Cisco needed to make generative AI out there to each single worker in a safe, cost-optimized method. To do that, Cisco IT developed an inside AI-powered assistant — purpose-built with safety — designed to raise how workers worokay. Extra than simply one other software, Cisco’s inside AI assistant drives important effectivity and frictionless experiences for workers – with 73% of customers reporting elevated productiveness and a median time financial savings of 5 hours per week.
As AI instruments like ChatGPT emerged within the market, we noticed each alternative and threat. Whereas Cisco acknowledged the transformative energy of AI and the outcomes these instruments might allow for our group, the growing utilization of public AI options additionally raised important security and safety considerations for enterprises.
Seven in ten executives consider generative AI within the enterprise introduces new safety dangers for firm knowledge and are involved about workers inputting personally identifiable info (PII), consumer knowledge, or propriety info into engines like ChatGPT and Google Gemini (Salesforce, 2023). Counting on exterior AI providers might expose delicate Cisco knowledge to public coaching units — a threat we weren’t keen to take.
We wanted an answer that made generative AI out there to each single worker, regardless of the place they work from, whereas retaining Cisco knowledge safe and inside.
First steps to a safe answer
From day one, our precedence was retaining Cisco’s knowledge safe and in-house, not in another person’s coaching set. The unique structure Cisco’s Improvement Workforce launched in April 2023 was designed to supply a safe surroundings for workers to securely experiment with AI instruments. It was an enterprise-wide answer powered by Azure OpenAI fashions that maintained a dialog immediate retailer, audited prompts in actual time, and mechanically redacted personally identifiable info (PII) previous to processing.
Eight months after launch, the Cisco IT design group stepped in to reinforce person expertise and drive broader adoption. Initially, solely 30% of the workforce — primarily technical workers — had been utilizing the software. The purpose was to make sure all workers, no matter their technical background, may gain advantage from it.
The group took a user-centric and data-driven method, conducting foundational and generative analysis to completely perceive what workers wanted from this software. By leveraging all of the out there knowledge about person ache factors, figuring out what workers had been looking for, and evaluating it with the highest areas of friction, the design group constructed out key use circumstances for the assistant. These included options to assist workers brainstorm, code, translate, generate content material, find out about Cisco merchandise, and extra — in the end lifting the load of on a regular basis work.
This analysis revealed that the primary factor workers had been on the lookout for was IT assist — that means the true potential of Cisco’s inside AI assistant might be unlocked by means of ingesting Cisco knowledge. This grew to become the best precedence.
Transferring ahead to assist workers
We began by ingesting Cisco Individuals and Communities and Assist Zone knowledge (articles, web sites, and stories) into the software. We had Retrieval Augmented Era (RAG) options constructed for Cisco.com and SalesConnect (inside content material portal for all gross sales assets) purposes earlier. The identical capabilities had been added to the inner AI assistant as effectively to gauge the wants of gross sales customers — a audience our group needed to handle.
With this high-quality Cisco knowledge ingested within the software, workers can use AI for assist case troubleshooting, artistic writing, knowledge evaluation, questions, and even technical duties like community monitoring and configuration. It will possibly additionally streamline the onboarding course of for brand spanking new hires by supporting laptop computer or cell phone setup and answering questions on expense stories.
Establishing an ongoing working mannequin
Cisco’s inside AI assistant was constructed for speedy integration, strong safety, and actionable insights, all at a world scale. That is supported by an ongoing working mannequin the place our group constantly displays person suggestions and delivers options with agility, creating an iterative, full-circle course of.
To design an inside assistant greatest fitted to Cisco’s international workforce, we developed a layered structure round these parts:
- AI agent, MCP, and enterprise search platform: The AI Agent and Mannequin Context Protocol (MCP) platform hosts all of the AI brokers and MCP servers developed utilizing open-source AI frameworks. Its modular, plug-and-play structure offers the Enterprise AI/ML engineering group the flexibility to onboard new AI brokers and search purposes with out operational overhead. The platform additionally gives LLM-as-a-service and RAG-as-a-service providing to over 4300+ groups throughout Cisco.
- Enterprise AI agent registry and MCP registry: This registry permits workers to register and join all distant AI brokers and distant MCP servers developed by groups throughout the enterprise with standardized agent and MCP safety, agentic protocols and entitlements in order that workers can securely entry this linked agentic mesh from the inner assistant.
- Hybrid multi-cloud mannequin and AI agent orchestration: Utilizing a federated method, our inside AI assistant connects to a number of Cisco AI brokers and main AI fashions akin to Azure OpenAI, Claude, Google Gemini and Cisco’s inside massive language mannequin — Deep Community Mannequin. The platform mechanically routes every request to the most effective out there AI mannequin for deployments based mostly on workload, latency, reliability, and use-case. This ensures customers at all times get quick, correct outcomes.
- Constructed-in safety, knowledge governance, and observability: Safety is woven into each layer of the software, guaranteeing our office stays resilient in opposition to evolving threats whereas enabling innovation. Cisco’s AI Protection guardrails are used to scan person prompts and MCP server instruments for malicious code and hidden or missed threats.
- Superior knowledge operations and AI-driven enterprise influence: Area particular AI brokers have been developed to allow clever automation of enterprise processes by leveraging AI prepared enterprise knowledge.
This platform, alongside our ongoing working mannequin, permits us to deploy new options and effectively and constantly refine our roadmap — guaranteeing we keep on the forefront of AI innovation.
“Designed with a security-first mindset, our inside AI assistant has highly effective guardrails that mechanically detect and redact delicate knowledge earlier than it’s despatched to a public AI mannequin — giving our workers an clever accomplice they will belief.” – Sujith Joseph, Principal Engineer, Cisco
Driving better effectivity throughout our workforce
Since its launch, Cisco’s inside AI assistant has dealt with greater than 21 million interactions, serving 100,000+ customers throughout our international workforce.
Cisco’s inside AI assistant is greater than only a chatbot. It has shortly develop into essentially the most extensively used AI software at Cisco, facilitating a median of 156,000 every day interactions and driving better effectivity as 73% of customers reported elevated productiveness and a median time saved of 5 hours per week.
That is made doable by options and developments at the moment out there within the software, together with:
- Entry to the newest AI fashions
- AI brokers and LLM orchestration
- Information and picture evaluation
- PowerPoint technology
- Private RAG (RAG on person’s private knowledge in OneDrive, and many others.)
- Limitless Deep Analysis (Analysis stories utilizing Cisco inside knowledge and net knowledge)
- Information evaluation AI agent
- Enterprise AI Agent and Connector Registry (Integration of distant AI brokers and MCP servers)
Classes discovered alongside the way in which
AI instruments are solely ever as dependable as the info they’re educated on. One problem we confronted early on was guaranteeing that we had been solely ingesting clear, high quality, and structured knowledge into the software. Something much less might actually lower the standard of the responses and the usefulness of the answer. The Dev Workforce performed continuous and rigorous testing to assist be certain that the assistant doesn’t hallucinate and constantly gives updated and correct responses.
Moreover, driving adoption throughout our international workforce introduced challenges, particularly amongst AI-cautious or non-technical workers. Regardless of the answer’s approval for extremely confidential Cisco knowledge, there was a stage of apprehension surrounding its use and potential misuse. This spurred an effort to upskill our workers by creating efficient demos, enablement assets, and growing normal AI consciousness.
Our user-driven, design-led method was essential for navigating these challenges and allowed us to construct a software that caters to the wants of our numerous workforce. We proceed to finish generative analysis to grasp how our workers use the AI assistant and the way it will resonate with them of their day-to-day work.
From product to platform
AI is remodeling industries at an unprecedented charge. Whereas most organizations acknowledge the pressing must undertake AI applied sciences and instruments, many should not totally ready to successfully leverage AI. At Cisco, we all know that AI is now not a futuristic idea. We’re constantly innovating internally — creating AI-powered instruments, securing them, and in the end empowering our workers to do their greatest work day by day.
Constructing on its robust basis, Cisco is concentrated on evolving the AI assistant from a product right into a dynamic platform, empowering workers to have a hand in shaping their AI expertise. The Agent Registry and upcoming Agent Builder options will allow customers to tailor the software to greatest match their wants at work. Not solely will this enhance the general usefulness and worth of the AI assistant, however it can additionally assist upskill our workforce, constructing a extra technically proficient and AI-fluent worker inhabitants.
As a dedication to Cisco’s funding in AI, the Cisco Automation and AI Heart was just lately created to give attention to increasing the adoption of AI. Trying forward, the imaginative and prescient for the inner AI assistant is to develop into a dependable, always-on accomplice that may seamlessly combine into each workflow, anticipate wants, and allow groups to give attention to what issues most.
The inner AI assistant isn’t simply altering how we work at Cisco; it’s a cornerstone of constructing a future-proofed office that’s safe, adaptable, and prepared for what’s subsequent.
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