Is it possible to create a fully-automated business?
As the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the workforce around the world in the past few years, organizations have started to consider ramping up business automation.
Gartner stated that hyper-automation was one of 2021’s biggest trends in tech. As companies continue to invest in digital transformation, will adopting a hyper-automated ecosystem be worth the effort?
What is Hyperautomation?
Hyperautomation refers to the concept of automating everything in an organization. Businesses implement hyper-automation as an end-to-end toolchain that combines a variety of software and services.
The technology used to realize hyper-automation in a business includes artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) software. There are an endless number of possible use-cases where hyper-automation can be leveraged.
Process-agnostic software will allow hyper-automation to be used in a wide number of industries such as healthcare, manufacturing, and e-commerce.
Other technologies that can help automate a business include optical character recognition and conversational AI. These technologies will reduce the need for manual tasks and will allow the business to scale up at a rapid rate.
Key Benefits of Hyperautomation
Data Consolidation
Businesses that invest in hyper-automation can easily simplify the integration of various data sources. For example, the HR department can easily keep track of various onboarding, hiring, and payroll processes in a single portal.
Hyperautomation makes it possible for every step of a procedure to be logged and archived for future reference.
Productivity
Hyperautomation allows companies to increase productivity by automating manual processes. Employees can focus on more important tasks if they no longer need to perform manual data entry, emailing, and other regular tasks.
Scalability
Introducing hyper-automation to your business allows you to easily scale. Processes that may require more manpower when scaling your business will just need to be scaled up through upgrading your cloud service. Additionally, a hyper-automated system can easily scale up and scale down as needed, allowing you to cut down on unnecessary costs.
Examples of Hyperautomation
Robotic Process Automation
Robotic process automation occurs when we automate basic tasks by using software to mimic human-like behavior. RPA software follows processes defined by an end-user, such as filling out forms, customer feedback processing, and order management.
The use of RPA in organizations can help drive growth in new roles where employees can focus on higher-level tasks which require creative thinking.
Low-Code/No-Code Development Platforms
The hyper-automation ecosystem must allow for even non-technical roles to interact with it. This requires low-code solutions that will enable all teams to collaborate.
Low-code and no-code solutions must work with existing applications, services, and processes to allow people outside the IT teams to design and implement custom solutions. Low-code platforms such as Appian can allow teams to rapidly design enterprise-ready apps and dashboards that scale.
Providing low-code solutions to the rest of the organization allows developers to focus on more challenging problems central to the business.
Digital Twins
Digital twins are virtual replicas of physical entities in a business that helps teams make data-driven decisions. For example, the supply chain industry can set up digital twins of their processes to model how different scenarios can affect product delivery and warehouse usage.
Popular digital twin providers include Autodesk Tandem and Amazon’s IoT Twin Maker.
Challenges of Hyperautomation
While hyper-automation is useful for many organizations in the long term, each company will have different hurdles to cross when adapting it. Creating a hyper-automation ecosystem is not a simple task, especially for larger businesses with various systems already in place.
For example, a business that employs an IT team, Sales team, HR team, and Manufacturing department will have to find unique solutions for each of these areas. Each of these systems may operate at different time intervals and produce data in different formats. The challenge of hyper-automation is to steadily find a way to unify all these systems of your business.
Compared to traditional automation, hyper-automation requires a holistic understanding of how the organization as a whole operates. In order to succeed, businesses must have a comprehensive strategy that covers all departments, procedures, and personnel in their organization.
Conclusion
As seen in this article, hyper-automation cannot be achieved with a single digital solution. It is the combination of various digital technologies working together to form an end-to-end solution. These technologies differ from industry to industry, but mostly involve robotic process automation and low-code platforms.
Organizations that focus on growth and scaling their company will benefit from hyper-automation. Industries that rely on hundreds of manual processes to run will improve efficiency and accuracy by adapting to a hyper-automated ecosystem.
Which industries do you think will benefit the most from hyper-automation?
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