Exploring Now Assist

  • Release version: Xanadu
  • Updated August 14, 2024
  • 3 minutes to read
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    Summary of Exploring Now Assist

    Now Assist integrates generative AI capabilities into the ServiceNow AI Platform to enhance organizational productivity and efficiency. It enables improved self-service, actionable recommendations, effective search, and contextual answers by leveraging large language model (LLM) skills tailored to various workflows and business areas.

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    Now Assist is a family of generative AI features designed to perform specific tasks such as chat summarization or knowledge article summarization, delivered as skills within different ServiceNow products. These skills empower users across multiple workflows including Technology, Customer, Employee, Creator, and Finance & Supply Chain.

    Now Assist Framework and Products

    The Now Assist framework operates on the ServiceNow AI Platform and requires activation of specific Now Assist products aligned to your business workflow:

    • Technology Workflow: Supports IT services and operations with products like Now Assist for CMDB, ITOM, ITSM, Security Incident Response, and Strategic Portfolio Management.
    • Customer Workflow: Enhances customer service applications including Field Service, Financial Services, Telecommunications, and Public Services.
    • Employee Workflow: Targets HR Service Delivery with products for Health and Safety, HRSD, and Legal Service Delivery.
    • Creator Workflow: Supports platform builders and tools such as App Engine Studio, AI scripting, and RPA Hub.
    • Finance & Supply Chain Workflow: Addresses procurement and supplier operations with Accounts Payable, Supplier Lifecycle, and Sourcing products.

    Administrators install and manage these products and their skills via the Now Assist Admin console.

    Key Features and Tools

    • Now Assist Admin Console: Enables installation, configuration, skill management, user access control, and monitoring of usage and performance.
    • Now Assist Panel: Provides users with an intuitive interface to access generative AI skills in context.
    • AI Search Integration: Generates AI-powered answers and summaries during user searches for enhanced knowledge discovery.
    • Mobile Support: Delivers generative AI skills optimized for mobile environments.
    • Virtual Agent Integration: Allows creation of conversational experiences and topic authoring using LLM topic discovery.
    • Generative AI Controller: Offers developers and administrators the ability to customize workflows and integrate third-party LLM licenses into custom flows and conversations.

    Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    • For Users: Access to AI-enhanced search results and contextual assistance improves self-service and productivity.
    • For Administrators: Comprehensive tools for configuring Now Assist products, enabling or disabling specific skills, managing access, and monitoring performance ensure efficient governance.
    • For Developers: Flexibility to extend Now Assist capabilities through custom integrations and third-party LLMs supports tailored AI experiences.

    Overall, Now Assist equips ServiceNow customers with scalable generative AI functionality across their enterprise workflows, enabling smarter decision-making, automated assistance, and enhanced user engagement.

    Learn how Now Assist brings generative AI capabilities to the ServiceNow AI Platform. With Now Assist, you can improve the productivity and efficiency in your organization, deliver better self-service, recommend actions and provide answers, and empower your users to search more effectively.

    Now Assist overview

    Now Assist is a growing cross-platform family of generative AI features, which are tasks that a large language model (LLM) can perform. Generative AI features are based on the initial training and architecture.

    A skill delivers a feature plus the use case to the user. An example of a skill is chat summarization within a customer workspace. Now Assist products provide features and skills that are tailored to meet the needs of users in different workflows.

    Now Assist framework

    The Now Assist framework is supported across the ServiceNow AI Platform. To use Now Assist skills, activate one or more of the following Now Assist products.
    Table 1. Now Assist products
    Workflow Business areas Available products
    Technology The Technology workflow includes IT applications, such as IT services and operations, managing your strategy to deliver products and services, and platform security.
    Customer The Customer workflow includes applications that support customer service, including field service, financial services, telecommunications and media, and the public service sector.
    Employee The Employee workflow supports HR Service Delivery features.
    Creator The Creator workflow supports a variety of Platform tools and builders, including the following:
    • App Engine Studio
    • ServiceNow AI Platform scripting
    • Platform Analytics
    • RPA Hub
    • Service Catalog
    • Workflow Studio
    		 Now Assist for Creator
    Finance & Supply Chain The Finance & Supply Chain workflow supports purchase requisitions, sourcing requests, and request for products or services.
    Now Assist products include some or all of the following foundational platform tools for Now Assist. For more information, see Now Assist skills in the Platform workflow.

    The following diagram shows what's available in the Now Assist framework.

    Figure 1. Now Assist framework
    The Now Assist framework includes Now Assist Admin, Now Assist panel, and Generative AI Controller. Framework components become available once you install a product such as Now Assist for IT Service Management (ITSM).

    Now Assist benefits

    Benefit Feature Users
    Leverage the power of search with the Now LLM generative AI model to answer questions in user searches with actionable AI-generated summaries of relevant knowledge articles. Now Assist in AI Search Everyone
    Install and configure Now Assist applications and the skills they provide. Now Assist Admin console Administrators
    Choose which skills to turn on, and which users can access them. Now Assist Admin console Administrators
    Monitor the usage and performance of your Now Assist implementation. Analyzing Now Assist performance Administrators
    Access generative AI skills in context through a user-friendly interface. Now Assist panel Everyone
    Use Now Assist skills on mobile devices. Now Assist for Mobile Everyone
    Customize your workflows and use your own third-party LLM license. Generative AI Controller Administrators or developers
    Use Now Assist in other platform features. Now Assist skills in the Platform workflow Administrators or developers
    Monitor Now Assist consumption on your instance. Monitoring Now Assist usage in Subscription Management Administrators