When Documents Disrupt Every Workflow
Every enterprise workflow depends on information locked in documents — and every decision depends on accessing that information quickly. Support agents need policy details mid-customer call to make the right exception call. HR teams search through handbooks during employee inquiries to provide accurate guidance. IT specialists hunt through technical manuals while troubleshooting to choose the correct fix. Compliance officers verify procedures across multiple PDFs before approving critical actions. Managers need to review lengthy proposals and reports to greenlight projects, but can't afford to read 40 pages just to make a go/no-go decision.
But here's the real problem: employees don't just need to find information — they need to understand it quickly and extract precise answers to make confident decisions. The cognitive load of processing dense, lengthy documents while juggling active tasks is overwhelming. Context-switching between "doing the work" and "finding information to do the work" exhausts mental bandwidth and increases decision fatigue.
Without instant access to both the big picture and specific details, every document search breaks the workflow twice: once when trying to grasp what a document contains, and again when hunting for the exact answer needed.
Each interruption forces employees to pause their actual work, make decisions with incomplete information, or worse — delay responses while they dig through pages. The cost isn't just time lost; it's decisions made with uncertainty, customers left waiting, cognitive overload from information processing, and teams second-guessing themselves because the information they need is technically available but practically out of reach.
The reality for knowledge workers:
- Hours wasted reading through pages of dense text to extract key insights
- Endless scrolling and Ctrl+F searches to find specific answers buried in PDFs
- Screen-bound reading that limits when and where content can be consumed
- Slower decision-making as teams struggle to extract meaning from complex content
- Cognitive overload from processing volumes of information
- Missed insights that could drive better outcomes
- Delayed responses to customers and colleagues waiting for answers
This isn't just inconvenient — it's a fundamental barrier to organizational agility and employee productivity.
Introducing SmartDocs: AI-Powered Document Intelligence
SmartDocs transforms how your enterprise interacts with documents, turning information overload into instant clarity with three powerful capabilities:
Introducing SmartDocs: Document Summary
Document Summary distills lengthy, complex content into concise, contextual overviews — giving users instant clarity without losing meaning. Whether it's a 50-page policy document or a detailed contract, SmartDocs extracts the essence in seconds.
The impact:
- Grasp key points without reading cover-to-cover
- Make faster, more informed decisions
- Reduce cognitive load and information fatigue
- Enable quick triage of document priority and relevance
Introducing SmartDocs: Document Q&A
Ask questions. Get answers. Move forward.
Document Q&A eliminates the frustration of manual searching by letting users ask natural-language questions and receive instant, accurate answers directly from their documents. No more endless scrolling or keyword hunting — just ask what you need to know.
The impact:
- Find specific information in seconds, not hours
- Boost knowledge accessibility across teams
- Empower employees to act with confidence
- Keep workflow momentum without breaking focus
- Deliver faster responses to stakeholders
You can catch our latest demo and presentation on SmartDocs in our Platform Academy sessions:
Doc-to-Voice
Listen, learn, and act — anywhere, anytime.
Doc-to-Voice transforms any document into an immersive, voice-based experience, liberating professionals from screen-bound reading. Whether it's a detailed report, case study, proposal, or contract, users can now consume content while commuting, exercising, or preparing for meetings.
Traditional document consumption disrupts workflow — users must stop, read, and interpret, making multitasking nearly impossible. Doc-to-Voice solves this by turning passive reading into active, auditory engagement that fits seamlessly into busy schedules.
The impact:
- Consume documents on the go without sacrificing comprehension
- Enhance information retention through multi-sensory learning
- Maximize productivity by staying informed during non-work activities
- Improve accessibility for diverse learning preferences and needs
- Free up valuable time for strategic, high-impact work
- Enable analysts, agents, and sales reps to stay current effortlessly
Interested in trying it out?
Release: Q4’25 (Innovation Lab)
How to access: Sign up through QR code & contact your Account Team
Dependencies: Requires Now Assist for Platform
Pricing: Free for Innovation Lab participants
Work Smarter, Not Harder
SmartDocs doesn't just save time — it transforms how your organization leverages its collective knowledge. By removing friction from document interaction across reading, searching, and consumption modes, you enable:
- Faster comprehension with instant summaries of complex content
- Quicker actions based on accurate, on-demand answers
- Better decision-making grounded in a comprehensive understanding
- Flexible consumption that fits into any workflow or schedule
- Improved productivity through seamless, multi-modal knowledge access
- Enhanced employee experience with AI working in the flow of work
- Greater accessibility for diverse learning and working styles
Ready to unlock your documents?
Stop letting valuable insights remain buried. With SmartDocs, every document becomes instantly accessible, understandable, and actionable.
Have you implemented SmartDocs in your organization? Share your experience below!
Want to learn more about SmartDocs capabilities? Check out the ServiceNow Documentation or reach out to your ServiceNow account team.
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