Adopting process optimization through the use of RPA (Robotic Process Automation) systems makes it possible to make various business areas more efficient. Born above all as software robots with the aim of automating back office processes, these software owe much of their success to very low implementation costs, to the drastic reduction of the percentage of error attributable to man and to the speeding up they bring to normal workflow. Today their possible use scenarios range from the acquisition of data from various documents for inclusion in business applications, to the processing and distribution of said data, once acquired, up to their possible exchange thanks to the integration between different applications such as they can be ERP and CRM. Process optimization can therefore take place in the context of business processes typically affected by a large amount of manual tasks. Among the many examples in this regard, we can mention 3 in which repetitive and routine tasks have a particularly significant impact: administration, finance and control, management of information systems and personnel management.
The corporate function of administration, finance and control provides for the management of various activities which include active and passive cycles, reporting, financial analysis and planning, tax services, etc. Process optimization, in this case, performs a double task: the automation of long sequences of activities; support in control systems which are generally based on 3 levels. The first includes the classic procedural, IT, behavioral, administrative-accounting controls that are used to verify the correct performance of operations. The second level focuses on cross-border risk and compliance controls. Finally, the third, the so-called Internal Audit, provides the guarantee that everything in the entire system is carried out in accordance with laws and regulations. All this translates into enormous manual tasks that an RPA solution can replace, introducing significant savings in time and resources, as well as resulting in greater satisfaction among employees removed from frustrating data entry tasks.
Similarly to the area of administration, finance and control, the management of information systems is also called upon to carry out a series of reiterative obligations ranging from ordinary maintenance of the infrastructure, to provisioning, to the configuration of new users, to the monitoring of servers and applications, to service desk management, systems integration and so on. What has been underlined for the previous function, i.e. automation of routine activities and control of internal processes, also applies to the management of information systems. With the further advantage that process optimization does not require an additional commitment of IT staff for the implementation of Robotic Process Automation, since it does not have any impact on the architecture and platforms and, consequently, no need for variations in the existing application park. This is because the software robots, in treating the data to be managed, behave as if they were human users in all respects, with the difference that they do it 15 times faster.
Personnel management is the third example of a company environment in which innumerable manual operations related to the function must be performed. From the elementary ones, such as the retention of personal data, to the more complex ones, such as the management of pay slips or the updating of duties, there are many processes that require data entry, verification and feedback. But they are also the most easily eligible in a process optimization path through RPA technologies due to their characteristic standardization. This last aspect, in particular, is what unites the 3 business departments considered, as well as others that could be added to the list. Although, in fact, the opportunities for process optimization thanks to automation cannot be dropped from above in all business situations, but require an accurate assessment phase, there are, however, some areas with a strong aptitude for their adoption. And the 3 cases mentioned clearly show this.