How to use intelligent automation to improve your business processes

Automation today has seeped into almost all the relevant aspects of the business world. From robots to automated deliveries, every organization is trying to read the benefits of automation in some way. The number of automated jobs increases by 14% every year. A survey conducted in 2017 proved that 86% of the employees believed that automation services will help them do their jobs more efficiently.

Intelligent automation is the method of automating your key business processes to increase the overall efficiency of a workplace. It is also known as cognitive automation and combines three tools- robotic process automation (RPA), business processes management (BPM), and artificial intelligence (AI).

Intelligent automation is a much sought-after technology as it delivers concrete benefits to companies. It not only simplifies processes for the human component of the workforce but can also eliminate operational inefficiencies.

Intelligent process automation is extremely relevant to business as it has diverse applications. Intelligent automation can be used by financial institutions, government bodies, manufacturing units, hospitals, schools, universities, and the list goes on. It adds improved support for collaboration in analytics, decision-management, social media integration, etc.

What is a business process?

A business process is a sequence of activities performed by a group of stakeholders to achieve a specific business task. It is the basic building block of a business function. In a business process, connected tasks are assigned to various participants who undertake them in an ordered fashion.

Business process management helps organizations build and manage workflows to their most optimal potential. It helps streamline tasks and eliminate confusion in the workplace.

Three Main Components Of Intelligent Process Automation

Intelligent process automation is the integration of three cognitive technologies.

1. Artificial Intelligence (AI) – The most vital part of intelligent process automation, AI is a technology that uses complex algorithms and machine learning to observe, study, and analyze different kinds of data. Organizations can use artificial intelligence to create an information base and use it for predictive analysis. This component forms the decision-making engine of intelligent automation.
2. Business Process Management – the next part of intelligent automation is BPM or business process management. It is used to design, manage and automate workflows of an organization with the help of automation tools like low-code automation engines, etc.
3. Robotic Process Automation – The last part of intelligent automation, RPA technology uses bots to execute basic tasks such as acquiring data through forms or simple questions.

Benefits Of Intelligent Automation

1. Improved Accuracy

Intelligent automation is used to automate major parts of a business process, in turn, reducing manual activities and eliminating the risk of errors that arises because of human intervention.

2. Improved Efficiency

Algorithms do not get tired the way people do. Intelligent automation can be used to execute highly repetitive and mundane tasks without losing any time or speed iterations. The chances of an error occurring during task execution also get minimized through automation, hence the output gets delivered much faster.

3. Reduced Costs

The cost of deploying intelligent automation once is much lower than recruiting, training, and paying for an ever-evolving workforce. Intelligent automation also reduces costs by accelerating tasks and improving production speed.

4. Better Quality in Production

Intelligent process automation tackles an important aspect of quality which is the elimination of variation. By automating tasks, the variation between the execution of each task gets minimized and hence the output is of a homogenized, uniform quality.

5. Better Customer Experience

Firms that use intelligent process automation can automate certain customer interactions and query-related processes. This ensures a faster problem resolution for customers and enhances their customer experience.

6. Simplifies Compliance

Many firms, especially financial and legal services firms, need to adhere to a strict set of compliance regulation policies. Intelligent automation can help you automate certain tasks to develop a consistent system for meeting these regulations.

How To Use Intelligent Automation To Improve Your Business Processes

Intelligent automation has a slew of benefits. One of the best things about intelligent automation is that it is not very difficult to deploy. You can improve your business process with the help of intelligent automation by following a few steps-

1. Identify The Parts You Can Automate

The first step towards intelligent automation is identifying the parts of your business processes that you can automate without decreasing the quality of output in the process. You can do this by observing the data you have collected from your past processes.

2. Remember The Goal

Why are you trying to automate a specific process? While designing the automation strategy, you have to keep in mind what you are targeting. Are you trying to save time or money? Or are you striving for accuracy? Making one of the goals the primary focus will help you get clarity while making the automation design.

3. Design The Workflow

Map out the entire workflow with as many details as you can at this stage. Add parallel workflows as well as additional and optional tasks. Consult with the stakeholders involved in the business processes and take their input while revising the workflow design.

4. Automate and Test The Process

Use a low-code automation engine to automate specific tasks in the workflow. Once the tasks have been set up, execute the process in a controlled environment to test its accuracy and efficiency.

Planet Crust – Automate Tasks With Corteza

Planet Crust’s low-code solution Corteza helps you create, develop, and instantly deploy complex and high-value solutions in only a few days. You can use its automation engine to automate various processes of your business functions.