ServiceNow integrates the generative AI of OpenAI

Punctually, like every six months, a new version of ServiceNow arrives, a platform for managing digital workflows. The main innovations concern the introduction of generative AI, which will make it easier to automate workflows. Not only that: a new workflow, Finance, and Supply Chain have been introduced, also with artificial intelligence features.

The platform news presented at ServiceNow Knowledge 2023 

Artificial intelligence is at the heart of the new version of the ServiceNow platform. The multinational has in fact entered into a partnership with Microsoft to integrate the OpenAI and Microsoft OpenAI APIs. This collaboration resulted in two new features:  ServiceNow Generative AI Controller, to connect ServiceNow instances to OpenAI and Microsoft Azure OpenAI Now. Assist for Search, on the other hand, allows you to use generative AI in Portal Search, Next Experience, and Virtual Agent.

As Filippo Giannelli, Country Manager for Italy of ServiceNow explains to us, the AI ​​" is perfectly integrated into business processes " and will allow " to chat in natural language with a virtual agent [as happens with ChatGPT to understand, Editor's note]. A programmer can ask how a process is going, with questions like "which steps take certain days to complete ." Once these steps are identified, generative AI can be used to write the code needed for optimization. "A user, on the other hand, can review the business process according to his needs", continues Giannelli. 

As mentioned, at the moment the OpenAI AI algorithms have been integrated, but what will happen in the future? Is it also planned to be open to Google or other technologies? According to Giannelli, the technology will be irrelevant because " the point is to open the platform and allow it to be ready for innovation. We are not interested in what technology will be adopted, but how it can be applied to processes ".

Manage cloud complexity with AI from OpenAI

Some of the new features are aimed at site reliability and engineering teams, who will now have easier access to Lightstep's observability, tracking, and log statistics thanks to ServiceNow Cloud Observability enhancements.
All of this information will be brought together within a single dashboard designed to link information and actions across the tools, people, and processes involved.

Here comes a new workflow

The ServiceNow platform has been updated with two new workflows,  Finance and Supply Chain, designed to help businesses manage finance, vendors, and the procurement of products and services. 
The workflow connects to the company ERP and, also in this case, is enriched by artificial intelligence features, in this case non-generative, but designed to automate some processes through RPA (Robotic Process Automation) and help workers extract value from data in their possession.

ServiceNow and training

"We announced a major partnership with LinkedIn to train approximately 200,000 people on ServiceNow,” says Giannelli." The goal is to train them and give them a job. It falls under the RiseUP global initiative to train 1 million consultants ".

RiseUP is ServiceNow's program for worker reskilling and upskilling. The novelty, in this case, is that now the program is also open to the courses of the company's partners. Inevitably, given the close collaboration with Microsoft, the first ones that will be available will be precisely those of the Redmond giant. 

AI has also been integrated into this program and will be used within  New Employee Growth and Development to help people choose their own learning path depending on their business function and career plans. 

ServiceNow.org, a version of the platform dedicated to non-profits

Servicenow.org is a version of the ServiceNow platform designed for the needs of non-profit organizations, which includes specific features to manage emergency situations, such as refugee resettlement, management of crisis support volunteers, and dedicated call centers to these delicate situations.