As a ServiceNow platform owner or system administrator, you have probably noticed that standard Now Assist summaries capture technical details well but can miss the custom context your organization needs. While these AI summaries handle basic incident information effectively, they likely omit the custom fields your team created to track operational impact, regulatory requirements, customer effects, and other business-critical details. These fields contain the context executives and stakeholders need for decision-making, but when they are left out of AI generated summaries, people are required to manually search through records to find what matters.
The good news? Customizing a Now Assist skill (ex. Record Summarization) to include your organization-specific fields is more straightforward than you might think. You do not need professional services, and you do not need to worry about breaking functionality during upgrades. This guide walks you through the exact steps to make Now Assist summaries reflect the business context that matters most to your organization.
Appendix: Resources & Reference Links
Scenario
Acme organization wants to track how incidents affect business operations beyond standard priority classifications. You have created a custom field called "Incident Impact Summary" that captures operational consequences of service disruptions. Now you need Now Assist to include this context in its AI-generated summaries.
Step-by-Step Implementation 🛠
Step 1: Create Your Custom Field
Navigate to the Incident table configuration and create a new field called "Incident Impact Summary" with a String data type. This field should be designed to capture free-form descriptions of how the incident affects business operations. For example, entries might describe impacts like "delayed quarterly financial close for North America region" or "prevented 2,000+ customer orders from processing during peak hours."
Pro Tip: Recommend using Form Builder to make all of your field changes. It can be accessed from the classic view or UI Builder but is the preferred way to set max lengths, mandatory requirements, default values, and etc. Below is a screenshot of how a new field can be added using Form Builder - be sure to modify the view in the correct scope (ex. Service Operations Workspace) located in the top left.
Step 2: Add the Field to Your Incident Form
Once the field exists in your data model, place the field on the form layout in the optimal location. For this example, the new field has been placed within the Impact section.
To test the new form, navigate to the Service Operations Workspace incident view and validate the "Incident Impact Summary" field appears as expected.
Step 3: Navigate to Now Assist Admin Console
Access the Now Assist administrative interface by using the application navigator Now Assist > Overview. This is your central hub for managing and monitoring all available Now Assist skills including the Incident Summarization skill that you are about to modify.
Step 4: Copy the Out-of-Box Skill
Here is where customization becomes upgrade-safe. Instead of modifying the out-of-box Incident Summarization skill directly, you create a copy that you fully control.
Locate the Incident Summarization skill in the skill list. Click the three-dot menu icon next to the skill name and select "Make a Copy." ServiceNow creates a new skill record that inherits all the configuration from the original but operates independently. This cloned skill will not be touched by future upgrades, giving you complete control while preserving the ability to reference or restore out-of-box functionality if needed.
Step 5: Configure Input Fields
Open your newly cloned skill for editing. Navigate to the "Choose Input" section, which defines what data Now Assist considers when generating summaries. This section controls which incident fields the AI analyzes before producing its output.
Add "Incident Impact Summary" as a Base input field. This tells Now Assist to incorporate the content from your custom field when generating summaries. The AI will now analyze not just standard incident data but also the business context your agents document in this custom field.
This is the critical configuration change that transforms generic summaries into business-relevant intelligence.
Step 6: Configure Availability and Access (Optional but Recommended)
Before saving your customized skill, take a moment to configure availability settings. These settings determine who can use the skill, where it appears in the interface, and which organizational scopes it applies to.
Consider configuring:
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User role access: Define which roles (such as itil, admin, or custom service desk roles) should have access to the customized summarization skill
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Display locations: Specify where the skill appears, such as in the Now Assist panel, context menus within incident records, or both
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Organizational scope: If you operate a multi-tenant or domain-separated instance, define which parts of your organization should see this customization
Step 7: Test Your Customization
Configuration is complete. Now validate that everything works as expected. Navigate to an incident record that contains data in the "Incident Impact Summary" field. Open Now Assist and generate a record summary.
Review the AI-generated output carefully. You should see language that directly references or paraphrases content from your custom field. The summary should integrate this business context naturally with standard incident details, creating a cohesive narrative rather than a disjointed list of facts.
If the custom field content does not appear in the summary, verify that:
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The field contains data in the test record
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You saved your skill configuration changes
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You refreshed your browser session to pick up the updated skill definition
Measuring Business Value
Customizing Now Assist summaries delivers measurable benefits:
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Reduced time to insight: Stakeholders get decision-ready context without opening records or sending follow-up questions
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Fewer escalations and clarifications: When summaries include business impact details upfront, leadership teams make faster decisions with fewer back-and-forth communications
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Increased AI adoption: When summaries contain relevant, actionable context rather than generic descriptions, users trust and rely on Now Assist more consistently
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Better incident retrospectives: Post-incident reviews benefit from comprehensive summaries that capture both technical details and business consequences
