Robotic process automation is changing the workplace by directly impacting the bottom lines through productively boosts. This completely justifies the growing need for workers with requisite skills.
In 2019, one of the most sought-after skillsets was RPA skills, and this was only trumped by people with taxation and Hadoop skills. RPA is a fast-growing industry, so it makes sense if you’re questioning whether your company is ready for RPA, hence the “readiness” term. When you begin, you may want to check out some RPA application areas first.
Some uses for RPA include operational activities in sales, questions through a customer portal, and management. But the question remains: is your business ready for RPA? The signs that your business is ready usually lie within the problems you’re facing.
Smooth Workflow Requires Difficult Changes in Your Human Workforce
Seasonal variation in the necessary amount of work has become an issue for businesses because there are unwanted fluctuations in the flow of business revenue. A good example is the hospitality industry. Peak cycles need too much from your current employees, and the only way to avoid this is by hiring more people. As the year goes on, it leads to less-than-optimal resource allocation.
When you increase your workforce during peak times, you waste money during your off-peak times. However, if you decide to not hire new workers, then your current employees will be overwhelmed during peaks and you’ll end up with a higher employee turnover rate.
Software robots are scalable and make your company more flexible. Using bots, you’ll be able to handle issues better than before by deploying or reassigning them to a certain process whenever you need them to.
It Has Become Hard to Deliver Your Business’s Services Efficiently
The typical indicator of your business’s efficiency is if your business can give your customers a satisfactory resolution for their demands in a timely fashion. With that being said, manual task performance can slow down service delivery, increase the chance for errors, and burden employees with mundane, repetitive tasks.
If your business is experiencing this, it may be time to use disruptive technologies to handle claims in a more efficient way. Additionally, RPA would free up time for your employees so that they can use their higher-level skills for higher-valued tasks.
Manual, Repetitive Tasks Waste Time, Skill, and Effort
One of the biggest benefits of automation is that it increases the speed and accuracy of task performance. Bots are almost error-free, and they lower the risk of human error.
Furthermore, spending a lot of time on repetitive tasks leads to a lack of motivation in employees and cuts down their satisfaction and engagement in their job.
Luckily, RPA is a human-centered way of doing business. It allows your employees to use their skills for more complex work and more time to interact with customers, which leads to a better customer experience.
We’ve listed some negative signs for why you may want to switch to RPA, but there are positive signs too.
Adress Any Optimization Challenges
Some issues your business may face with workforce optimization include:
Employees’ fear of losing their job: A common fear that workers have about AI is that it will take their job from them. Although the low-level tasks will become automated, AI isn’t meant to push human workers away. Instead, it allows employees to focus on more important things while they work in conjunction with the AI. With that said, many jobs will simply shift in focus rather than be completely automated.
Legacy workflows: Optimization will change a lot of roles, processes, and responsibilities, and this may result in backlash from your employees. You can help by training your employees to focus on less repetitive tasks and more complex and rewarding work.
Legacy technology: Traditional workforce optimization applications can’t meet the requirements of today’s multichannel customer service operations. Each channel is usually sectioned off from the others, making it hard to manage a multichannel workforce. This is why it might be time to change to a could-based platform. There’s no software to download, update, or maintain. Your data is stored in the cloud and can be accessed securely. Your total cost of ownership will reduce because you won’t have software or hardware on your premises, and you won’t need to manage them.
You Know What Business Problems You Want to Solve
Automation is not supposed to find new problems for you. It’s supposed to help solve problems you’ve already found. Think about it. You are far more likely to enjoy the benefits of a successful RPA implementation by following a strategic path that has a business process design suited to your business’s goals.
Having a list of your business’s needs, objectives, and resources is important for a successful automation journey. Being aware of your resources and the obstacles you have to get over to achieve your objectives is important for creating long-term plans toward specific targets that will show you if you are right to consider RPA implementation.
You Have Assessed the Benefits of RPA For Your Business
You will know if your business is ready for RPA based on your evaluation of your quantifiable measures and qualitative measures. These will help you make well-informed, rational decisions regarding the digital transformation of your company. There are a lot of people that would jump into RPA implementation right away, but to be successful you need to plan with realistic estimations of the costs and benefits of RPA.
In Terms of Silos, Your Business Is Way Past Traditonal
Look at all your resources across each department that could be affected by RPA implementation. If there’s well-established communication between business and IT teams, then this is the kind of thing that will fit nicely with RPA technology. Transparency between departments and filling the gaps between business processes are the kind of company culture that can benefit very well from automation.