Category: Blog

There used to be a time when robots were science-fiction; thankfully that time is now long past. Thanks to Robotic Process Automation, organizations are able to reap the benefits of efficient and effortless process execution. Using the power of digital technologies, companies are able to improve customer experience, drive growth, and scale rapidly.

Yet merely implementing RPA is no longer considered a strategic advantage over the competition. In an environment where all major players are vying to get a piece of the RPA pie, companies must formulate strategies for expanding the value of automation across all levels of the enterprise.

For FlinQ Automation this means the establishment of RPA Centers of Excellence (CoE) which incorporate all level of human resources, existing processes and disruptive technology to augment the benefits that are usually reaped from simple RPA. In setting up a CoE, it becomes essential to identify new automation opportunities, expand the reach of RPA throughout the organization and work towards a long-term vision of the future.

But first, at this juncture, it would be wise to discuss what exactly an RPA CoE is.

What is a Center of Excellence?

Put simply, an automation CoE is an organization which looks past viewing RPA as simply a tool for automating processes and instead tries to achieve a holistic view of automation as can be applied to the entire enterprise. The CoE should not consider RPA as a one-shot exercise, but rather as an ongoing operation involving careful, systematic planning, rigorous testing and regular evaluation.

One of the prime characteristics of automation CoE is that they do not view automation as under the ambit of one particular software or technology; rather the outlook is reversed and all automation processes being implemented in the organization are brought under one cohesive structure that blends in seamlessly with each department of the enterprise.

Who can benefit from a Center of Excellence?

The very term Center of Excellence seems to be a mouthful and may give the idea that they belong in the realm of giant enterprises, but the truth remains that a business of any size can benefit from setting up a CoE.

For large organizations the major challenge is to overcome the overall immensity of operations and integrate individual automation efforts into a cohesive whole. A CoE helps to do just that by efficiently recognizing automation opportunities and streamlining the RPA system.

Small and medium businesses on the other handstand to be future ready by proper implementation of CoE. While setting up isolated automation efforts may seem cost effective, in the long run it only adds to the overhead. A well-defined RPA strategy from the get-go can bring coherence to the automation of an organization in the long run.

At FlinQ Automation we have enabled organizations of various capacities for setting up RPA centers that deliver on the promise of excellence. And while doomsayers may cry job cuts due to automation, a RPA CoE is all about integrating the efforts of people together with the efficiency of automated processes. FlinQ considers the human workforce one of the key pillars for enabling successful automation.

The way to the future

According to the latest estimates by Gartner and Forrester Research, RPA is here to stay. Any organization that wishes to remain relevant needs to tap the power of automation CoE. FlinQ Automation can be your strategic partner in helping you develop your RPA capabilities and leverage technology to amplify your organizational processes. In this way, you stand to lead the way to tomorrow.

Every RPA implementation is different, but some key pitfalls occur regularly and can be avoided when you follow best practices. Here are some key lessons learned to help your company in the RPA journey.

#1 Understand the complexity of the processes you want to automate.

Rule-based processes are ideal candidates for automation. However, these same processes can cause complications for RPA when you do not understand and document the complexity. People can learn patterns, but RPA has difficulty mimicking this ability. A rule-based process that requires ambiguous decisions may prohibit the RPA implementation from being effective.

#2 Host design sessions to make sure business and technology users are on the same page.

It is important to hold “design sessions” which answer key technical questions before bringing RPA into your workflows.

The design sessions should include i) mapping out business processes, ii) gathering information from end users, iii) analyzing the frequency of process execution, iv) analyzing how often there are “exceptions to the rule”, and v) documenting process outputs

When you fail to hold technical design sessions, it can severely delay timeline and result in unnecessary re-work.

#3 You will probably need to ask people to re-engineer their processes – and this requires change management.

When you evaluate processes to automate, re-engineering is almost always recommended to increase the ease of implementation. The scale of these modifications, however, can vary. Factors such as data inputs required, preexisting data standardization, and flexibility in the sequencing of tasks can influence the amount of upfront work required.

For a seamless RPA implementation, it is important to manage the expectations of the project team. We manage these expectations by establishing communication which outlines the reasons for the process re-design and the actions required by the team. In contrast to most change management initiatives, RPA requires a robust change management plan before go-live, given the magnitude of change required by your teams.

#4 Test the robot to ensure it handles exceptions properly.

It is easy to start celebrating once your robot successfully automates a process for the first time. However, the real work begins in the testing phase to ensure the robot handles exceptions properly. Use activities which give the robot instructions on what to do in case of errors or when encountering unfamiliar grounds.

Finally, check, double check, and triple check that the process runs in all scenarios types before signing off on a successful implementation and handing over to the end user.

#5 Keep growth in the back of your mind at all times. There are multiple ways to perform one objective, but some configurations are more conducive to scale than others.

As companies grow and change, processes tend to evolve. Think object-oriented and make the design process a central key of your RPA implementation.

RPA developers tend to code workflows with fixed values for certain processes, and do not think about potential scalability. The company must go back into the workflow and re-configure the values to reflect the necessary change because the original robot was not developed with scalability in mind.

There are a lot of scenarios where designing a robot to automate a task could result in headaches when change happens. We recommend taking a flexible approach for all RPA implementations, taking growth into account.

#6 Achieving a return on your RPA investment

Robotic process automation, when implemented thoughtfully, can create tremendous value across your organization, as it has for ours. This value includes: Cost Savings and Employee Engagement.

Automated processes reduce the number of employee hours required, giving you the flexibility to grow your operations quicker without adding headcount.

In recent studies from Forrester and the Hackett Group, RPA is addressed as ‘one of the most disruptive forces in human history’. And they predict this trend to continue as companies have to improve productivity and performance. The new ‘digital workforce’ is fast and reliable. They make few mistakes and are available 24/7.

Forrester noted that most of the investments in RPA are in the areas of finance and accounting. And it is Interesting to notice that, with RPA, business units such as finance and accounting are more likely than usual to deploy and manage the technology themselves, instead of the IT department.

How to ‘add’ rpa to your already automated financial processes?

For the remaining tasks that have historically been difficult to automate, RPA can provide certain benefits. Every business has unique aspects to their workflow that enterprise software doesn’t automate. For example, in accounts payable companies often have to pull from or send invoices to a portal. You may have to extract only a few hundred invoices a month, so the process remains manual since it would be costly and time-consuming for IT to build an integration. But RPA can automate that process very quickly and affordably.