How many IT service management (ITSM) survey reports and blogs have you read that talk about the issues the IT support industry has had, and continues to have, with IT self-service portals? I’d imagine the answer is “too many.” While using self-service as part of an omnichannel approach to service and support has worked well in many consumer-world scenarios, the same hasn’t been true for corporate IT use cases. The industry has known the contributory issues for at least half a decade. However, organizations can still struggle to get the level of employee uptake needed to consider their IT self-service portal a success. And even then, the employee experience associated with the portal might be lacking compared to other IT support channels.

Thankfully, there’s now a better way. One that repositions the issue to solve it. What’s interesting about the solution, though, is that while it employs new technologies, it also relies on one of the oldest ITSM capabilities – knowledge management. Intrigued? Please keep reading to learn more about how the future of IT self-service involves employees self-resolving with conversational bots.

In this blog you'll learn how the future of IT self-service involves employees self-resolving with conversational bots. #selfservice #servicedesk #ITSM Click To Tweet

But first, there’s a need to understand how poorly traditional IT self-service has fared – because this helps to explain the need for conversational bots.

Why traditional IT self-service is dead (or at least on life support)

The IT self-service portal was going to address various IT support issues, with the promise of “better, faster, cheaper” IT service and support capabilities. In particular, meeting employees’ consumer-world-driven support expectations. But even a decade ago, there was the realization that many IT self-service portals had failed to deliver the expected benefits (while self-service technology adoption levels were high).

This failure was best summed up in a now-dated 2017 Service Desk Institute (SDI) IT self-service survey, which found that:

“… the number of organizations that have realized these benefits and have achieved the anticipated return on investment (ROI) are few, less than 12% according to recent SDI research.”

A 2021 ITSM.tools self-service survey found a marginal improvement when one in five organizations (21%) reported that the expected ROI for their IT self-service investment was achieved. However, the latest HappySignals employee experience data shows that self-service has overtaken traditional IT support channels in usage terms for organizations investing in employee experience improvement. Albeit while on average taking 91 minutes longer and delivering a poorer employee experience than the telephone channel.

So, for many organizations, there’s still much improvement needed with IT self-service capabilities. However, simply addressing the root causes of the many issues is not the answer; with a new technology use case providing an alternative solution that delivers better engagements and outcomes, that in turn increase self-help adoption levels and drive benefits realization. That technology use case is conversational bots.

Looking to increase self-help adoption levels and drive benefits realization? Check out this blog. #selfservice #servicedesk #ITSM Click To Tweet

Why your traditional IT self-service capabilities might be unloved and underused

If you ask an employee what’s wrong with your organization’s current corporate IT self-service capabilities, some will state that they’re good (and these are some of the people that currently, and will continue to, use it). Others, however, will be thrilled to share why they don’t use IT self-service (or use it begrudgingly). The list of potential issues could be a blog in itself, but a sample of the issues includes:

• Difficulties in finding the IT self-service portal to use it
• Using the correct IT terminology to find relevant knowledge article solutions or service catalog offering
• Trawling through IT-define hierarchies to find what’s needed
• Needing to log a ticket or call or email the IT service desk for the required solution or service.

Ultimately, traditional IT self-service might be viewed as an inferior IT support channel relative to other IT support channels and superior consumer-world service and support experiences.

How conversational bots are bringing IT self-service back to life

Intelligent conversational bots employ artificial intelligence (AI) in the form of machine learning and natural language processing (NLP) to respond accurately to employee questions and requests. For example, in terms of questions, “How do I…?” or “What is…?” In terms of requests, these can be service requests, incidents (a request for help), or other requests such as an annual leave request in the context of Human Resources (HR) operations.

'Conversational bots help to address the barriers to #selfservice adoption by first bringing the self-service capabilities to employees rather than expecting them to do the leg work.' #servicedesk #ITSM Click To Tweet

Importantly, conversational bots help to address the barriers to self-service adoption by first bringing the self-service capabilities to employees rather than expecting them to “do the leg work.” Not only is this logistically easier, but it also allows employees to seek assistance or new services while they go about their work. For example, by accessing a conversational bot from within Microsoft Teams or on their mobile phone while “on the go.”

There are many other benefits, some of which are shared with traditional IT self-service capabilities. The difference, however, is that conversational bots offer an easier-to-use engagement capability that drives the usage levels needed to reap the anticipated benefits (unlike what the industry has seen with traditional IT self-service). These benefits include:

• Better service or employee experiences thanks to a smoother IT support journey
• 24/7 IT support availability
• Multilingual application
• Employees can request help in plain English (or whatever their preferred language is)
• Time savings – both in terms of wait times and engagement times
• Labor-based cost savings – for both the service provider and the employees seeking help
• Because high-volume, low-value tasks are handled via self-help, skilled IT personnel can focus on higher value-add tasks
• Personalization thanks to immediate access to end-user data, e.g. the conversational bot will know an employee’s location and their IT equipment
• Scalability, with the ability to quickly ramp up to meet increased demand
• Consistency of IT support provision
• Data-based insights into service demand and common issues that can inform decisions
• Data-based insights into improvement opportunities such as missing services or knowledge articles
• It’s easier to change processes and actions than with human-delivered IT support
• There’s an automated record of IT support interactions, including for audit trail purposes
• Meeting non-IT use cases in digital transformation or enterprise service management scenarios
• Improvement over time, thanks to machine learning.

While all of these benefits are great, getting employees to use self-help capabilities repeatedly is the key to achieving them. This is where the differentiating value of conversational bots lies.

The key to conversational bot success

While your organization might be looking at the technological options related to introducing conversational bots, it’s also essential to ensure that the associated knowledge management needs are addressed. Because knowledge, and knowledge sources, are the fuel that conversational bots need to provide the responses that employees expect.

For example, when an employee asks, “How do I get roaming added to my mobile phone for a business trip to Venice?” Not only are NLP capabilities needed to understand the essence and context of the question, machine learning to know the most appropriate response, and orchestration to action the need (if approved), but the provided response needs to have been sourced from an available knowledge base.

'The importance of a knowledge base, and other knowledge sources, to conversational bot success should not be underestimated.' #selfservice #servicedesk #ITSM Click To Tweet

Hence, the importance of a knowledge base, and other knowledge sources, to conversational bot success should not be underestimated.

If you’d like to learn more about how conversational bots will help your organization’s employees self-serve and self-resolve, please arrange a demo with one of our team.