KiwiRail fosters innovation and efficiencies with JSM deployment and AI integration

The Opportunity

Project Overview

KiwiRail wanted to implement an in-house service management platform for New Zealand’s first AI-driven internal customer service capability. The existing ITSM tool, ServiceNow, proved expensive and inflexible, leading to an overwhelmed service desk and dissatisfied employees. The need for managing a growing volume of requests while maintaining excellent service prompted the search for a solution.

Tool Selection

After extensive research, KiwiRail chose Jira Service Management (JSM) as their Enterprise Service Management tool. Elegance Group, recommended by Atlassian, became their implementation partner. Additionally, Moveworks was selected as the conversational AI platform.

The Solution

Implementation Challenges and Solutions

The implementation involved deploying JSM, integrating the Moveworks bot, and migrating data from ServiceNow. Notable considerations included designing JSM to accommodate the Moveworks bot, breaking down request types, and shaping the Service and Asset catalogue.

Automation flows, JSM workflow, and schema designs were crucial for bot interaction, enabling partial or zero human input. The cutover from ServiceNow to JSM was seamless, migrating over 5,000 tickets with approvals and attachments intact.

Vendor Collaboration

Managing multiple vendors, including Spark New Zealand and NTT, added complexity. Clear, transparent, and consistent communication became essential. Integrating Moveworks AI with JSM required collaboration and learning on-the-go.

Change Management

Transitioning from ServiceNow to JSM and implementing AI posed a change management challenge. Adapting to new processes and understanding AI technology required effort from staff and stakeholders.

The Impact

Positive Outcomes

On launch, KiwiRail’s JSM received overwhelmingly positive feedback from internal and business stakeholders. Improved employee experience, streamlined IT operations, and enhanced internal technology investments were noted.

Achievements

In the first month post-launch, KiwiRail observed significant results:

• ~1000 hours of increased employee productivity
• Over 850 issues automatically resolved
• Over 325 issues accelerated for human intervention
• Up to 20,000 automation executions per day

Ongoing Relationship and Future Projects

Elegance Group continues to work with KiwiRail on subsequent projects across the Atlassian stack, developing assets for the IT division, migrating knowledge bases, and optimizing native Jira functionality. The goal is to make JSM the primary tool for storing and serving asset information, reducing third-party app expenses.