How to select the right opportunities for automation?

Processes are the backbone of any company and are present everywhere: purchasing, production, sales, finance, support, and so on. If you want to keep or achieve a top position in the market, you cannot rely on just being good. Rather, it is important to constantly improve. Processes play an essential role in this and their continuous improvement has a significant impact on the success of a company.

Improving processes has always been the focus of my professional career and after more than 20 years I believe that it is basically very easy to design the perfect process. All you have to do is maximize efficiency and minimize risks. Everything we do to improve processes falls into one of these two buckets, right?

But of course, improvement is not that simple, which is because we rarely know where in the process the problems occur, how or what causes them, and how to fix them. Process Mining does help to create the necessary transparency, but then something has to happen for the situation to change and hopefully improve.

Execution matters!

Basically, there are three levers to improve processes. I like to abbreviate them with PPT. This does not mean PowerPoint, of course, even though PowerPoint often plays a big role in improving processes. ??

PPT stands for People, Process and Technology:

1. Process: You can optimize the process flow by, for example, eliminating superfluous activities or changing the sequence of activities to avoid bottlenecks.
2. People: You can train the people involved in the process, enabling them to work more efficiently and make fewer mistakes.
3. Technology: You can, of course, use technology, such as automation, to improve processes.

Why automation?

The need for automation derives from the situation that companies use not just one, but usually several systems to handle their processes. These systems are constantly being adapted and expanded to meet market requirements and legal regulations. Complete integration of all systems is almost impossible in terms of time and money, and so people often close these gaps by acting as the interface between systems. Copying data from one system to the other and back is not efficient, human errors create risks and for employees this work is often frustrating. Such rule-based and repetitive activities are particularly well suited for the use of software robots, also known as RPA (Robotics Process Automation).

Think, before you start to automate!

I'm a big fan of automation, and there are many good reasons for automation. But before reflexively trying to solve all problems with automation, ask yourself if doing so would solve the problem or make it worse. A simple framework to do this is ESSA.

• E - Eliminate: If we discover inefficiencies and risks (e.g. with process mining), we should first try to eliminate them. Especially in the case of risks, I have not yet encountered a customer who would have liked to see risks automated and thus generated more efficiently.
• S - Simplify: Not all apparent inefficiencies can be eliminated. Approvals may be bottlenecks and slow down a process, but they are necessary to avoid risk. But you can try to simplify these activities.
• S - Standardize: Once you have found a simpler way to perform an activity, you should ensure that the activity is always performed in this standardized way.
• A - Automate: Simple and standardized activities are particularly well suited for automation with RPA.

If you follow these four steps when selecting automation potentials, the chances increase that you will end up with a really good, safe and efficient process and not just an automated crap process.

And lastly, a reference to a video I recently stumbled across: Elon Musk's 5 step process for making things in a better way. I don't know about you guys, but I see some parallels there.

Thank you so much for taking the time to follow my thoughts. I would be happy to hear your feedback and happy to read other opinions or experiences.