Enterprise Service Management Foundation
Enterprise Service Management Foundation combines the Core Business Suite and the Simplified IT Service Management to deliver unified service experiences across IT, HR, finance, legal, workplace services, and procurement. The integrated solution streamlines service delivery and reduces administrative overhead for growing organizations.
Combined benefits of integrating Core Business Suite with Simplified IT Service Management
Enterprise Service Management Foundation (ESM Foundation) brings together the Core Business Suite and the Simplified IT Service Management to create a comprehensive service delivery platform.
The integration eliminates service silos and provides employees with a unified experience for all their service requests, while enabling organizations to use AI-assisted automation and intelligent routing across service domains.
| Feature | Core Business Suite only | Simplified IT Service Management only | ESM Foundation (both together) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unified employee portal experience |
Yes|\[Omitted image "icon-check-mark-green.png"\] Alt text: Yes|\[Omitted image "icon-check-mark-green.png"\] Alt text: Yes|
|Cross-departmental request routing|
Yes|\[Omitted image "icon-error-red-x.png"\] Alt text: No|\[Omitted image "icon-check-mark-green.png"\] Alt text: Yes|
|Multi-channel support (chat, email)|
No|\[Omitted image "icon-check-mark-green.png"\] Alt text: Yes|\[Omitted image "icon-check-mark-green.png"\] Alt text: Yes|
|Supplier Collaboration Portal|
Yes|\[Omitted image "icon-error-red-x.png"\] Alt text: No|\[Omitted image "icon-check-mark-green.png"\] Alt text: Yes|
Workflow for ESM Foundation
Using Core Business Suite with Simplified IT Service Management together provides the following benefits:
- Streamline service delivery across IT, HR, finance, legal, workplace services, and procurement on a unified platform.
- Leverage AI-assisted automation for incident triage, resolution recommendations, and intelligent routing.
- Reduce administrative overhead through automated workflows and standardized processes.
- Improve employee satisfaction with consistent, AI-assisted service experiences across all departments.
- Accelerate resolution times through AI-assisted knowledge management and contextual recommendations.
- Support multi-channel engagement including chat, email, and portal interactions.
- Provide Supplier Collaboration Portal capabilities alongside employee service delivery.
The following figure shows how employees, service agents, administrators, and suppliers use ESM Foundation to deliver seamless, AI-enhanced service experiences. Employees access all services through a unified portal with AI search and conversation-interface support, while specialized agents handle requests using AI-assisted tools that share common workflows and intelligent automation.
ESM Foundation workflow with unified portal, AI routing, and supplier collaboration.
In this workflow:
- Employee submits a service request through the unified Employee Center portal with AI-powered search and chat assistance.
- The AI-native system triggers triage and routes the request to the appropriate service team based on intelligent categorization.
- The service agent receives the request in an AI-enhanced workspace with contextual recommendations and resolution suggestions.
- AI agents provide automated triage, draft responses, and suggest next steps to accelerate resolution.
- The agent collaborates with other departments using shared case management and AI-assisted knowledge discovery.
- The employee receives real-time updates through preferred channels and can interact via chat, portal, or email.
- Suppliers access the dedicated collaboration portal for invoice requests and general inquiries.
- The system captures metrics and feedback across all service domains for continuous improvement.
Core Business Suite service areas
Core Business Suite provides comprehensive service delivery capabilities across multiple business functions, enabling organizations to centralize and standardize service experiences.
| Service Area | Capabilities | Key Benefits |
|---|---|---|
| HR Service Delivery | - General HR requests and case management - Payroll inquiry handling and resolution - Benefits request processing and support | Streamlined HR service delivery with automated request routing and case tracking. |
| Legal Service Delivery | - Legal request submission and management - Contract review and approval workflows - Legal conformance inquiry handling - Legal Knowledge Base integration | Centralized legal service delivery with standardized request processing |
| Workplace Service Delivery | - Workplace service requests and issue reporting - Space management and reservation capabilities - Facility maintenance request handling - Workplace safety and conformance support | Comprehensive workplace service management with space optimization |
| Finance Service Management | - General finance request processing - Budget inquiry and approval workflows | Streamlined financial service delivery with automated approvals |
| Health and Safety management | Health and safety request handling | Comprehensive safety management with conformance tracking |
| Source-to-Pay Operations | - Procurement request processing - Invoice request management - Purchase order tracking and approvals | End-to-end procurement management with supplier portal content integration. |
Simplified IT Service Management capabilities
Simplified IT Service Management provides request management support across the entire service delivery lifecycle, enhancing administrator, employee, and fulfiller experiences.
| Capability Area | Features | User Benefits |
|---|---|---|
| Employee Experience | - AI search with internal and external content sources - Conversational interface for issue resolution - Automated incident creation with Now Assist - Intelligent Service Catalog item recommendations - Multi-channel support \(chat, email, portal\) | Faster issue resolution with AI-guided self-service and intelligent recommendations. |
| Fulfiller experience | - AI-assisted incident triage and categorization - Automated resolution plan generation - Intelligent Knowledge Base article recommendations - AI-assisted email and response drafting - Similar incident linking and pattern recognition | Enhanced productivity with AI recommendations and automated assistance. |
| Administrative experience | - Guided and conversational setup processes - Automated configuration with default presets - Contextual learning resources and assistance - AI-driven configuration recommendations - Simplified installation and deployment | Reduced implementation time with AI-guided setup and automation. |
| Agentic workflows | - AI-assisted incident triage automation - Intelligent resolution recommendations - Automated status updates and notifications - Cross-functional workflow orchestration - Predictive analytics and insights | Autonomous task execution with intelligent decision-making capabilities. |
| Analytics and insights | - Real-time dashboard with key metrics - Workload distribution analytics - Performance trend analysis - AI-powered insights and recommendations - Cross-domain service analytics | Data-driven decision making with comprehensive service visibility. |
Requirements for implementing ESM Foundation
ESM Foundation plugin is available in the ServiceNow® Store. The following capabilities are included in the Enterprise Service Management Foundation solution.
- Core Business Suite Foundation - provides unified service delivery across HR, legal, workplace services, finance, health and safety, and procurement
- Simplified IT Service Management - enables AI-powered IT service management with intelligent automation and assistance
- Employee Center - provides unified portal experience for all employee services
- Now Assist for ITSM - delivers AI-powered skills and agentic workflows for service automation
- Virtual Agent - enables conversational AI support and guided interactions
- Service Portal - supports self-service capabilities across all service domains
- Setup Hub - facilitates guided setup and configuration management
- Now Assist for Core Business Suite - provides conversational configuration experience
Note: Depending on your license, you will have access to certain application features, generative AI skills, agentic workflows, and AI agents. For more information, see ServiceNow product tiers.
Get started with ESM Foundation
Get started with ESM Foundation by completing the following implementation and configuration tasks:
- Install Setup Hub to enable modular admin home dashboard access
- Install and configure Core Business Suite with default configurations for all required business units
- Install Simplified IT Service Management with guided setup and default presets
- Configure Employee Center portal to provide unified access to all service domains
- Set up Service Catalog items and request forms for each business unit (HR, legal, workplace services, finance, health and safety, procurement.
- Configure automated routing rules and assignment groups for cross-departmental service delivery
- Enable features including Now Assist skills, agentic workflows, and Virtual Agent capabilities
- Establish Knowledge Base articles for each service domain.
- Configure multi-channel support including conversational interface and email notifications.
- Set up Supplier Collaboration Portal for external stakeholder engagement.
- Configure comprehensive analytics dashboards for service performance monitoring across all domains
- Train service agents on AI-assisted tools and integrated case management workflows.
Parent Topic:Solutions