Smartsheet Automation Joins a Booming Workflow AI Market

The Question Behind the Question

Asking whether Smartsheet can do automation is really asking something bigger: can the platforms businesses already use replace the manual, repetitive work that eats up the modern workday. The answer for Smartsheet is yes — coverage describes it as having moved well past basic task tracking into a system capable of automating recurring processes like reminder emails and status updates, positioning it as a genuine workflow engine rather than just a spreadsheet-style tracker 1.

That framing matters because Smartsheet isn't operating in a vacuum. It sits within a fast-expanding category of tools — spanning dedicated automation platforms, AI models, and enterprise operations software — all competing to eliminate the tedious administrative tasks that consume employee time.

The Automation Toolbox Keeps Growing

Smartsheet's pitch echoes what has made connector tools like Zapier popular for years: taking mundane, repetitive digital chores — copying data between spreadsheets, sending follow-up emails, shuffling files — off employees' plates by linking together the disparate apps a business already relies on 3. Where Zapier positions itself as a bridge between thousands of separate web applications, Smartsheet's approach is more self-contained, building automation directly into its own project and work-management environment 13. Both reflect the same underlying market pressure: organizations want fewer manual handoffs and more systems that run themselves.

AI is accelerating that shift further. Google's release of the Gemini 3.7 Flash model brings notable improvements in workflow automation and document handling, upgrades expected to make its Spark agent meaningfully more capable of handling everyday chores 2. That signals a broader trend of general-purpose AI models increasingly absorbing the kind of task-automation work that used to require specialized, single-purpose tools.

Consolidation and Enterprise Stakes

Not every player in this space is thriving, however. Relay, an AI-powered workflow automation start-up launched in 2021, has shut down, with its staff moving on to join Google's Chrome team — a reminder that even well-funded automation start-ups face a difficult path competing against large platform incumbents and fast-moving AI labs 4.

At the enterprise level, the stakes go beyond individual productivity tools. Discussions around modernizing Global Business Services point to organizations trying to align intelligent workflow automation with more responsive, modern IT support systems, explicitly aimed at removing operational bottlenecks and lifting overall productivity across large organizations 5.

Why It Matters

Taken together, these developments suggest automation is no longer a niche feature bolted onto project-management software — it's becoming table stakes. Whether through Smartsheet's native automations, Zapier's cross-app connections, Google's increasingly capable AI models, or enterprise-wide GBS strategies, the common thread is a push to strip manual busywork out of daily operations. The Relay shutdown is a signal that this market is also consolidating quickly, rewarding platforms that can embed automation deeply rather than standing alone as single-purpose tools.