Introduction

Since launching our Intelligent Automation research area in late 2017, every month we have delivered insightful Peercasts featuring member companies’ experiences, sometimes using a panel format with multiple member companies discussing the pros and cons of available solutions, and at other times with one member company featured on a specific topic.  During the past two years, twelve of these Peercasts have followed an open format, best described as “Our Story – Implementing Intelligent Automation”, where the featured company shared their experiences, including lessons learned, with Peercast attendees, where attendee questions were answered candidly and honestly. 

Because Peercast attendance is restricted to member practitioners, there is never any reason for bias or restraint, with all attendees able to talk openly about their experiences.   Best of all, members can easily follow up privately with the featured presenter for a one-off conversation, or exchange comments or questions privately with other attendees using Peeriosity’s integrated Peer Mail capabilities. 

Company Experience

A Peercast^TM in our Intelligent Automation research area featured a global company with $5B in annual revenue, more than 10,000 employees, and operations in 25+ countries, discussing their story for implementing Intelligent Automation within their Global Business Service’s (GBS) organization.  Their GBS organization has a broad scope of services including:

1. Order–to-Cash
2. Procure-to-Pay
3. Record-to-Report
4. Hire-to-Retire
5. Quality and Regulatory Compliance
6. Integrated Business Planning
7. Centralized Process Improvement, Automation, & Measurement

Within the Centralized Process Improvement, Automation, & Measurement area, the featured company shared experiences about deploying Robotic Process Automation (RPA). Their RPA journey started four years ago when they became aware of RPA and then quickly selected a small third-party development firm, completed a vendor evaluation, had discussions with IT, and established their first RPA governance team.  The first implementation of RPA went live three years ago, resulting in 1,200 hours of savings.

Two years ago, the company added additional processes to the scope of RPA projects and formalized its partnership with IT, in addition to bringing the development work in-house.  As a part of this transition, they identified and began training for eleven internal resources, which included nine with business expertise and two with expertise in IT.  These resources were part-time at first, with many eventually transitioning to full-time as part of a newly created Process Automation Team.

The Process Automation Team was formalized last year, with five full-time developers and a Center of Excellence lead.  They have implemented ten new processes to date, and are on track to deliver eight more in 2019, resulting in a reduction of over 10,000 hours in manual work effort.

Some of the lessons learned include:

1. Include IT early, particularly as it relates to leadership, security, and architecture.
2. Pay attention to messaging, so that the “people part” of the change is communicated properly.
3. Make sure selected processes are well documented, understood, and that they work well without the need for rework or excessive troubleshooting.
4. Have realistic expectations of the time needed to complete each project and the resources required.
5. Developers must have significant process knowledge to be successful
6. Properly implemented and managed, RPA is a game changer, with a very large and positive impact on work processes.

Closing Summary

Every month Peeriosity members participate in private and exclusive discussions with Peers as members of a practitioners-only research community that delivers primary, “from the source”, research with details on how leading companies are evaluating and implementing Intelligent Automation.  Each Peercast is supported by member research, using Peeriosity’s iPolling^TM capabilities to highlight the range of approaches followed, with the ability to see details by company, and with an option for following up directly with peers for additional discussion.

What approach does your company take to access primary research for how leading companies are implementing Intelligent Automation?  If you have already started your Intelligent Automaton journey, what is your primary objective today, and do you expect that to shift over time?

Who are your peers and how are you collaborating with them?

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“Peercasts^TM” are private, professionally facilitated webcasts that feature leading member company experiences on specific topics as a catalyst for broader discussion.  Access is available exclusively to Peeriosity member company employees, with consultants or vendors prohibited from attending or accessing discussion content.  Members can see who is registered to attend in advance, with discussion recordings, supporting polls, and presentation materials online and available whenever convenient for the member.  Using Peeriosity’s integrated email system, Peer Mail^TM, attendees can easily communicate at any time with other attending peers by selecting them from the list of registered attendees. 

Peeriosity members are invited to log into www.peeriosity.com to join the discussion and connect with Peers.   Membership is for practitioners only, with no consultants or vendors permitted.  To learn more about Peeriosity, click here.