How to Survive in the Robotic Process Automation Skills Market

Robotic Process Automation, Intelligent Automation, Rapid Automation; everyone is talking about it, but very few have got it right yet when it comes to hiring.

As Rob King pointed out in his recent article on the key roles that make up a centre of excellence, https://bit.ly/2pZdDR0 there are essentially 6 roles needed to start out on your RPA journey. In our view, there is not one correct way to hire into these positions, but it is important to take a strategic view on the variability of demand and cost of these resources to ensure you are able to attract, reward and retain the limited pool of talent that does exist.

The market for skills in RPA is following a typical niche skills curve. People are being unskilled by their current employer, getting certified, working a few lifecycles, and going contracting. There is no escaping the fact that these skills are at a premium right now, and anyone being certified internally may end up leaving and chasing the money as soon as they get the letters against their name.

So how do you ensure you can compete in this skills market?

The first thing is to map the skills needed to set up a CoE and figure out where to attack the external market, where to utilise the SI’s, and when to benefit from skills you already have internally.

Simplistically, if the skills are:

Volatile and Core to your Business – Partner with consulting firms or SI’s who can provide expertise, flexibility and a bench.

Volatile and a Commodity – Use external contractors to deal with peaks in demand

Sustained and Core to the Business – Build your team internally. Develop the skills of your perm employees

Sustained and a Commodity – Buy the service through third party contractors

You are going to need to attract or promote an RPA leader to lead a centre of excellence and provide the strategy and vision for RPA.  These people cost money, and have plenty of options on the table, so you need to make your proposition compelling and move quick.

You should be able to up skill current business analyst’s / process analyst’s to create the criteria around opportunity identification, but be conscious that these people will quickly be on the radar or the competition and recruiters. What are you going to do to keep them with you?

Architecture, tech stack and development will either need to be satisfied via your System Integrator relationships, or the external skills market. If you have deep pockets, the advisory firms should be able to provide you with a wraparound service, but for a product that sells itself largely on how intuitive and simple it is to automate a process, this cost may be prohibitive for most, and will certainly remain the preserve of the enterprise.

If you do decide to dip a toe in the water of the external skills market, you need to remain focussed on how your business is being portrayed to the candidate community. Every interaction that you, your HR, internal recruitment, or a staffing business, has with a candidate, has a real impact on your ability to hire RPA experts.

A scatter gun approach to recruitment and a lack of prioritisation in the hiring process will never be successful when candidates are so in demand. You need to ensure that you have a single, dedicated voice to the market; a partner who can tell the story of the opportunity in a compelling way and ensure that your attraction and on-boarding process is slick and effective, whilst working with you to forecast future demand, ensuring an enduring pipeline of the right talent when you need to scale.

In such a rapidly evolving and in-demand market, you either prioritise your talent strategy or lose ground to your competition as RPA initiatives move on at a pace.