Automation: The Rise of the People

New roles emerge in the era of Enterprise Process Automation

Of all the external forces that will affect companies over the next three to five years, CEOs now see technology change as the most critical. Cloud computing and the consumerization of IT are at the top of the list of reasons why. When you combine these changes with heightened customer service demands and greater end-user expectations, you can see how businesses now face a perfect storm.

Tempting as it may be to recruit more people to deal with all this, just having more hands on deck isn’t the answer. More manual work means more manual error. But automation doesn’t mean that robots will take over the world. On the contrary, you will need people in the workplace—the right people— doing more strategic activities to meet and exceed your goals.

In the current business environment it’s crucial to automate processes—especially for repeated, critical business processes. That way you can ensure the accuracy, speed, efficiency, consistency and quality you need every time. Activities such as payroll, billing, supply chain and system copy must be first on the list to automate.

When you automate these processes you get:

Faster, reliable, standardized and cost-effective process execution
Fewer errors
Rapid flexibility
Lower process cost
Highly skilled and knowledgeable staff freed from repetitive, mundane tasks and refocused on more strategic activities

Adapt and thrive

That’s right. Automation makes your workers more valuable and more strategic. With it your employees get to ditch the grunt work and focus on their real skills. They don’t just need to work anymore. They need to work smarter. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (as stated in Control Engineering magazine), the talent needed for process-focused automation in the U.S. manufacturing industry alone is expected to grow six percent from 2010 to 2020.

With the present and predicted rise in enterprise process automation, Forrester’s Stephen Mann expects us to see new roles being created such as:

Business relationship manager
Automation architect
Service designer
Service manager
Vendor manager
Process owners

Remember Bill Gates’ comment: “The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency.” There’s no question that automation isn’t just good for business. It’s good for people, too.