Virtual Agent
Answer and Route Requests Conversationally, Then Hand Off Cleanly
Give employees a conversational way to get answers, raise requests and report issues, with a smooth hand-off to people.
Virtual Agent provides conversational self-service on top of the catalog, knowledge and incident processes, handing over to human agents with the conversation attached.
Example conversation · illustration
- EmployeeI need access to the finance reporting tool.
- Virtual AgentThat's the “Application access” catalog item. Do you need viewer or editor access?
- EmployeeViewer, please.
- Virtual AgentSubmitted. Your manager approves this item, and I'll update you here.
Catalog request started · approval stays with the manager
The enterprise challenge
Simple questions consume skilled agents
Password, access and how-to questions fill queues.
Repetitive contacts
Agents answer the same questions.
Out-of-hours gaps
Employees wait until morning.
Lost context
Hand-offs restart the conversation.
A virtual agent earns trust by being clear about its limits. In Nexus the conversation sits on the same catalog, knowledge and incident records the service desk already uses. The agent answers what approved knowledge can answer and starts requests the catalog defines. When it is unsure, when the topic is sensitive or when the employee asks, it hands the conversation to a person with the full context attached.
Signature view
The Conversation Decision Tree
Routine questions are answered quickly and complex ones reach the right agent with context.
The Conversation Decision Tree: every conversation starts with intent recognition and then takes one of four routes: a knowledge answer, a catalog request, an incident report, or a person. Each route has a marked hand-off point. Step through a conversation to see what the employee sees, what the virtual agent does and what Nexus records. Conceptual illustration with example dialogue, not a product screen.
- Employee message
- Understand intent
- Knowledge answer
- Resolved?
- Close with record
Answered from knowledge · step 1 of 5: Employee message
- EmployeeHow do I set up email on my new phone?
What the virtual agent does, and what stays with people
The virtual agent assists and routes; it does not make approval decisions.
The virtual agent handles
Answers from knowledge
Routine questions are answered from the knowledge base, with guided troubleshooting where it helps.
Starts catalog requests
Requests use the catalog item's own questions and approval rules.
Reports incidents
Raises incidents with the details captured in the conversation.
Shares status
Shows progress on the employee's open requests and incidents.
The virtual agent never
Approves or rejects
Approvals stay with the approvers the catalog item names.
Makes decisions that belong to people
Case outcomes and HR or security judgements stay with the responsible teams.
Goes beyond the employee's permissions
Answers and record access respect the employee's role-based data boundaries.
Closes a case it handed off
Once a person has taken over, that person owns the outcome.
Anatomy of a hand-off
When a person takes over, nothing is lost
Hand-off is a designed step with defined triggers and a defined packet of context, not a fallback when the conversation fails.
Hand-off triggers
| Trigger | Routed to |
|---|---|
| The employee asks for a person | Service desk queue for the topic |
| The knowledge answer does not resolve the question | Service desk queue for the topic, with the transcript |
What the person receives
Transcript
The full conversation so far moves to the person taking over.
Linked records
Any request or incident already created in the conversation.
Summary for the agent
AI Agent Assist drafts a short summary for the person taking over.
What Virtual Agent covers
The approved capabilities, then further detail from the module record.
Conversations
Understand and respond.
- Conversational self-service
- Multi-turn conversations
- Multi-language support
- Knowledge answers
- Guided troubleshooting
Actions
Get things done.
- Request initiation
- Incident reporting
- Status updates on open requests
Hand-off
Escalate with context.
- Live agent hand-off
- Conversation transcript transfer
- AI Agent Assist
Conversational AI Engine
Natural-language understanding for multi-turn support conversations.
- Multi-turn conversation handling
- Multi-language support
Conversational Request Fulfillment
Common requests started and tracked in the conversation, fulfilled through the catalog.
- Status tracking and notifications
Knowledge-Driven Responses
Answers drawn from the knowledge base, FAQs and documentation, with sources.
- Guided troubleshooting flows
Context-Preserving Agent Hand-off
When the virtual agent reaches its limits, a person continues with full context.
- Context-preserving escalation
- Conversation transcript transfer
From question to answer or agent
Trigger: An employee starts a conversation.
Ask
Message received.
Understand
Intent identified.
Answer
Knowledge provided.
Act
Request or incident raised.
Hand off
Agent continues.
Outcome: The employee is helped or routed with full context.
How AI supports the conversation, in explicit modes
Each AI item names its mode. None of them approves, decides or closes on a person's behalf.
- Assistance drafts, answers or summarizes
- Recommendation proposes for a person to accept
- Predictive anticipates or flags
- Workflow-triggered runs only as configured
| AI item | What it does | Mode |
|---|---|---|
| Intent understanding | Messages are interpreted to suggest answers or actions. | Assistance |
| AI Agent Assist | Agents receive summaries on hand-off. | Assistance |
Controls with named owners
Conversations are service records: logged, permission-bound and reviewed by the people accountable for the service.
Logged conversations
Interactions are recorded.
Data boundaries
Answers respect permissions.
Tenant isolation
Records are scoped to the organization's own environment.
Virtual Agent in practice
Representative situations from everyday employee service.
Monday-morning access requests
The situation
After a reorganisation, many employees ask for the same application access, and agents fill in the same form over and over.
With Nexus
The virtual agent recognises the request, asks the catalog item's questions in the conversation and submits it. Managers approve as usual, and agents focus on the requests that need judgement.
Aligned to recognized practice
Mappings describe alignment of practice, not attestation or certification.
| Framework | Practice | Nexus capability | Supporting record | Relationship |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ITIL 4 | Service Desk practice: multiple channels for user contact, with escalation to people | Conversational self-service with live-agent hand-off and transcript transfer on the shared service desk records | Conversation and hand-off records linked to requests and incidents | Aligned practice |
| ITIL 4 | Knowledge Management practice: knowledge used at the point of need, with feedback for improvement | Knowledge answers in the conversation, with the article referenced and the employee's feedback captured | Knowledge article references and feedback on the conversation record | Aligned practice |
Why enterprises choose Nexus for conversational service
Conversation on the service records
Requests, incidents and knowledge in the conversation are the same records the service desk works, not a separate bot database.
Hand-off is designed, not a fallback
Every route through the conversation has a marked hand-off point, and the person taking over receives the full context.
Clear limits
The virtual agent assists and routes. Approvals, sensitive matters and outcomes stay with people.
Where conversations lead
Part of the Platform, Workspaces & Automation Function. Every route in the conversation ends in a module the service desk already runs.
Service Catalog
Requests initiated conversationally.
Incident Management
Issues reported.
Request Fulfillment
Requests fulfilled.
People Services
HR questions.
Across the portfolio
- iShield Connect
Virtual Agent contributes conversational intake to the Omnichannel Customer Service solution led by iShield Connect.
What changes for employees and the service desk
Faster help
Routine questions answered.
Focused agents
Skilled work prioritized.
Clean hand-offs
Context preserved.
Where this module is used
