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ISG Research is happy to share insights gleaned from our latest Buyers Guide, an assessment of how well software providers’ offerings meet buyers’ requirements. The Conversational AI for Workforce: ISG Research Buyers Guide is the distillation of a year of market and product research by ISG Research.
The digital transition to artificial intelligence-enabled (AI) software is transforming 
enterprises in unprecedented ways. While many AI initiatives in business focus on data processing for analytics and operational efficiency, there is a notable shift with the rise of conversational AI. This advancement goes beyond traditional human-computer interactions, as sophisticated digital assistants and chatbots leverage large language models (LLMs) and generative pre-trained transformers (GPT) to engage in meaningful dialogues. These technologies have revolutionized question-and-answer interactions, paving the way for a new era of conversational AI. As businesses adopt these innovative applications, the workforce benefits from streamlined workflows, fully harnessing the potential of AI-driven conversations.
ISG Research defines conversational AI as a method that enables workers to engage using human language, enhancing interactions through natural language processing (NLP), LLMs and GPT to answer questions, gain insights and take actions. Conversational AI allows workers and teams to enhance interactions and improve productivity within organizations. It automates repetitive work, facilitates quick access to information and assists with tasks such as skill improvement, training and onboarding while providing real-time support for operational questions.
By enhancing communication and knowledge-sharing across departments, conversational AI for the workforce helps streamline processes and improve overall workplace efficiency. The AI-focused software assists or guides workers and customers in accessing precise information that is typically not easily accessible. The integration of conversational AI with agentic and generative AI (GenAI) platforms has now become a foundational requirement for enterprises to support the workforce effectively.
Conversational AI has experienced significant advancements since the 1950s, evolving from simple, text-based interactions like ELIZA to sophisticated systems that maximize AI and machine learning. In the 1990s, the introduction of voice recognition technologies enabled simpler engagements, followed by a shift in the 2000s to AI-driven NLP, which improved the understanding of context and intent in conversations. The rise of consumer virtual assistants like Apple's Siri and Amazon's Alexa over a decade ago demonstrated the potential for generalized interactions.
Today, conversational AI for the workforce capitalizes on a new generation of AI capabilities to revolutionize business processes and interactions across the workforce and with consumers. The transformation to natural, human-like dialogue—powered by NLP, machine
learning and speech recognition—has evolved from basic chatbots to more sophisticated virtual assistants, including those with voice interfaces to assist everyone in the workforce. As the digital workspace for conversational AI becomes essential for every enterprise, it increasingly enables smarter self-service applications. Through 2027, one-third of enterprises will need a workplace systems platform to monitor and act on the interactions of human and conversational AI systems.
Enterprises need conversational AI for the workforce to enable intelligent engagement and operational efficiency through accurate natural language understanding and personalized interactions that yield meaningful answers. As conversational AI for the workforce becomes more sophisticated, it is essential that it can draw knowledge from across business processes and organizational information to provide valuable insights. Moreover, explicit guidance is necessary to enhance productivity and ensure that the use cases and organizational changes required for success align with the incremental investments made.
For enterprises to succeed with conversational AI, it is crucial to integrate this technology into applications and systems to ensure that knowledge is easily accessible to the workforce. This integration will facilitate interactions with consumers and customers, allowing them to access information efficiently and engage meaningfully. Additionally, conversational AI for the workforce software must address the growing demands for privacy and security, as well as digital sovereignty across different countries and regions. As the adoption of conversational AI increases, the need for enhanced performance and responsiveness will scale alongside the importance of ensuring robust security and governance of the enterprise's information.
This Conversational AI for Workforce research aims to help enterprises navigate the rapidly evolving and complex landscape of communication and collaboration technologies, identifying software that best meets specific organizational requirements. This comprehensive research evaluates a full spectrum of offerings and can be used in conjunction with research on collaborative AI platforms, suites and AI agents. Unlike separate evaluations that focus on individual software categories, this research specifically explores how these technologies integrate to create unified digital workspaces that enhance productivity and engagement.
Enterprises should view conversational AI for the workforce as a strategic investment that enhances worker efficiency and transforms productivity in unexpected ways. When evaluating software providers, buyers should prioritize applications that seamlessly integrate into the digital workplace and support daily activities. It is important to consider the provider's innovation roadmap, especially regarding integration with agentic AI and AI agents to perform tasks and generate outcomes. By selecting the right conversational AI software, enterprises can establish a cohesive foundation that simplifies workflows and interactions for the workforce. Additionally, organizations should focus on developing new AI-infused digital experiences to achieve long-term communication excellence in an increasingly complex and regulated digital environment.
The ISG Buyers Guide™ for Conversational AI for Workforce evaluates software providers and products in key areas, including platform support, intelligence and workflow, agentic AI, analytics and insights, AI overall, communication administration and integration and specific AI support with conversational AI. This research evaluates the following software providers offering products that address key elements of conversational AI for Workforce as we define them: 8x8, Appian, AWS, Cisco, Dialpad, Google, Microsoft, Oracle, Pega, RingCentral, Salesforce, SAP, ServiceNow, Sprinklr, Tencent Cloud, Vonage, Zendesk and Zoom.
This research-based index evaluates the full business and information technology value of conversational AI for workforce software offerings. We encourage you to learn more about our Buyers Guide and its effectiveness as a provider selection and RFI/RFP tool.
We urge organizations to do a thorough job of evaluating conversational AI for workforce offerings in this Buyers Guide as both the results of our in-depth analysis of these software providers and as an evaluation methodology. The Buyers Guide can be used to evaluate existing suppliers, plus provides evaluation criteria for new projects. Using it can shorten the cycle time for an RFP and the definition of an RFI.
The Buyers Guide for Conversational AI for Workforce in 2025 finds Oracle first on the list, followed by ServiceNow and Microsoft.
Software providers that rated in the top three of any category ﹘ including the product and customer experience dimensions ﹘ earn the designation of Leader.
The Leaders in Product Experience are:
- Oracle.
- ServiceNow.
- Google.
The Leaders in Customer Experience are:
- ServiceNow.
- Oracle.
- Salesforce.
The Leaders across any of the seven categories are:
- ServiceNow, which has achieved this rating in six of the seven categories.
- Oracle in five categories.
- Salesforce in four categories.
- Google and Microsoft in two categories.
- Appian, AWS and Zoom in one category.
The overall performance chart provides a visual representation of how providers rate across product and customer experience. Software providers with products scoring higher in a weighted rating of the five product experience categories place farther to the right. The combination of ratings for the two customer experience categories determines their placement on the vertical axis. As a result, providers that place closer to the upper-right are “exemplary” and rated higher than those closer to the lower-left and identified as providers of “merit.” Software providers that excelled at customer experience over product experience have an “assurance” rating, and those excelling instead in product experience have an “innovative” rating.
Note that close provider scores should not be taken to imply that the packages evaluated are functionally identical or equally well-suited for use by every enterprise or process. Although there is a high degree of commonality in how organizations handle conversational AI for workforce, there are many idiosyncrasies and differences that can make one provider’s offering a better fit than another.
ISG Research has made every effort to encompass in this Buyers Guide the overall product and customer experience from our conversational AI for workforce blueprint, which we believe reflects what a well-crafted RFP should contain. Even so, there may be additional areas that affect which software provider and products best fit an enterprise’s particular requirements. Therefore, while this research is complete as it stands, utilizing it in your own organizational context is critical to ensure that products deliver the highest level of support for your projects.
You can find more details on our community as well as on our expertise in the research for this Buyers Guide.
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