How process automation has helped in making the organization more competitive?

What is most required at the workplace?

You might say it would be to keep the costs minimized and increase the productivity of the employees. If the efficiency in routine work can be boosted, the total revenue potential of can organization can increase tremendously. This can be brought about only by bringing down repetitive work. Employees should be made to put their attention in more value-added work that can bring in better returns. This is possible only through the introduction of process automation. By employing this method, you will be able to use optimum resources to get the highest results in a cost-effective manner. Technology, if properly blended with the valuable human resource can produce amazing business results.

Why is process automation required?

With process automation, what happens is the increase in the process activity with a higher level of efficiency. Better customer service is required to satisfy customers, otherwise,  you may lose them and the reputation of your organization may suffer. Without process automation in today’s competitive world where everyone makes use of technology to create an edge for themselves, you will not be able to serve your customers efficiently.

Take the example of Bombay dabbawalas organization (BDO) from being a cottage industry once to a profitable large-scale industry, and all they had to do was to standardize their scale of operations and automate it. Here is the link to a white paper published by IIM Ahmedabad explaining their success story.

With the implementation of business process automation, you can enjoy the following advantages:

• Repetitive tasks can be done by machines more quickly without the requirement of human intervention
• Chances of human errors are removed
• Accountability at the different stages of the business processes are transparent
• Communication processes become streamlined
• The stage of a job under process can be seen very clearly and the person on the task can be identified
• Problematic areas can be identified easily and greater thrust or assistance can be injected for solution
• Regular and frequent tracking of the work progress is possible with easy generation of reports indicating the progress of the job, the productivity of the workers and the efficiency of the entire process

So, how do we implement process automation?

• Standardize business process: There is a huge quantity of work that has to be performed in an organization. For doing these works, there are several processes to be followed that require the involvement of multiple employees and resources along with systems, data, and decision-making processes. With the help of  process automation processes are simplified with the manual jobs being reduced to the minimum. The employees can be made more productive by engaging them in jobs involving greater value which require human intervention and where automation cannot give the desired degree of results.

• Make use of technology: Once process automation is implemented, technology is used for the management of the process entirely. A proper routine is followed by the relevant persons for this automation to be exercised which is effective in bringing about the complete transparency of the jobs.

• It is useful for workers to have proper work know how: The domain knowledge of work is very important for getting any job done. The automation processes set up the ownership of the work being done and individuals become accountable for their share of responsibility in the different stages of the process. The ultimate effect is in the augmentation of communication and productivity.
  With the manifold advantages that can be derived out of process automation, almost all modern organizations have imbibed this system. To stay competitive, you too should embrace it, if you have not yet adopted automation.