Salesforce Introduces AI & Automation Capabilities For Public Sector

Salesforce today announced Public Sector Einstein 1 for Service, including CRM, trusted AI, and data capabilities to help government employees automate administrative tasks and provide faster service to constituents. Built on the Einstein 1 platform, public sector organisations can now quickly and easily generate case reports, capture real-time call transcriptions, and document and format case interactions, all in a single offering. 

Why it matters: BCG estimates that generative AI could unlock a $1.75 trillion productivity opportunity annually across many functions and levels of government. However, 62% of IT decision makers across industries, including those in the public sector, feel their organisation’s data systems are not ready to leverage AI.

Innovation in action: Public Sector Einstein 1 for Service offers government contact centre agents and case managers trusted conversational and generative AI, enabling them to be more productive and efficient. Features include: 

• Caseworker Narrative Generation uses generative AI to summarise vast amounts of data to help caseworkers generate case reports and summaries in their workflows. For example, after an intake interview in the field, a social worker can automatically collate their case notes into a summary that can be designed to meet their reporting requirements, reducing time spent on manual administrative work.
• Service Cloud Voice uses conversational AI to transcribe calls while guiding contact centre agents on the most appropriate next steps for the caller. For example, when emergency housing assistance call volumes spike after a natural disaster, AI can help the case worker or agent quickly assess what the caller needs, provide guidance on resources, recommend the next best action, and capture important details from the conversation.
• Einstein Activity Capture for Public Sector uses natural language processing to help caseworkers document case interactions by automatically collecting data and summarising important insights from various sources, like calendar events, contacts, or emails. For example, important insights from an email thread between a case worker and a client are automatically surfaced and stored in Salesforce, creating less manual work while keeping case information up to date.

High-quality AI requires high-quality data and insights: Public Sector Einstein 1 for Service also includes Data Cloud, which connects and harmonises data and uses it to power government agency applications. 

• With Data Cloud for Public Sector, public sector organisations can bring data from different sources — including benefits, education, and healthcare data — into a common data model to build unified constituent profiles and personalise interactions. And Salesforce’s new Vector Database helps manage and ingest both structured and unstructured data, leading to better generative AI output. For example, a government agency can ingest and harmonise information, like case records and call transcripts, to maintain a real-time view of a constituent, like an employee applying for workers compensation, to better understand their service needs and interaction history.
• Interaction Notes for Public Sector allows caseworkers to take detailed notes of their meetings and conversations with constituents or other case participants, specify the confidentiality level of the notes, add action items or next steps, and quickly search for and filter summaries to find notes from previous interactions, all in one place. 

What’s new in compliance: Salesforce also now offers several Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) compliant tools to help government agencies drive efficiency and productivity while meeting regulatory requirements. These tools include: 

• Salesforce Field Service is now available on Government Cloud and is FedRAMP High and DoD Impact Level 5 authorised. U.S. public sector entities, including federal and state agencies, departments of public works, social services, health, audit, and inspection departments, and the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) can now deliver efficient field service operations to achieve mission success.
• Privacy Center is now available on Government Cloud and is FedRAMP High and DoD Impact Level 5 authorised. IT and data specialists can now more easily operationalize privacy requirements and respond to data subject access requests. It also helps streamline customer consent and preferences for marketing purposes.
• Security Center is now available on Government Cloud and is FedRAMP High and DoD Impact Level 5 authorised. IT teams and administrators now have complete visibility across all business units to centrally view, monitor, and manage security health.
• GovSlack, a version of Slack designed to support key government regulations for processing and storing sensitive data, is now FedRAMP High authorized. This provides a secure experience for public sector agencies, allowing them to connect their people, tools, and partners in one place and break down communication silos.

Salesforce perspective: “Public sector organisations want to simplify their technology stack, better engage with constituents, and reduce employees’ administrative burdens while improving employee productivity. With Public Sector Einstein 1 for Service, organisations can implement trusted AI to become more efficient, better manage and harmonise their data, and give employees the tools they need to better serve their constituents, all while driving their mission forward.” – Linda Saunders, Salesforce Director Solutions Engineering Africa.