AI will transform the role of implementation consultants

To quantify this future of work, ServiceNow paired up with research partner Pearson for the third year in a row to produce the 2025 Workforce Skills Forecast. This study assesses how AI agents and related technologies such as generative AI (GenAI) will impact tech workers like implementation consultants and the organizations that employ them in the next five years.

[NOTE: Experienced human writers and editors used AI to help research and draft this article.]

ServiceNow and Pearson used machine learning to mine labor market data in 10 countries (Australia, Canada, Germany, India, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, the UAE, the UK, and the U.S.). The resulting analysis maps the changing relationship between people and AI in the workplace and predicts that AI will change the mix of skills required for people and organizations to thrive.

Long-term impacts of AI on implementation consultants:

1. Strategic player: Consultants will spend less time on technical execution and more time on strategic advisory work, interpreting AI outputs in a business context. To do this well, they must reimagine their role from being a technical to a transformation advisor.

2. A focus on governance: In the years ahead, there will be a high expectation that software and implementation consultants act as liaisons between AI and humans, ensuring that AI-based solutions are adopted responsibly and with robust ethical and governance oversight.

By 2030, the impact of AI and other advanced technologies on the implementation consultant role will be high.

Even as the position transforms, our research shows that an additional 32,800 implementers will be needed in the U.S. to satisfy increasing demand over the next five years.

Implementation consultants play a pivotal role in helping organizations integrate new technologies into their business operations. This role requires them to collaborate closely with clients to understand their specific and unique technical, business, and operational requirements. It requires a thorough knowledge of technology to allow for the proper configuring of technological software or tools to fit specific client processes. The role also includes ongoing support of the technological implementation by providing training, troubleshooting, and documentation to allow clients to get the most out of the system.

According to ServiceNow University, the average annual U.S. salary for an implementer (not just in a consulting role) focused specifically on the ServiceNow AI Platform is $112,000.

The key responsibilities of an implementation consultant include:

• Acting as the single point of contact for projects and overseeing project reporting and resource management
• Helping to lead during the design phase and document user stories to align current processes with recommended best practices
• Providing technical guidance during workshops, assisting in the creation and refinement of user stories, and configuring the solution during the execution phase
• Supporting the project team with the design and configuration of a technological solution

AI will significantly impact the role of the implementation consultant, radically changing the workflows, expectations, and skills needed to succeed in this career. Why? Implementation consultants focus on project management and software implementation, tasks that can benefit enormously from AI-powered agents.

According to our research with Pearson, 38% of an implementation consultant’s current role will be automated or augmented by AI over the next five years, the highest percentage of any of the roles studied.

Three-fifths of that will come from the impact of agentic AI, and the rest will come from the application of non-agentic AI tools. AI’s impact on this role will translate into more than 15 hours saved per week per person by 2030—9.4 hours saved by agentic AI and 6.2 saved by non-agentic AI.

For tasks impacted by agentic AI for the implementation consultant role, 11% will be fully automated, meaning humans will not be needed to complete those tasks, and 12% of tasks will be augmented, speeding up the work and allowing people to do much more than they could on their own without AI. Tasks that will see the most impact from agentic AI include management of client meetings and project recordkeeping. Non-agentic AI tools will take over much of the data analysis humans now do.

Interestingly, more experienced/advanced implementation engineers will experience only a 12% impact from agentic AI (half to automation and half to augmentation), per the research. This may be because they bring a depth of knowledge, experience, and soft skills that cannot simply be replaced by AI.

As agentic AI becomes increasingly prevalent in the workforce, implementation consultants can take the following measures to update their technical and interpersonal skills in order to remain relevant and even thrive.

• Reskill and upskill: Implementation consultants (and all tech workers) should prioritize learning AI-related skills, such as AI governance, ethics, and systems architecture. As agentic AI takes on more complex roles, human supervision will be indispensable.
• Master AI tools and improve data literacy: Become an expert in generative and agentic AI tools such as OpenAI APIs, AutoML, and other enterprise automation platforms. A high level of comfort working with and interpreting large data sets produced by AI-driven analyses will be vital for future roles.
• Develop soft skills: A high degree of communication skills and empathy will help implementation consultants translate AI-created insights into the priorities and language understood by clients and stakeholders. Additionally, a knowledge of change management skills that can help organizations adopt AI-enhanced systems successfully will be highly valued.
• Hone business acumen: Consultants will need industry-specific expertise to advise clients on how best to leverage AI systems for the most competitive advantage in their particular sectors.
• Adapt to hybrid work models: Agentic AI is likely to reshape workflows, creating hybrid teams of humans and AI-powered digital teammates. Workers should adapt to these collaborative environments, learning to work dynamically—and successfully—alongside their new AI colleagues.
• Embrace emerging job categories: The introduction of agentic AI will lead to entirely new job categories. Due to the high degree of automation and augmentation in the implementer role, these workers should be proactive in exploring related and emerging tech-focused opportunities, especially in fields like AI-human interaction design, AI ethics consulting, and AI maintenance.

By honing these skills and adopting a mindset of continuous learning, implementation consultants can maintain relevance and thrive alongside agentic and non-agentic AI. Keep in mind that AI is a tool—albeit a very powerful one—but it’s not a replacement for human ingenuity. By focusing on adaptability, continuous learning, and leveraging uniquely human traits, tech and IT workers can position themselves as indispensable collaborators in an AI-driven future.

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