The future of enterprise service management: Developing agentic AI workflows
Here are three considerations to help in making sure that AI investments today continue to yield long-term value.
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In the neverending quest for B2B organizations to become more efficient, to do more with less, and to realize the absolute most ROI, agentic AI is the next frontier.
Published in Harvard Business Review, economist Mark Purdy provides perhaps one of the most accessible definitions of agentic AI to date: 'Think: AI-powered agents that can plan your next trip overseas and make all the travel arrangements; humanlike bots that act as virtual caregivers for the elderly; or AI-powered supply-chain specialists that can optimize inventories on the fly in response to fluctuations in real-time demand. These are just some of the possibilities opened up by the coming era of agentic AI.'
Purdy's AI-driven future may seem far off, but the fact is agentic AI is already here, and with great implications for the enterprise. Agentic AI is powered by large language models (LLMs) that can automate and make low-level decisions. For B2B organizations, there are immediate benefits to be had from implementing this technology to power workflows within enterprise service management (ESM) across the business, from IT to HR to customer service and beyond.
HOW DOES AGENTIC AI WORK?
Put simply, traditional static workflows are being replaced by agentic AI, which creates dynamically flowing workflows by iterating and adjusting at each step of the process towards a defined outcome. As workflows within an organization's ESM transform from manual to agentic, the tech roadmap follows the general process of building the agents, creating agent-to-agent integration either directly or through the use of model context protocol (MCP), and the agentic AI platform itself.
AGENTIC AI IN ACTION
Once in place, there are several tangible outputs that can be achieved as a result of advancing workflow management within an organization. At a high level, there's an immediate decrease in the quantity of repetitive, low-level manual tasks for members of the IT, HR, finance, and customer service teams, coupled with an immediate increase in the speed at which B2B organizations can deliver responses and solutions to customers, vendors, and employees.
In practice, agents can map customer inquiries to the correct departments and deliver customized responses to customer service agents based on individual queries from specific customers. Internally, agents are able to streamline HR requests like PTO approvals or manage regularly occurring tasks within supply chain management.
Equally as valuable: Agents know what they don't know and can implement intelligent routing to flag urgent or high-level problems to the appropriate (human) individual in the company.
TAKING A 'FUTUREPROOF' APPROACH
We are still at the beginning of this next phase of AI digital transformation, and the decisions made now will impact a company for many years to come. It's critical for B2B organizations to consider both the short-term need and the long-term vision during this process. Band-aid fixes today can become a very costly endeavor over the next decade.
Here are three considerations to help in making sure that AI investments today continue to yield long-term value:
Think Beyond Simple Automation: Streamlining workflows and automating low-level tasks is very quickly becoming table stakes for any organization. These capabilities are must-haves, but only scratch the surface of agentic AI's true power.
Focus On Predictive And Prescriptive Capabilities: AI's ability to anticipate and address customer, partner, vendor and employee inquiries will unlock new levels of efficiency, freeing up people to focus on higher value tasks that move the business forward.
The Ability To Scale Is Key: Real-time monitoring across organizational workflows can help B2B leaders implement AI solutions that can scale with the business. To prioritize AI rollout within the organization, create real-time dashboards to monitor processes and identify inefficiencies within all workflows and work from there.
AI transformation is moving more rapidly throughout B2B organizations than perhaps any previous disruptive technologies. Companies that watch from the sidelines will quickly get left behind. However, it's important to balance the need to act now with long-term vision. Beginning with workflow management is a safe and effective way to begin to integrate agentic AI into organizational DNA.
The early-rate deadline for Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies Awards is Friday, September 5, at 11:59 p.m. PT. Apply today.
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