It’s crunch time! With users demanding exceptional customer experience at lightning speed, you’ve reached the point where you adapt or lose your job!
Requests come into your IT department every day. These repetitive tasks are soul-crushing, boring and time consuming. Your Service Teams are drowning in a mountain of repetitive tasks that should be automated, leaving them free to focus on critical activities.The key to providing a great customer experience is through automation – utilizing concepts such as Artificial Intelligence, Auto Remediation, Service Portal and Virtual Agents.
“Consumer based Apps such as Uber and Deliveroo have reset customer expectations. They want self-service and immediate action; as an IT Leader you now have to deliver this level of service” states Glyn Sowerby, Product & Services Director at Newflow Systems.
CIOs are seeing Automation as a fundamental component of their digital transformation strategy. Automation is no longer a luxury; it’s a necessity if IT organisations are to keep pace with customer expectations.
Trends

Trends Most organisation have started down the automation journey and have probably tackled some of the more common forms of automation. If not, these would make a great place to start.
• Ticket creation
• Auto assignment
• Surveys
• Customer communication
• Repetitive tasks
• Report production and distribution
But with increased volumes and customer expectations these steps are not enough. Let’s take a look at some of the Automation capabilities that can drastically improve your KPIs.
Machine Learning
In order to accurately predict outcomes, machines must be trained to identify trends and provide recommendations based on historical events.Users are presented with various weighted recommendations that they can choose from. Actions can range from creating an Incident to auotamtically resetting your passowrd.Utilising Machine Learning will:• Speed-up ticket creation• Reduce the number of tickets the Service Desk has to deal with• Resulting in improved customer satisfaction Some sophisticated service manangement platforms such as ServiceNow and Servicely provide these capabilities.
Common Platform Features:

Virtual Agent
Drastically reduce the number of customers calling the Service Desk and improve KPIs such as ‘incidents resolved at the first point of contact’ and ‘incident resolution times through the use of Virtual Agents. Allowing customers to engage with the machine to create requests and solve issues. Common Platform Features:
• Natural language search capabilities
• Integrated into other systems to provide relevant information
• Provides likely recommendations to users – including auto resolution i.e. reset password
• Fully scripted exchanges and actions
• Auto resolution
Service Portal
A “feature-rich” and “catalogue enabled” portal takes volume away from the Service Desk and gives users self-help capabilities:
• Logging of all types of requests from password resets to booking a days leave
• Move the technology out of IT to gain true buiness benefits
• Access to knowledge basis and self-help
• Service catalogue defining available services
• Workflow enabled to automate business processes
• Natural language search capabilities through a virtual agent
Auto Remediation
Fixing issues without human interaction is the ultimate goal, resulting in an improvement in all KPIs. Repetitive tasks such as password reset, wifi token requests and leave requests, are the low-hanging fruit and ideal candidates to start your automation journey.Utilising Auto Remediation will provide:• Cost Savings: engineers will not need to resolve repetitive tasks• Quality: will improve as the same tried and tested solution will be used every time; no human error
Automation for Efficiency and Profitability
Increased efficiency, productivity, and lower costs all translate to healthier profit margins for businesses – both small and large. Process automation saves time and allows resources to be diverted to other areas. As a result, businesses can remain smaller and more agile. If you’re ready to take your business to the next level, Newflow can provide you with an unforgettable automation experience. We can develop and deploy an industry-leading Cloud Platform that will ensure that designing and automating your workflows is a breeze. Click here now to get in touch.
About Glyn Sowerby
Glyn is a Service Management evangelist focused on operational excellence (ITIL Service Manager), with over 30 years of IT experience mostly spent in senior IT management positions at large and complex enterprises. The last ten years have seen Glyn applying his Service Management experience in the Telecommunications industry where he has been developing and implementing Service Management software specifically built for the Telco vertical. He is an enthusiastic and determined individual with a proven ability to inspire and motivate. An excellent communicator and relationship manager with a consultative and collaborative style.