Integration with ServiceNow Platform

Now Assist isn't a standalone product bolted onto ServiceNow. It's woven into the fabric of the platform. Understanding these integration points helps you design skills that feel native rather than awkward, and helps you know where AI capabilities can enhance existing workflows.

In this section, I'll walk through the key touchpoints where Now Assist meets the platform.

Where Users Experience Now Assist

Now Assist surfaces through multiple channels, each suited to different user types and contexts.

In product desktop shows skills directly on forms and workspaces. When an agent opens an incident, they see a Summarise button right there on the record. No context switching. No separate application. The AI is embedded in the work itself. This is the most common experience for fulfillers working in ITSM, CSM, HRSD, and other modules.

Now Assist Panel provides a conversational interface accessible from the banner across the platform. Fulfillers click the sparkle icon and interact with AI through natural language. They can ask it to summarise the current record, generate resolution notes, or trigger custom skills. The panel understands context, so it knows which record you're looking at.

Virtual Agent brings Now Assist to requestors through Employee Centre, Service Portals, and mobile applications. This is where end users interact with AI capabilities. They ask questions, the AI searches knowledge bases, finds relevant articles, and provides answers. No more rigid conversation flows. LLM powered Virtual Agent creates fluid, natural conversations.

AI Search integrates Now Assist into search experiences. When users search, they don't just get a list of results. They get AI generated answers synthesised from the most relevant knowledge articles. Actions Genius Results can even recommend relevant catalog items or Virtual Agent topics based on the query.

Workflow Integration Points

Now Assist enhances productivity across the major ServiceNow workflows.

IT Service Management is where many organisations start. Incident summarisation, resolution note generation, chat summarisation, knowledge article creation. Agents spend less time reading through work notes and more time actually resolving issues. The AI handles the cognitive overhead of understanding what's happened so far.

HR Service Delivery brings AI to employee services. Case summarisation helps HR agents quickly understand employee situations. The tone matters here. HRSD prompts often need to balance professionalism with empathy, particularly for sensitive topics like leave requests or performance concerns.

Customer Service Management extends similar capabilities to customer facing teams. Case summarisation, sentiment analysis, response recommendations. The AI helps agents understand customer context quickly and respond appropriately.

IT Operations Management applies AI to operational data. Alert analysis helps teams understand what's happening in their infrastructure. Event correlation surfaces patterns. These skills work with the operational data that flows through ServiceNow's ITOM modules.

Security Operations uses AI to help analysts work faster. Incident analysis, threat assessment, response recommendations. Security workflows often involve time pressure, so AI that reduces cognitive load delivers real value.

The Display Experience Decision

When you activate a skill, you choose where it appears. This decision shapes how users experience AI capabilities.

In product desktop works best when the skill relates directly to the record the user is viewing. Incident summarisation belongs on the incident form. Resolution note generation appears when someone's resolving a ticket. The AI is contextual and immediate.

Now Assist Panel suits broader capabilities or situations where users want to interact conversationally. It's also useful when you want to provide AI access across different record types without configuring display options for each one.

ServiceNow recommends enabling both options. Let users access skills however feels natural to them. Some people prefer clicking buttons. Others prefer typing requests. Accommodate both.

Role based access controls who sees what. Not every skill should be visible to every user. Configure roles appropriately so people see relevant capabilities without clutter.

Data Flows and Context

Understanding how data flows helps you design better integrations.

When a skill executes, it pulls data from the current record and any configured sources. That data becomes context for the prompt. The AI generates output based on that context. The output returns to the user through whatever interface triggered the skill.

Record context comes from the current record the user is viewing. Fields like short description, description, work notes, and comments flow into the prompt based on your input configuration.

Knowledge context can be pulled through RAG retrievers that search knowledge bases, SharePoint, or other configured sources. The AI can reference this knowledge when generating responses.

Platform context includes things like the current user, their role, the application they're in, and other environmental factors. Skills can use this context to tailor their behaviour.

Customisation Paths

The out of the box skills handle common scenarios, but most organisations need customisation.

Skill copying lets you take a shipped skill and modify it. The original remains unchanged. Your copy can have different input fields, modified prompts, or adjusted availability conditions. This is the simplest customisation path.

Skill Kit lets you build entirely new skills for use cases that don't match any out of the box option. You design everything from scratch, giving you complete control.

UI Builder integration (available in recent releases) lets you embed custom skills directly into workspaces you've built. The skill output appears exactly where you want it in your custom interface.

Consistency Across the Experience

ServiceNow emphasises creating a unified experience across all Now Assist skills. Users shouldn't feel like they're interacting with different products when they use different skills.

Think about display options consistently. If incident summarisation appears in product and in the panel, change summarisation probably should too.

Think about role assignments consistently. Similar users should see similar capabilities across different workflows.

Think about behaviour consistently. If your custom skills behave differently from out of the box skills, users will notice and find it confusing.

The goal is AI that feels like a natural part of the platform, not a collection of disconnected features.

The Prompt Engineering Connection

Integration decisions affect prompt design. If your skill appears on incident forms, you know what data is available. If it appears in the Now Assist Panel, you might need to handle cases where the user isn't viewing any record.

Platform integration also means working within platform constraints. RBAC determines what data the skill can access. Data masking transforms sensitive fields. RAG limits what knowledge sources the AI can reference.

Your prompts execute within this platform context. Design them accordingly.

Right, one final architectural component to cover. Let's look at how Now Assist Guardian keeps everything safe.