Sleepwalking into Exclusion: The Hidden ITSM Risk for 2026

When IT service management (ITSM) and other digital leaders discuss ITSM risks entering 2026, the conversation typically revolves around outages, cyber threats, rising costs, tooling, or vendor lock-in. These are all important ITSM risks. But they’re also predictable. The ITSM risk, I believe, we’re underestimating is exclusion.

Why Exclusion Is the Hidden ITSM Risk

As artificial intelligence (AI) and automation are adopted at a pace, too many organizations are sleepwalking into exclusion. AI is being embedded into ITSM and business workflows, and to make knowledge explicit. Plus, decisions are increasingly being shaped by algorithms – often without a deep consideration of the human impact.

The danger is subtle: the dashboards stay green, the tickets close, the service level agreements (SLAs) are met – yet people are quietly left behind, falling further and further into the shadows. They are being excluded.

The Human Cost of AI in ITSM

Exclusion is not a “soft” issue. It’s a socio-economic risk with real-world consequences.

Consumers left behind by AI bias

For consumers, AI systems that lack transparency can entrench bias, creating digital barriers that are invisible but deeply felt. This leads to services that technically function but socially fail to meet expectations. Add to that the practical inequities, such as a lack of reliable internet, outdated equipment, or limited digital literacy. These aren’t edge cases – they’re everyday realities for millions of people. And while AI is often positioned as a leveler, it rarely helps those on the margins. It assumes baseline access, embeds existing bias, and usually replaces human safety nets with automated friction. Instead of enabling, it can overwhelm – creating systems that look efficient in a boardroom but feel alienating in real life. The outcome is exclusion by design, not by accident.

And if you are sitting there scoffing, know this. I’m not making this up; around a quarter of UK households (26%) had difficulty affording communications services in May 2025, which equates to approximately 6 million people.

Employees feeling replaced, not enabled

For employees, rather than feeling enabled by AI, many feel threatened or overwhelmed. Some worry about being replaced, while others worry about their ability to keep up with new tools and expectations. When people feel AI is “done to them” rather than “built with them,” engagement plummets.

And once again, this isn’t just a hunch. Rightly or wrongly, in August of 2025, 51% of those surveyed were worried AI would take or alter their jobs.

For the service management industry, if we fail to build inclusive pathways for education and training, the ITSM workforce of the future will be less diverse, less confident, and less capable of handling the very complexity AI promises to solve. In the second survey called out above, the highest percentage of those concerned were aged between 25 and 34. (For further clarity, the poll was conducted among large employers, including BT, Amazon, and Microsoft.)

Service management practices remind us that value is co-created between the service provider and the consumer. Exclusion is the opposite of co-creation. It locks voices out of the conversation, erodes trust, and ultimately kills value before it’s even realized.

How ITSM Leaders Can Tackle Exclusion

Don’t sleepwalk into exclusion

• Govern AI like any other supplier
• Treat AI decisions as you would vendor actions. Apply best practice governance principles of accountability, transparency, and ethical review. If you can’t explain why AI made a decision, you shouldn’t be using it. 
• Carry out regular service reviews with your AI – seriously, do it!

Fix knowledge before AI fixes you

• Knowledge management is the foundation of intelligent services.
• Without unified, findable, and context-rich knowledge, both humans and machines make poorer decisions – and exclusion creeps in.

Address the human impact of AI adoption

• Acknowledge employee concerns about job security and being overwhelmed.
• Develop training and communication strategies that position AI as an enabler, rather than a threat.
• Co-create adoption journeys with your teams so they see themselves in the solution.

Invest in socio-economic resilience

• Go beyond traditional SLAs and XLAs. Measure accessibility, affordability, inclusiveness, and fairness of AI-driven outcomes.
• Services should enable all communities to participate, not just the majority or those with privilege.

Educate for the future, not the past

• Retrain employees in AI literacy, ethics, and human-centered practices.
• For new entrants, emphasize inclusivity, adaptability, and service value – so the next generation builds with people in mind from day one.

Tackle Exclusion Now

The truth is, exclusion doesn’t appear on dashboards. It won’t trigger an incident alert or flag in a quarterly report. But its impact is profound: it breaks trust, stifles innovation, and undermines the very foundations of co-created value.

Final Thoughts: Inclusion as a Strategic Imperative

As we move into 2026, for me, the most significant ITSM risk is not technological failure. It’s the human cost of systems built without humanity in mind – where employees feel threatened, consumers feel unseen, and communities are quietly left behind.

Leaders who confront exclusion head-on won’t just reduce risk; they’ll create organizations where their people and consumers are truly enabled to thrive.

Download the full SymphonyAI white paper: ITSM Risks into Growth Opportunities in 2026