The IT industry has been experiencing major turnover and burnout issues for years, and skilled workers are a rare commodity nowadays.
We spoke with Ariel Gesto, CEO and founder of InvGate, to find out how IT workers can automate tasks or make some tasks much easier to solve with gen AI.
BN: What are the most challenging hurdles that IT teams are currently facing?
AG: The most significant hurdles for IT teams today revolve around four pivotal challenges. First, there’s the drive towards automation, where leveraging low-code/no-code tools is essential to transcend mundane tasks, thereby allocating more creative and complex problem-solving to our teams. Then there’s the issue of security, with the potential to obliterate a company’s value through incidents like ransomware attacks, which threaten both reputation and operational integrity. Then, AI itself has become a double-edged sword, surrounded by a whirlwind of expectations and fears, creating a scenario where IT leaders are pressured from all directions to craft a sensible, secure adoption strategy amidst the omnipresent fear of missing out. Lastly, collaboration underscores the transformative role of IT departments as pivotal enablers of interdepartmental synergy, pushing towards a more digitized, transparent, and standardized workflow under the umbrella of Enterprise Service Management (ESM). This transition demands tools that transcend traditional IT boundaries, speaking directly to the needs and languages of various departments, thereby ensuring the seamless integration and utilization of technology across the enterprise.
BN: What are the different tools InvGate is using to help address these challenges?
AG: InvGate is getting in on the ground floor of AI-enhanced Service Management, addressing these challenges with a suite of AI-powered tools within our AI Hub. These allow IT professionals to improve their ticket replies, better categorize incidents, speed up the knowledge article drafting process, and provide end-users with contextual information on knowledge articles to decrease ticket volume. With all these capabilities, we aim to put artificial intelligence in the service of IT teams, enhancing them to be more efficient so that they can focus on the tasks that actually solve problems. This is the first launch of the AI Hub, and we’re working to expand it in the future to include a smarter Virtual Agent that can provide a conversational experience, natural language search, software and hardware normalization, auto-healing capabilities, anomaly detection, and workflow analytics, to name a few.
BN: Can you give us an example of how these AI tools work to streamline tasks?
AG: A prime example is our Ticket Summarization feature. After a ticket has accumulated several updates and interactions, this tool can automatically generate a concise summary of the ticket’s activity and status using AI. This greatly reduces the time needed for a new or returning agent to understand the current state of an issue, facilitating quicker decision-making and action. This is great for an agent returning to a complex, multi-step troubleshooting ticket after a break, or for collaboration between various teams involved in the same ticket; in seconds, they can get a clear, AI-generated summary, allowing for a seamless transition back into the problem-solving process without the need to sift through extensive ticket history.
BN: What’s the role of generative AI in the IT space and how is it helping solve some of these issues?
AG: By acting as a force multiplier for human effort, generative AI is reshaping the IT landscape, turning routine challenges into opportunities for innovation and improved service delivery. It excels in automating redundant or time-consuming tasks, such as drafting responses or generating documentation, allowing IT professionals to focus on more strategic and creative problem-solving activities. Its application improves communication by providing precise, context-relevant responses and content, enhancing interactions within teams and with users. This not only streamlines operational processes, making them more efficient, but also elevates user satisfaction and engagement.
Generative AI is also beginning to play a pivotal role in cybersecurity, analyzing large amounts of data to identify patterns and predict potential threats, thus enabling proactive defense strategies. By integrating with existing systems, it can automate the detection and mitigation of security vulnerabilities. And due to its ability to generate realistic simulations and models facilitates better training, testing, and development environments, leading to more robust IT solutions and services.
BN: How do you see the future of AI solutions in the IT space?
AG: The future of AI solutions in IT is incredibly promising. As these technologies continue to evolve, they will become even more integrated into the fabric of IT Service Management, leading to more sophisticated, self-healing systems, predictive analytics, and a shift towards more proactive support models. AI will be central to driving innovation, improving service delivery, and enhancing the overall strategic value of IT teams. Importantly, AI’s ability to augment agents by serving as an intelligent aid opens up limitless possibilities for growth and innovation.
The advent of AI in IT is also paving the way for democratizing complex technical problem-solving, enabling users with varied skill levels to perform tasks that once required strong technical expertise. As AI becomes more adept at understanding and predicting user needs, we can imagine a transition towards IT services that are not just reactive but anticipatory, providing solutions before the problem becomes apparent. This represents a shift toward an optimistic future where IT is not just about managing technology, but also about empowering people to achieve more than ever before.
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