New research has revealed that 85% of customer service and support leaders plan to explore or pilot conversational generative AI (GenAI) solutions in 2025, underscoring the growing prominence of AI in the sector. The survey by Gartner, conducted from July to August 2024, included 187 customer service leaders and offers insight into how organisations are navigating AI adoption.
The findings highlight that many such leaders are stepping into strategic roles traditionally associated with IT. Nearly half (47%) of respondents said that their organisation is primarily responsible for identifying new AI opportunities, compared to just 19% who see this as IT’s role. A further 40% of respondents indicated that customer service teams are taking the lead in roadmapping AI evolution, with an equal 28% suggesting shared responsibility with IT.
While customer service leaders drive strategy, technical tasks like building, developing, and maintaining AI solutions remain with IT teams. Over half of the respondents attributed responsibility for development (55%) and operational support (57%) to IT. Notably, the responsibility for driving the adoption of AI is split, with 53% of leaders indicating shared roles between IT and customer service.
The survey revealed a strong focus on upskilling among customer service leaders, as 64% plan to dedicate more time to learning about technology in 2025, responding to growing pressure from executive leadership to make GenAI initiatives successful. “More than 75% of customer service and support leaders said they feel pressure from executive leadership to implement GenAI,” said Gartner customer service and support practice research senior principal Kim Hedlin. “The customer service function has a growing level of influence over AI initiatives. This historically people-and-process driven function has evolved into a technology-focused one.”
However, barriers remain. Many organisations rely on well-maintained knowledge libraries for effective conversational AI, yet 61% of respondents reported backlogs in editing articles and over one-third admitted to lacking formal processes for revising outdated materials. These gaps may hinder the smooth deployment of AI-driven solutions.
Growing adoption of AI transforming customer service across industries
Several organisations have already implemented AI-driven solutions to enhance customer service. HotelPlanner.com, a hotel booking platform, introduced AI travel agents capable of handling inquiries and processing room reservations. These AI agents, trained on extensive datasets of real staff interactions, communicate in multiple languages and perform tasks such as recommending hotels, checking availability, providing prices, and processing payments.
Similarly, Reddit has begun testing an AI-powered feature named Reddit Answers, designed to assist users in finding information more efficiently. This tool searches posts across the platform to respond to user queries, offering curated summaries of relevant conversations and linking to related communities and posts. Initially available in English to a limited number of US users, Reddit plans to expand this feature to other languages and regions in the future.
In the financial sector, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia has integrated AI across its operations to enhance services such as fraud detection and customer interactions. The bank’s AI chatbots offer sophisticated, context-aware responses, significantly boosting productivity by handling numerous daily inquiries and allowing human agents to focus on more complex tasks.
Read more: Vodafone ploughs £140m into new SuperTOBi chatbot rollout
