Future of Work
Summary
At ServiceNow, we make work work better for people. This past year has shown us the impact the world of work has on productivity, and it is our goal to accelerate its transformation to meet the needs of our employees and customers. In this session, we'll cover the who, what, where, and when of the future of work at ServiceNow as well as examples of how we as an organization are putting these methods into practice. We will also discuss trends and opportunities appearing in the new future of work and ways companies can adapt.
Key Insights
-
•
Hybrid work models require seamless integration of physical and digital workplace environments to foster global collaboration.
-
•
Real-time data on workspace usage enables smarter business decisions and better support for hybrid employee needs.
-
•
Flexible and staggered work schedules help reduce burnout and require companies to promote calendar hygiene and a culture of trust.
-
•
Measuring productivity by quality of work rather than hours spent is essential for flexible work environments.
-
•
Distributed teams benefit from tooling that simplifies access to resources like Zoom recordings and clear remote work policies.
-
•
Environmental impact considerations are influencing business travel policies and employee tooling for travel decisions.
-
•
Reskilling and upskilling are critical as automation shifts work from roles to skills, with dedicated learning time becoming a priority.
-
•
Automation in IT follows principles of automate, accelerate, and amaze, emphasizing customization and user empowerment.
-
•
Integrations, such as bringing ServiceNow tasks directly into Microsoft Teams meetings, reduce tool-switching and increase productivity.
-
•
Organizations face challenges balancing autonomy in tool choices with maintaining connected data and reducing blind spots.
Notable Quotes
"Companies are no longer dependent on where people are located to work."
"With how of work now separated from where we work, the design process stays the same—thinking holistically for all personas and touchpoints."
"Flexible and staggered schedules help people not get burned out."
"It doesn’t matter when work is done, so long as it’s done and its quality."
"Instead of measuring productivity by hours or busyness, focus on quality of work."
"Employees can take as much or as little time off as they want, so long as their job gets done."
"As manual tasks get automated, individuals can focus on higher-value tasks and training machine learning systems."
"Bringing tasks directly into meetings lets you work where collaboration is happening without jumping between tools."
"The future of work is about making the user the hero—humans and machines working together."
"Roles are evolving with automation, but the shift toward skills is what will define future jobs."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Short-term learnings kind of roll into long-term ones as you iterate and build on historical findings."
Taylor Jennings Joe Nelson Alex KnollRepository Retrospective: Learnings from Introducing a Central Place for UX Research
March 9, 2022
"Speculation fills in the gaps where past experience fails us, often seen in hesitation or pauses."
Nicole AleongFuture Orientations to Everyday Life: Futures Anthropology as a Methodology
March 26, 2024
"Disruptive innovation is about changing customer behavior, not shipping features."
Jeff GothelfInnovation Studios: the Engines of Enterprise Experimentation
May 14, 2015
"Meeting designers where they spend their time, like integrating accessibility plugins into Figma, is the most effective way to make progress."
Saara Kamppari-MillerDesignOps for Inclusive Design and Accessibility
May 26, 2022
"If you don’t have the basics taken care of, infinite promotions and ping pong tables are just noise."
Tess DixonC'mon Get Happy
September 29, 2021
"Our skills matrix became the center of gravity for our practice—it started writing job descriptions and guiding recruitment."
Liam ThurstonWhy Your Design Team Is Quitting, And How To Fix It
June 10, 2022
"Your career is a design project. It’s the only one you own, so own it like you would a product."
Ian SwinsonDesigning and Driving UX Careers
June 8, 2016
"Choosing the right hill to die on is so important and so hard; the problems that matter come around again and again."
Leisa ReicheltOpening Keynote: Operating in Context
November 7, 2018
"Slowing down is hard in a capitalist economy that values speed, but patience and self-care are necessary."
Rachael Greene Alison DavisBuilding a Design Ops Practice that Really Works (Most of the Time)
October 2, 2025
