Intelligent Actions Agent

The Intelligent Actions agent executes actions across 200+ connected third-party applications using tool calling. It interprets natural language instructions to determine which tools to invoke, constructs the API calls, and returns the results. A single Intelligent Actions agent can manage tools from multiple applications simultaneously and intelligently selects the appropriate tool based on the user query and conversation context.

Formerly known as the External Tool Caller.

Use Cases

Your workflow needs to read or write data in an external application (CRM, ticketing, HRIS, accounting, etc.).
You want the AI Employee to take action in the real world -- creating records, updating statuses, sending notifications.
You need to chain multiple API calls across different systems based on LLM reasoning.
You want a single agent to orchestrate tools across multiple applications -- for example, looking up a customer in Salesforce, creating a ticket in ServiceNow, and notifying a team in Slack, all within one workflow step.

Inputs

Input	Type	Description
`instructions`	Text	Natural language description of the action to perform.
`context`	Text	(Optional) Data or parameters needed to complete the action (e.g., extracted entities, user input). You can feed output from other agents using the Additional Context configuration.

Outputs

Output	Type	Description
`result`	Text	The result of the tool execution in natural language.
`raw_result`	JSON	The raw API response data.

Configurations

Parameter	Description	Default
`integrations`	The connected applications available to this agent. Configured via the workspace integrations page.	All workspace integrations
`instructions`	Additional behavioral instructions (e.g., "Always confirm before creating records").	None
`max_tool_calls`	Maximum number of tool calls per execution.	`5`

Supported Integrations

The agent supports 200+ applications across categories including:

CRM: Salesforce, HubSpot, Pipedrive
Ticketing: Zendesk, Freshdesk, ServiceNow, Jira
HRIS: Workday, BambooHR, Rippling
Communication: Slack, Microsoft Teams, Gmail, Outlook
Productivity: Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Notion, Asana
Accounting: QuickBooks, Xero, NetSuite

See Integrations for the complete list.

Custom Tool Integrations

When the pre-built catalog does not cover a specific system, you can build custom tool integrations using Ema's no-code builder so AI Employees can call any HTTP-accessible API as an Intelligent Action. Custom tools are created as Custom Apps on the Integrations page. Each Custom App can hold one or more actions, and once registered, these actions appear alongside pre-built tools in the Intelligent Actions agent configuration.

See Custom Integrations for a step-by-step guide.

Multi-Tool Selection

A single Intelligent Actions agent can support tools from multiple applications at once. The agent's decision engine evaluates the incoming request, selects the appropriate tool within the correct system, fills required parameters, executes the call, and returns the result for post-processing. This design ensures flexibility and scalability across diverse workflows with minimal manual routing.

To add tools, click + Add in the agent configuration panel to open the tool selection menu. Choose the target application (such as ServiceNow) and select the specific tool actions you want to enable -- for example, Create Ticket, Update Due Date, or Add Ticket Comment.

Parameter Configuration

Each tool may require a different set of input parameters. Click Manage against any tool to open its parameter configuration screen. For each input, you can specify how the value is filled:

Fixed value -- A specific constant that should always be used for a parameter. For example, you may want the User ID to always default to a predefined value.

Human-in-the-Loop (HITL)

You can enable HITL for each tool within the Intelligent Actions agent. When enabled, the agent pauses execution and prompts the user with a confirmation step before executing the tool action. Configuration options include:

Message, confirmation button, cancel button -- Customize the text displayed to the user.
Hidden parameters -- Select parameters that should be hidden from the end user (e.g., User ID).
Mandatory vs. optional HITL -- Mandatory always pauses for approval; optional invokes HITL only when the agent needs more information to proceed.

See Intelligent Human Collaboration for full details.

How to Use This Agent

After extracting invoice data, create a record in the accounting system:

document_trigger -> extract_entities -> intelligent_actions("Create an accounts payable entry with vendor={{vendor}}, amount={{amount}}, due_date={{due_date}}") -> workflow_output

Multi-tool workflow -- look up a customer, then create a support ticket:

chat_trigger -> intelligent_actions("Look up customer {{email}} in Salesforce, then create a ServiceNow ticket with their account details") -> respond_using_action_calling_results -> workflow_output

To display the output of a tool call to the end user, link a Respond using Action Calling Results agent immediately downstream. This response agent interprets both the original input query and the raw output from the Intelligent Actions agent to return a user-friendly response.

Respond using Action Calling Results -- for formatting tool execution results into user-facing responses.
App Navigator -- for web UI automation when no API is available.
Send Email -- dedicated email-sending agent; prefer over Intelligent Actions for email.
Human Collaboration -- for routing to a human reviewer outside of per-tool HITL.