How our customers are innovating through the pandemic

“Pandemic response experience” is not the first line you’d expect to see on a CIO’s resume. As a deadly new virus spread across the world in recent weeks, however, IT leaders everywhere have been scrambling to ensure their employees stay safe, connected and productive. At the same time, we all need to protect top line revenues, ensure the customer experience doesn’t miss a beat, and avoid any disruption to customer operations.

As the CIO of ServiceNow, I frequently exchange notes with CIOs at other companies. Most of them use the Now Platform to manage digital workflows for employees and customers. These days we’re dealing with many of the same challenges.

Most of us have operations in multiple countries. Most are experiencing supply chain disruptions and addressing the challenge of providing network access and equipment to dispersed employees, many of them unused to working remotely. On the cyber front, many of us are seeing a surge in phishing and social engineering attacks.

At the most basic level, we’re all focused on keeping our people healthy and safe. On March 16, ServiceNow launched a new customer care plan, which includes four no-charge apps to help companies and government agencies manage their emergency response programs. The apps have since been downloaded by more than 1,000 organizations worldwide. 
 

In addition, many of our partners and customers are building their own digital workflows to help deliver vital emergency services. This is a truly global effort that spans hundreds of organizations around the world. Let me share just a few examples, to show what’s possible when a global software ecosystem mobilizes to meet a common challenge.

The City of Los Angeles used the Now Platform® to build a COVID-19 portal that supports drive-through coronavirus testing. Within 48 hours, the city pushed their portal live to 16 million citizens who can now research and verify symptoms, schedule an appointment, and choose a drive-through testing location.

Using the Emergency Self Report and Emergency Exposure Management applications, the city and county of San Francisco has been delivering mission-critical information that resource managers use to assess and manage organizational readiness in healthcare, law enforcement, fire and other essential services. 

At a retail company specializing in home improvement, the HR team was facing a surge of emergency paid leave requests due to COVID-19. Within 96 hours they built a mobile leave request app on the Now Platform and deployed it to 330,000 employees globally. 

Finally, a multinational pharmaceutical company is using our mobile employee workflow tools to help its European employees get to work. Currently, borders are closed across Europe for everything apart from necessary commutes. In recent weeks, officials have been asking border crossers to provide documentary proof of employment or be turned back.

This is where a mobile, centralized hub and one-stop-shop has proven an unexpected benefit. Thanks to the Now Platform, employees are able to access and download their proof-of-employment letters from their mobile devices with just a few clicks from their mobile devices. Within the first two weeks, more than 2,700 employees downloaded this letter. This has allowed them to travel to their campus, where they are working to develop life-saving medications.

I’m proud that ServiceNow is doing its part to help the world get through this crisis.

I’m humbled by the creativity and drive of our partners and customers, who are using the Now Platform to get vital work done in very tough circumstances. I’m confident that together we can get through this crisis and emerge stronger on the other side.