17 February of 2021 — Bangkok, Thailand
RPA stands for Robotic Process Automation, but the scope of work of RPA can be as wide as your imagination. With the potential of simplifying, improving efficiency, and cost reduction, several companies welcome RPA to renew and transform its operations.
In the research on RPA by Deloitte, in 2018 the main objectives of implementing RPA in a company were to Focus on continuous improvement (35 percent), Increase the level of automation (24 percent), Develop analytics capabilities (17 percent). However, after 3 years there is another relevant factor that companies started considering and that is Customer Experience Improvement.
Nowadays, new RPA companies are providing solutions in the form of SAAS model for small companies to make use of the RPA technology without creating heavy stress to their liquidity. These companies let you create solutions in a simplified way, they integrate additional functionality, from 3rd party developers that make the automation simple and fast.
So what to do and what not to do when thinking about RPA?
We created a list of what we believe is the checklist for RPA Implementation:
- Have a strategy. RPA is a great solution and even if you don’t have a strategy it will probably bring benefits but the impact is significantly higher if you have a clear purpose and a bigger goal.
- Do your homework. Take a look at the processes that you currently have and that improving them would take you closer to your bigger goal.
- Do more homework. Research different solutions, there are many vendors offering RPA solutions. Find one that in the short term can solve your problem and in the long run will help you reach your ultimate goal. There is no point in getting the best for just one part if the rest will not be covered.
- Be ready, make sure that your systems are able to integrate the new solution. Not all companies can implement the same solutions so make sure that your solution matches your current restrictions for integration.
- Think creatively, there are many solutions and plug-ins you can use, some vendors have OCR plug-ins, Cloud integrations, Chatbots solutions, and many more options you can use to fully automate your process.
- Build a team that is fully dedicated and committed to polishing your automation, a mix between different teams helps improve the development process.
Now, what is really important to avoid when working with RPA.
- Do not forget that RPA requires a transformation process and that many people involved will need to understand the new processes.
- Think beyond Cost, Do not make your decision entirely based on cost savings. RPA brings several benefits and some of them include: improved compliance, improved customer experience, improved quality/accuracy and improved productivity
- Do not drop your goal halfway through. RPA implementations have great potential of solving problems and making things more efficient, that is why it is important to have a clear understanding and a larger picture of what you want to achieve.
- Do not forget about the scaling potential. Even if your current process is efficient enough for your operation, do not discard the scaling potential RPA can bring to your business.
Even if robotics implementations will take effort and investment, your reward can be very significant if done properly. In the end, not everything is money, even if your RPA solution is not saving costs in the short run, evaluate other benefits that you can get from RPA. Developing an RPA with OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology, for an onboarding process, could potentially help you scale your business, speed up the waiting period for your customers, and have an overall boost of security.
RPA, for an operational process enhancement, can help reducing the amount of errors, reducing headcount assign to that role or even have scalability potential in your operation. Explore this opportunities and get more information on how to apply RPA.
By Jaret Carranza R.