One of the reasons why RPA has such a high rate of implementation failure is because of the lack of understanding surrounding it. On top of unawareness, there are myths and fallacies that makes it even worse.
Perhaps in a few years, the business leaders will look back and laugh at themselves for believing in these myths. However, at the present, RPA is a relatively newer concept and all the myths surrounding is completely understandable.
Don’t forget, when the car radios were invented, people believed that it will make driving difficult and there will be chaos on the roads.
Everyone scoffed at the idea of cellphones, thinking it absurd to ditch wires in the house, and carry a small black box around.
Hence the suspicions of new unknown things are accepted. But it only gets harmful when it proves again and again that it is a success, but people fail to see it from the shroud of myths surrounding them.
Let’s debunk some of the RPA myths today:
Myth 1: RPA Implementation is Like Any Other New Software Installation in The Office
Not true. Robotic tools are unlike any other software and so is their implementation method.
Traditional software sticks to that one task they are developed to perform. This task could be any step of the operational process.
RPA on the other hand has a much wider approach and the bots work even on the user interface and collaborate with systems across all platforms, just like a human employee would. They are also scalable and can interact with various applications and almost mimic humans, unlike something a regular software can do.
Installing a software requires involvement of few departments, and doesn’t affect the entire organization by large, or the different roles. Deployment of RPA on the other hand begins with the involvement of the management, the C-Suite executives had to become part of the process. The decision to deploy RPA is soon followed by a new role, a project manager, who is to head the RPA implementation and then later, be responsible for every aspect of it.
The management also had to develop a strategy, in order to make the deployment more successful. Then the organization has to propagate the change via change management, because RPA is one of the changes within an organization that is sure to meet resistance.
Then the next step involves deciding on the processes that will reap the most benefits from automation. Once the processes are selected, another step comes in, which involves making the chosen processes optimized, established, and developed before integrating it with RPA.
Organization that believes in long-term planning often plan a whole infrastructure around the RPA system and how more bots should be deployed in the future to perform different kinds of repetitive, rule-based tasks.
Like we said before, RPA’s deployment is unlike the installation of any software. It takes more time, more efforts, and brings greater benefits.
Myth 2: Robotic Tools Can Never Be Inaccurate
Perhaps robotic tools can do no wrong but humans can since robots are a creation of mankind, it can also be inaccurate some of the times. Most business makes the grand mistake of thinking that robotic tools are 100% accurate and trust it blindly. Even more alarming is the fact that they believe all automation tools are the same and any one of it would do the job.
What most people don’t understand is that an automation tool can only be as accurate as its developer designed it to be. Even if the preconfigured instructions are not accurate, robotic tools will still follow it. Hence, if a robotic automation tool is wrongly configured or if the operations in a company are erroneous, to begin with, then the robotic tool will follow suit. It cannot act on its own and defy the humans to make things 100% accurate.
Like everything, RPA has its shortcomings too, and they become more pronounced when organizations do not expect them, and neither do they try to fill in the gaps. For instance, RPA cannot read or process any data that is non-electronic, hence organizations would need other technologies to fill in this gap so that RPA can register paper-based data.
Other shortcoming of RPA is that it cannot extract information like humans would, from all different kinds of formats, it is only programmed to read and understand one standardized format of documents. In order to overcome this, organizations need to maintain an unvarying format across all their channels including the clients’.
To make the most of the RPA tools, organizations need to find the holes and fill it in. Living in a bubble thinking that RPA can do no wrong can greatly affect its results.
Myth 3: RPA Is Not Relevant to Smaller Businesses
Most smaller business completely disregards Robotic Process Automation tools, by putting it in a box that says, only for behemoth enterprises.
This myth is the direct result of the implementation cost of RPA. Granted, it’s high but it is in no way, a luxurious investment. There’s a reason why experts keep stressing on the fact that RPA is now a necessity and does not belong to one province. Small or big, businesses invest money on assets they think will help them grow. Based on this myth, small business keeps on making smaller investments on anything but RPA, even on assets that guarantee little results.
RPA is as relevant to smaller businesses as it is to bigger enterprises, if not more. RPA is an asset that can help small enterprises become big. This myth is a myth because RPA massively helps smaller enterprises get rid of the day-to-day task complications and focus on the bigger picture. It helps small enterprises to eliminate the chances of error and save time and cost. Big or small, RPA can takeover accounting, human resource processes, supply chain management, and healthcare. Even smaller enterprises suffer from repetitive, monotonous and rule-based tasks and that’s where RPA fits in to bring results.
Think of RPA as large-scale recruitment in a company, only it is not humans but software that are employed. They single-handedly do the work of hundreds of employees in half a time. It fits right into the current system of the organization and mimics human behavior.
Omnisys Solutions has a well-developed practice in RPA, which supports both data analytics initiatives as well as carry out automation driven initiatives. With a focus on business value, Omnisys leverages RPA to deliver tangible dollar benefits to its customers.