We built an internal AI operations agent for a growing B2B company. It processes incoming requests, chases missing information, updates business systems, routes work, follows up automatically and flags exceptions for a person to review.
Industry: Professional & Business ServicesService: AI & AutomationUpdated
Overview
The challenge
The operations team spent much of each day reading emails, checking attachments, copying details into internal systems, asking for missing information, assigning tasks and chasing open items.
That worked while volumes were low. As the company grew, response times became harder to keep steady. Hiring more coordinators would have added cost without fixing the workflow itself, so the company chose to automate the repeatable steps and keep people responsible for exceptions and important decisions.
A request could sit unread until someone had time to open it, work out what it was and pass it on.
Staff copied names, dates, order details, notes and status updates from one system into another.
In busy periods, missing documents, approvals and customer replies were easy to lose track of.
The solution
The agent reads each email, form or request, works out what the customer or colleague needs and pulls out the key details.
Following the company's business rules, it creates or updates records, asks for missing information, assigns tasks, drafts replies and starts the next step in the workflow.
When details are unclear, a policy rule is triggered or an approval is needed, the agent writes a short summary and sends the case to the right person.
Before and after
Before
Manual inbox review
Staff opened every message, worked out the request type and decided who should handle it.
After
Automatic sorting and routing
The agent classifies each request, captures the key details and routes it using the company's business rules.
Before
Copy and paste
Information was moved by hand between email, the CRM, spreadsheets and internal tools.
After
Updates made by the agent
The agent creates and updates records directly in the systems the team already uses.
Before
Relying on memory
Staff had to remember which customers, suppliers or colleagues still owed them information.
After
Follow-ups tracked by the agent
The agent tracks open items, sends approved reminders and alerts a person when something needs attention.
Key features
The agent carries out a sequence of actions rather than stopping after one reply, so work moves from intake to completion.
Business impact
Fewer manual hand-offs
It connects to the CRM, ERP and internal tools the business already uses, so staff switch between screens less and stop re-entering the same data.
Business impact
Less copying between tools
High-risk, unusual and approval-based tasks are kept apart from routine work, so the judgement the business still needs stays with people.
Business impact
Automation with oversight
Results
Faster First Action on Routine Work
Routine requests are read and passed to the next step as soon as they arrive, instead of waiting in a manual queue.
Before: Queue BasedAfter: Continuous
Less Repetitive Back-Office Work
Staff spend less time copying data, creating routine records, sending reminders and moving information between systems.
Before: Manual StepsAfter: Agent Assisted
More Team Time for Important Decisions
Rather than checking every case, staff focus on exceptions, approvals and situations that need business judgement.
Before: Review EverythingAfter: Review Exceptions
Faster delivery
These parts were already built and tested, so we spent less time on setup and more on the client's own process, and the agent went live sooner.
Our coordination layer let the agent run multi-step tasks, from reading a request to updating records and sending reminders.
Ready-made permission controls limited the agent to the tools and actions approved for each workflow.
Tracking kept a record of open items and agent actions, which powers the follow-ups and the activity history.
The rule layer holds the company's routing and escalation rules, so they can be adjusted as the process changes.
Trust and control
The agent can only use the tools and actions explicitly allowed for each workflow.
CONTROLLED ACTIONSA person's approval can be required before financial, contractual or customer-sensitive actions are completed.
HUMAN APPROVALAgent actions and workflow outcomes can be logged, so the team can see what happened and improve the process.
TRACEABLERules, integrations and approval paths can be adjusted as the company's process changes.
ADAPTABLEThe operations team was buried in manual inbox work. Staff read every email, checked attachments, copied details into internal systems, chased missing information and followed up on open items. That held up at low volumes, but growth made response times uneven, and hiring more coordinators would have added cost without fixing the workflow.
The agent reads each email, form or API request, classifies it and pulls out the key details. It then follows the company's business rules to create or update records in the CRM, ERP and internal tools, ask for missing information, assign tasks and send reminders. Unclear cases go to a person with a short summary.
The agent can only use the tools and actions approved for each workflow. Financial, contractual and customer-sensitive actions can require a person's approval before they complete. When a rule is triggered or details are unclear, the case goes to the right person, and agent actions can be logged for later review.
If your operations team spends its day copying details between email and business systems, we can map that process and show which steps an agent could take on, with people still approving the exceptions.