Systems and methods that offer significant improvements to current virtual agent (VA) conversational experiences are disclosed. The proposed systems and methods are configured to manage conversations in real-time with human customers while accommodating a dynamic goal. The VA includes a goal-driven module with a reinforcement learning-based dialogue manager. The VA is an interactive tool that utilizes both task-specific rewards and sentiment-based rewards to respond to a dynamic goal. The VA is capable of handling dynamic goals with a significantly high success rate. As the system is trained primarily with a user simulator, it can be readily extended for applications across other domains.