefold increase in pipeline generation.

Infographic: 3x Pipeline, 80% Lower Costs – Rethinking the Modern Sales Stack

Posted on March 11, 2026March 11, 2026 by Kyle James

This infographic, based on analysis from Kyle James, examines the hidden cost of the typical “Franken-stack” sales environment where multiple disconnected tools handle data, engagement, calling, and analytics. This fragmentation creates a significant productivity drain as teams spend hours each week shuffling data and managing integrations rather than building customer relationships. The analysis highlights how a unified platform approach, exemplified by Apollo, can eliminate these seams by consolidating workflows and applying AI to handle the mechanical aspects of outreach while sellers focus on judgment and personalization. The result is a leaner revenue engine capable of generating up to 3x more pipeline, reducing overlapping technology costs by nearly 80%, and dramatically improving productivity.

The Web Is Forking Again

Posted on March 9, 2026March 9, 2026 by Kyle James

Last week I wrote that SaaS isn’t dying. It’s being sorted. Thin workflow tools are under pressure, systems of record are becoming infrastructure, and the era of easy multiple expansion is behind us. That conversation was about repricing. This one is about rewiring. Underneath the market volatility, the internet itself is quietly adapting to a new kind of client. And if you zoom out far enough, the pattern looks familiar. When mobile arrived, the web did not disappear. It evolved. The same underlying systems and content still existed, but they were redesigned to render differently depending on the device. Responsive design and mobile-first frameworks did not replace the desktop web; they standardized it for a second client. Companies that recognized that shift early rebuilt their interfaces accordingly and captured the next wave of growth. We […]

#HRTechChat: David Edwards on the “Last Mile” from Data to Decisions

Posted on March 5, 2026March 4, 2026 by Nicole Roberts

In this episode of #HRTechChat, Nicole Roberts (Senior Analyst & Advisor, 3Sixty Insights) is joined by David Edwards—strategic workforce planning practitioner, advisor, and author of The Strategic Workforce Planning Handbook—for a candid conversation about the gap between SWP theory and the messy reality of execution. David explains why strategic workforce planning still suffers from an identity crisis (too many definitions, too many expectations), and why organizations keep getting trapped in short-term thinking that freezes out long-term capability building. Together, they unpack why chasing “perfect data” can be just as risky as oversimplifying, and why the real skill leaders need—especially as AI accelerates planning inputs—is judgment: knowing what’s decision-grade, what matters most, and what to do next. The conversation also tackles the evolving role of managers, […]

#HRTechChat: Aman Kaur-Shaik on Why AI Adoption in HR Starts with Knowledge, Data, and Culture

Posted on March 4, 2026March 26, 2026 by Dylan Teggart

In this episode of #HRTechChat, Dylan Teggart speaks with Aman Kaur-Shaik—HR Director at Nutrien, member of the 3SixtyInsights Global Executive Advisory Council, and a 2024 Global Top 100 HR Executive—about what it really takes for organizations to adopt AI successfully. Aman explains why the biggest barrier to AI adoption isn’t the technology itself, but the environment organizations have built around it. From fragmented knowledge bases and outdated policies to inconsistent data and unclear guardrails, many HR teams are trying to layer advanced AI tools on top of systems that were never designed for them. Together, they explore why the hype around AI is beginning to settle, how HR leaders can move from experimentation to practical adoption, and why starting with strong knowledge management and data […]

Monthly Research Recap | February 2026

Posted on March 2, 2026February 26, 2026 by 3Sixty Insights Editorial Team

Recent Research: Research Agenda: Workforce Strategy, HR Enablement & HR Technology in an AI-Augmented World Nicole Roberts’ research agenda examines how workforce strategy, HR enablement, and HR technology are evolving as AI and automation reshape how work is performed and managed. The research focuses on enabling managers to lead effectively at scale, connecting skills and leadership capability to measurable business outcomes, designing HR–IT technology ecosystems that support AI-augmented work, navigating workforce transitions such as M&A and restructuring, and improving how organizations measure workforce performance to inform executive decision making. Grounded in practitioner experience and real-world case examples, the agenda emphasizes translating workforce data, technology investments, and workflow design into clearer decisions, stronger execution, and sustainable organizational capacity. Analyst Insight: Beyond Contact Data – How Apollo.io […]

SaaS Isn’t Dead. It’s Growing Up.

Posted on March 2, 2026March 9, 2026 by Kyle James

I was super early at HubSpot, a first one hundred employee. I watched the company go public. I used some of the gains from that IPO to put a down payment on my house. It was one of those rare moments where a long bet actually paid off in a tangible way. A year ago, HubSpot was trading above $800 a share. Today it sits in the low $200s. That is a decline of more than 70 percent in roughly twelve months. And it is not alone. Across B2B SaaS, billions in market cap have evaporated. Multiples have compressed. Growth stocks have been punished. The easiest narrative is that SaaS is dead and AI finished the job. I do not think that is what is happening. What we are seeing feels much more like SaaS growing up. The Easy Era […]

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