The business world constantly finds means to revolutionize the ways of working to improve business outcomes. Automation is one such way to simplify business processes. Surfacing in the 2000s, robotic process automation (RPA) has come a long way from its nascent stages. RPA has now become the buzzword among the C-suite and enterprises that are looking to automate their digital processes.
According to Grand View Research, by 2027, the global RPA market size is expected to amount to $25.56 billion. Besides large organizations, small businesses have also started embracing RPA solutions owing to the unparalleled business benefits and outcomes they can deliver. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, automation has assumed even greater importance and is becoming a business imperative.
What Is Robotic Process Automation?
To put it in simple words, RPA is a form of technology that uses software bots or digital workers to perform rules-based tasks. They can mimic human actions on the user interface, say a cursor jump or opening an application. After these tasks are precisely mapped out, the digital workers start imitating them. They can perform several tasks including:
- Opening emails and attachments
- Log into and log off enterprise applications
- Moving files and folders
- Copy pasting
- Field entry
- Performing calculations
Based on the way they collaborate with the human workforce, software bots are classified into two categories:
- Attended bots work alongside humans helping them with their tasks. They will be triggered by employees whenever needed.
- Unattended bots, as the name suggests, can work independently without human intervention. They are governed by logic and predefined workflow.
Robotic process automation solutions offer both attended and unattended bots based on the nature and demand of work.
How can RPA Help your Enterprise?
RPA cuts across several industry verticals including healthcare, banking, insurance, etc. Each industry is replete with use cases that are ideal for RPA. Here are some of the ways the bots help enterprises.
Boosts Efficiency
Is your workforce bogged down by unending manual, computer-based tasks that need little thinking? Are they predictable and measurable? For example, at banks, employees manually feed data into the system at frequent intervals. Though it is a crucial part, it cannot be denied that full-time resources are underused by working on routine and laborious tasks. With automation, those employees are offloaded from a task that consumed most of their time. Similar to a repetitive task, there might be a process where you frequently observe errors and calls for someone relooking it. Automating the right process with measurable savings helps you realize fast returns on investment.
Eliminates Human Error
Human errors are inevitable and likewise are the resultant costs. According to the IDC whitepaper (2008), human errors hurt organizations by $62.4 million a year. The software bots are consistent in following if/then rules. Being 100% precise and reliable in performing the tasks, the human workforce need not spend more time to relook or amend the errors. Thus, businesses can leverage RPA to maintain compliance standards. What you configure the bots with, they replicate the same. As long as the tasks are mapped correctly and optimized, an erroneous output is out of the question.
Improves Employee Satisfaction
Digital workers are relentless; they do not wear out. They can go on without a break 24/7 handling voluminous throughput. Snaplogic’s 2017 study revealed that 90% of employees perform rote and tedious tasks that can be easily automated. Robotic process automation solutions implemented in industries where large amounts of data are handled, for example, insurance and finance, bots can be deployed to fill forms. Imagine the time it frees up from your employees’ hands. They can now channel their time and effort into other critical and creative tasks instead of performing repetitive administrative tasks that breed boredom and dissatisfaction.
Faster Customer Service
Every business has enhanced customer service as one of their topmost priorities. With the number of man-hours saved by the bots, employees can spend more time interacting with the customers and solving their problems. Customer grievance redressal can happen in no time. Let’s see how this is possible. When a front-office worker interacts with the customers, he/she can trigger an attended bot that will retrieve the necessary information. The speedy response can significantly improve customer relationships. Also with digital workers in the picture, there is no downtime thereby accelerating the cycle time.
Adaptability & Scalability
It is easy to deploy additional bots and despite the scale, the RPA solutions can deliver similar business outcomes. While they are easy to implement, they can also be easily adapted. With the breach of the COVID-19 pandemic, many companies have started embracing automation technologies like RPA. According to a survey conducted by Forrester, 48 percent of worldwide organizations are expected to increase their RPA spending by five percent or more in the next year. RPA and other automation technologies are agile enough to handle the business problems that arise from the crisis.
RPA is continually evolving. The next-gen RPA is integrated with artificial intelligence and machine learning. With such integration, the bots learn each time a task is performed. There are several organizations that provide robotic process automation services combining their expertise in business process management. This results in a result-oriented productive business ecosystem.
If you think your organization is RPA-ready, it’s time to do a deep dive into various companies that are in the RPA landscape. For a successful RPA implementation, it is important to go with an organization that specializes in it. Vuram, a hyperautomation services company, specializes in robotic process automation services that can help you build a digital workforce. It’s trained RPA specialists can lead you on your automation journey.
