Architecture & capabilities

Overview

The Customer Order Manager is built on a set of integrated agentic skills coordinated by a Supervisor Agent. This article covers the core skills that make up the Digital Worker, how its agent modes and configuration options work, the full order management workflow, integration points, and how it determines when to proceed automatically versus when to involve a human.

Agentic skills

The Customer Order Manager operates through five core skills. Each handles a distinct part of the order management process.

Customer communication

Handles all order-related conversations with customers, including acknowledgments, status updates, and clarifications. This skill sends confirmations when orders are received and processed, and drafts clarification requests when information is missing or unclear. All customer-facing communication is managed through this skill, ensuring a consistent and timely response regardless of order volume.

Order processing

Interprets incoming orders and converts them into validated purchase order confirmations with correct details and validations. This skill parses order content from emails, PDFs, and other document formats, structures the data, validates completeness, and prepares it for ERP entry. It handles unstructured formats and applies extraction rules to reliably pull part numbers, quantities, prices, and delivery information.

Asset discovery

Identifies the relevant assets, configurations, or product context needed to fulfilll the customer order accurately. This skill validates parts, sizes, and units against system records, ensuring that what the customer has ordered maps correctly to what exists in IFS Cloud before any order is created.

Quote evaluation

Reviews pricing and quote details to ensure the order aligns with agreed commercial terms before processing. This skill checks customer-specific pricing, discounts, and contract terms, flagging any discrepancies between the incoming order and the terms on record.

Notifications

Keeps teams informed by sending timely alerts and updates when actions, approvals, or exceptions are required. When an order is processed successfully, teams receive confirmation via Microsoft Teams. When an exception is detected, the notification includes full context so the team can make a decision quickly.

Agent modes and configuration

The Customer Order Manager offers two agent configurations to match the complexity of different order types.

Basic agent mode uses standard language models for straightforward order processing with clear part numbers and standard formats. This mode is suitable for high-volume, well-structured orders.

Reasoning mode employs advanced reasoning models for complex scenarios requiring deeper analysis, unclear formats, or sophisticated validation logic. This mode is appropriate when orders involve ambiguous formatting, non-standard part references, or multi-step validation requirements.

In Reasoning Mode, administrators can configure:

• Reasoning effort: Controls how much computational effort the agent applies to problem-solving and validation

• Verbosity: Adjusts how detailed the agent's responses and logging will be, supporting transparency and debugging

• Concurrent processing: Enables parallelization of tool execution to improve performance when handling multiple orders simultaneously

Order management workflow

The following table outlines the full order management workflow from initial intake through to customer communication.

Order Intake & Parsing	Parses orders from email, EDI, and portals; extracts customer, items, quantity, price, and dates; handles unstructured formats	Structures order data, validates completeness, triggers order workflow	Email / EDI / IFS
Order Validation & Contract Check	Validates pricing, checks customer terms and discounts, identifies inconsistencies	Flags discrepancies, applies validation rules, routes for exception or auto-processing	IFS / Teams
Availability & Feasibility Check	Checks stock availability, identifies constraints such as lead time or capacity, detects fulfilllment risks	Confirms feasibility, flags constraints, triggers alternative flows if needed	IFS
Order Creation & Processing	Validates structured order data, ensures ERP readiness	Creates order in IFS Cloud, ensures data consistency, triggers downstream processes	IFS
Exception Handling & Resolution	Identifies mismatches in price, date, or quantity; detects incomplete orders	Triggers human-in-the-loop review, suggests resolution options, resumes flow after decision	Teams / Email
Customer Communication	Detects need for acknowledgment or clarification, identifies delays or issues	Sends order confirmations, drafts clarification emails, provides status updates	Email

Tools and integration layer

The Customer Order Manager uses a comprehensive set of tools to interact with IFS Cloud and connected systems:

• Get Defaults: retrieves site ID and coordinator defaults

• Get Customer ID: searches and matches customer names to retrieve customer IDs

• Get Customer Bases: fetches customer-specific defaults needed for order creation

• Get Addresses: retrieves stored customer addresses for validation and matching

• Check PO Number: validates whether a customer PO number has been used previously

• Get Sales Part Numbers: retrieves cross-reference information for part number resolution

• Get Part Information: fetches detailed information for each part including conversion factors

• Create and Update Order: generates the customer order record in IFS Cloud

• Update Entities: adds new parts to the system when necessary

Integration points

Email Systems: Monitors Microsoft Outlook and Gmail inboxes continuously, processing incoming customer orders with PDF, image, and Excel attachments in real time.

ERP Platforms: Integrates directly with IFS Cloud to read customer records, validate part numbers and pricing, and write complete order details automatically.

Collaboration Platforms: Uses Microsoft Teams, Slack, OneNote, and Google Drive for exception notifications, approvals, and documentation.

CRM Systems: Connects with Salesforce, HubSpot, and Qoncierge to maintain customer relationship context and communication history.

Document Processing: Handles PDFs, images (JPG, PNG), Excel sheets, and EDI with high extraction accuracy using OCR and AI-powered parsing.

Human-in-the-loop design

The Customer Order Manager is designed so that routine processing happens automatically and human judgment is applied where it's genuinely needed.

The system proceeds independently when:

• Part numbers are valid and exist in the system

• Quantities are standard and delivery requirements are clear

• Customer information matches existing records

• The order is complete with no exceptions or discrepancies

Human input is required when:

• Part numbers are invalid or don't exist in the system

• Information is unclear or missing and requires clarification

• Only some line items in an order are valid

• Orders involve pricing discrepancies or contract term conflicts

• Business judgment is required for high-value or complex decisions

When an exception is detected, the system identifies the specific issue, sends a detailed notification via Microsoft Teams with complete context, allows team members to provide guidance directly in the Teams channel, and executes the approved action immediately once a decision is made.

Testing and validation

The platform includes an evaluation environment for testing and development. Teams can input sample email bodies with realistic content, attach PDF documents containing customer order information, trigger the agent and observe processing in real time, and monitor all tool calls and interactions.

Debug mode provides detailed visibility into the inputs and outputs of each tool call. Advanced view breaks down each operation into form input, API task, and response processing components for complete transparency into how each step is being handled.