Jun 04 2020
Digital Workspace

Knowledge 2020: The Smarter Way to Workflow

Despite a global recession, major brands can accelerate growth by undergoing a workflow revolution.

Moving forward in the new normal, value chains will never be the same again. The organizations that embrace digital transformation — particularly when it comes to workflow — are the ones that can thrive in a difficult economy.

Despite a global recession, major brands like Disney and AT&T are still accelerating growth and productivity. During ServiceNow’s Knowledge 2020 event, industry leaders discussed how the ability to streamline their workflows through ServiceNow helped their businesses flourish.

Disney Makes Lucrative Pivot to Streaming with ServiceNow

Disney’s subscription numbers exploded when it stepped into the business of streaming last November. Its streaming service, Disney+, exceeded expectations by attracting over 50 million subscribers within the first few months of its release.

Dan Shmitt, vice president and CIO of Disney Streaming Services, noted that ServiceNow enabled the company pivot to a new business model.

“It's been a tremendous partnership,” he said. “ServiceNow provided an extremely flexible and extensible platform that allowed us to develop a best-in-breed customer help center. It allowed us to provide best-in-breed tooling to the agents that support us around the world.”

In the wake of the pandemic, several of Disney’s traditional revenue generators, such as theme parks and movie theaters, were forced to shut down. But Disney+ quickly became a strong source of revenue, even though the streaming service was only a few months old at the time — in part, thanks to support from ServiceNow.

“Disney+ has been widely successful. As a result, we have more and more customers to support,” Shmitt said. “The fact that I can scale the tooling and provide those tools to agents at will, this has been hugely helpful.”

He also noted that integrating ServiceNow’s platform was quick, something that Disney+ needed. “Our timeline was incredibly tight. We had five months from the day we decided to standardize on ServiceNow as a platform to the day we went live.”

As CIO, Shmitt doesn’t take his responsibility to choose customer support tools lightly. “It gives me tremendous peace of mind to know the ServiceNow team is as committed to our success as our internal team,” he said. “It has given me time back. I can rely on the platform, I can rely on the team. For me, that’s been the most positive part of the partnership.”

MORE FROM BIZTECH: What goes into a successful digital transformation.

Reopening Offices with Safe Workplace Apps

The Knowledge 2020 event also showcased ServiceNow’s Safe Workplace application, which monitors hotspots for COVID-19 outbreaks to see which sites are ready to reopen and which locations still need more time.

From tracking personal protective equipment inventory to screening and verifying employee health, the app guides executives as they decide on when, and how, to bring employees back to work.

Most important, Safe Workplace can track employee sentiment by polling them on whether they want to return to the office or not. “If the sentiment is low, you don’t want to force employees into a situation they are not comfortable with,” said Amy Lokey, vice president and global head of design at ServiceNow.

Ready or not, there’s a digital revolution on the horizon. The digitizing and streamlining of workflow is what Bill McDermott, CEO of ServiceNow, describes as the workflow revolution.

“With every great revolution that you’ve looked at in history, it might take years and years to architect it. But there’s that one moment where everything changes and it becomes the standard,” McDermott said. “We see the workflow revolution being that moment for ServiceNow. This is what we do.”

“The workflow revolution has only just begun,” McDermott added. “ServiceNow will be the catalyst to redefine the enterprise, not as it is today, but as it must be tomorrow.”

Keep this page bookmarked for articles from Knowledge 2020 and join the conversation on Twitter @BizTechMagazine.

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