VHA, Labor Department tap Salesforce for critical modernization efforts

Two high-impact federal agencies that engage millions of Americans annually are turning to Salesforce-powered agentic technology to modernize and improve customer experience and automate — through AI agents — contact center engagement.

The Veterans Health Administration, which provides care for approximately 18 million veterans each year, will use Salesforce’s agentic AI-based operating system built on Slack to “create a single front door” for its 300,000-plus staff operating across 150 medical centers. AI-infused Slack automates data calls for facility metrics of patient trends without requiring users to log in to multiple systems, and it features “automated swarming,” where Slack AI alerts medical center directors — humans in the loop — when facility metrics like wait times or patient satisfaction dip.

“The goal is to make things more efficient for a human, so they can do the thing that matters most, which is human care,” Josh Geiger, portfolio manager for Access and Operations at VHA, told reporters at Salesforce World Tour D.C.

Geiger said VHA was “watching and learning at the same time,” balancing innovation with oversight to ensure necessary safeguards for proper data governance and necessary privacy for sensitive information like patient data. Geiger added that the agency is shifting from “reactive to proactive,” and believes the AI tools will improve patient care and reduce administrative burden for VA staff.

“If I can take that person’s time — we get congressional asks, FOIA requests, data calls — that is a lot of time to investigate all that,” Geiger said. “But if I have the data sitting somewhere and the ability to reduce that person’s time [performing administrative tasks],” it could save hours of their time.”

In a similar use case, the Labor Department will soon roll out an autonomous AI agent named “DOLA” — short for Department of Labor Agent — designed to provide 24/7 support to citizens and staff by automating inquiries through its National Contact Center. The center is a repository for accurate, current information on all 28 DOL programs, and, when launched, the DOLA agent will appear on the bottom right-hand side of the contact center’s website.

DOLA will take user prompts and recommend next steps, open formal cases, respond empathetically and autonomously launch escalation paths.

According to a Salesforce release, DOLA has potential for massive impact. The Labor Department fields 2.8 million citizen support and inquiries each year.

“Our definition of success is to provide great customer experience,” Tanya Slater Lowe, director of Labor’s Office of Public Affairs, National Contact Center, said in a case study published by Salesforce. “To promise things like transparency, consistency, and diligence. To treat everyone like a VIP and equip them with the information they need throughout their employment journey.”

Speaking to reporters at Salesforce World Tour D.C., Mia Jordan, the company’s digital transformation executive, said “there’s been an acceleration” of agentic AI pilots and projects across public sector customers after a brief period of reticence.

Customers experienced some challenges with the new agentic AI technologies, like standardizing workflows. Salesforce, she said, responded aggressively to help customers navigate their agentic journeys, answer questions and address challenges, in part by launching a forward-deployed engineers program. The teams work with customers to ensure AI agent launches run smoothly.

“Our implementation strategy here is to get our customers comfortable,” Jordan said. “We’ve seen an uptick in customers wanting to move forward and move forward fast.”