Enhancing the service desk experience with next-generation capabilities

When you contact an agent for IT support, how delighted are you with that experience?

According to CX Index, 90% of businesses, regardless of the vertical they are operating in, have stated that they have made customer experience their primary focus. Why, then, has consumer perception declined for three straight years? This suggests consumer expectations are increasing faster than companies’ ability to meet them using traditional methods and technologies.

This same challenge exists in workplace support. Service desks have evolved beyond basic IT troubleshooting to become vital drivers of employee productivity and business agility. As organizations adopt AI, automation, and smart analytics, the traditional service desk is evolving to meet rising expectations.

Does AI matter?

The Internet became publicly available in 1993. Two years later, Amazon started selling books online. It took five years until we could search with Google. Ten years passed before MySpace Tom greeted us on social media, with Facebook arriving a year after that. The iPhone brought the Internet to our pockets 14 years after the web became publicly available—and now, few of us can function without it. Despite all our ambitions and aspirations, it takes time for new technologies to realize their full potential.

OpenAI released its generative AI-powered chatbot, ChatGPT, on November 30, 2022. Although the world is still beginning this AI journey, touting about using AI today is like touting that you use the Internet—it’s quickly becoming a standard tool rather than a differentiator. How silly would it be today to see an ad that stated, “Netflix: Powered by the Internet!” To the customer or end-user, it’s not really AI that matters. It’s what you’re doing with it to serve your customers, employees, and communities that is meaningful and powerful.

When someone searches Google, shops on Amazon, likes an Instagram photo, or pays a bill with their bank’s mobile app, they’re not thinking about the Internet. They’re appreciating the value of the service those companies are providing them. Similarly, using AI technology should focus on adding value rather than simply adopting it for its own sake.

The human experience: People at the core of AI

Just like reliable plumbing infrastructure makes water delivery possible, AI works best when it's thoughtfully designed with people in mind. It’s not the act of using AI that magically creates better customer experiences or improves service. The opposite can happen if you don’t prioritize people at the core.

We’ve seen this in service environments—chatbots that misunderstand urgent requests, automated systems that create endless loops of frustration, or virtual assistants that offer technically correct but practically useless advice. Deploying AI should not be a race to eliminate human involvement. Instead, it should give service professionals enhanced capabilities and create support experiences that are only possible through this collaboration.

This balance is essential because AI has clear strengths and limitations. AI excels at analyzing data to spot patterns, make predictions and automate repetitive tasks. It’s also good at processing languages for translation, summarization, and sentiment analysis tasks. However, AI is not good at complex reasoning or common-sense tasks. It also struggles with adapting to new scenarios, understanding nuanced situations, or exhibiting genuine empathy and emotional intelligence. Great customer experiences require all of these elements—technological efficiency paired with human understanding.

The quiet revolution in support: Service Experience Accelerator

Building on this understanding of AI's strengths and limitations, Unisys Next-Generation Service Desk leverages our Service Experience Accelerator (SEA) to transform support delivery by combining AI capabilities with human expertise. This Unisys-developed framework creates a more fluid, efficient experience through:

Enhanced customer interactions

• Conversational support that provides quick answers and guidance without queues
• Real-time translation in chat and voice channels to support more languages
• Pre-built automation for routine actions that gets employees back to work faster

Agent augmentation tools

• Agent Copilot surfaces relevant knowledge during interactions, keeping agents engaged with customers
• Automated compliance capabilities provide real-time visual checklists for each inquiry type
• Automatic conversation summaries improve documentation while reducing handling time

Continuous knowledge improvement

• Quality management teams analyze nearly all interactions using sentiment analysis
• The knowledge curation tool identifies gaps between existing knowledge base articles and actual resolution steps
• Creates an ongoing cycle that enhances both self-service and agent-assisted support

This approach delivers what matters most: better experiences for employees seeking help, expanded outcomes for the business, and improved work lives for service professionals—all by finding the right balance of technology and human expertise.

Looking ahead: The evolution of support

The service desk continues to evolve beyond its traditional boundaries. As AI capabilities mature, we'll see more intelligent self-healing systems and support experiences that adapt to individual work preferences and patterns.

Forward-thinking organizations recognize this shift from reactive problem-solving to proactive enablement. When technology issues are resolved faster—or prevented entirely—employees accomplish more, support professionals focus on higher-value work, and businesses operate with greater security and efficiency. Unisys is committed to leading this transformation through our Next-Generation Service Desk approach, helping organizations prepare for what's next in workplace support.

Contact us or visit our website to learn how to experience the next generation of service desk support with Unisys Next-Generation Service Desk, powered by Unisys Service Experience Accelerator.