Customer satisfaction is currently the dimension that can really make a difference between businesses that populate the cross-industry competitive landscape. To put it differently, it is a safe assumption that unless you provide a customer with what, when, how, and for how much they want, another business most likely will.
In this race to improve customer experience, automation and its capacity to streamline operational processes, improve the quality of end products, accelerate processing, while at the same time keeping costs low and enhancing employee engagement, make a significant contribution to “your own personal” competitive advantage.
“Customer satisfaction is currently the dimension that can really make a difference.”
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However, RPA does not exhaust the meaning of automation, and lately, technological developments in the direction of intelligent automation have started to gain ground. In this business context, partnerships between IT service providers, AI vendors, and RPA providers can only sharpen your company’s competitive edge.
So it’s about time that you start to take seriously the question regarding what kind of intelligent automation partner or RPA partner is most likely to be conducive to successful enterprise transformation. Keep reading if you need some assistance for deciding to whom you should award your RPA project.
How to choose an intelligent automation / RPA partner the smart way
Before you engage in selecting the most appropriate partner, it is highly advisable that you start with a thorough evaluation of your business targets. The next step is to translate these objectives in the language of ‘automation needs’: what do you need automation for, for which processes, and in which departments?
Error-prone, high volume processes, which are marred by bottlenecks, constitute the initial pool of choices. Furthermore, the comparison between those needs and what various providers have to offer will help you decide which RPA partner is the most appropriate for you now.
You can also address the question about ‘automation needs’ in terms of use cases. Application areas specify the needs fulfilled by software robots in different industry sectors. In line with our pragmatic approach to technologically-supported business, we have consistently talked about robotic process automation use cases in, e.g., insurance, finance, media, healthcare, ports, etc.
How to choose an RPA partner the smart way
Automation partners, both RPA and intelligent automation partners, are technology consultants whose level of expertise allows them to support the implementation and, hopefully, scaling of these novel technologies in your company.
Their most important role is to speed up the digital transformation of your company at all levels. In order to make a smart choice, you should…
1. Find out which commercial model your shortlisted potential partners use
Let’s face it, cost reduction is the primary objective for implementing RPA. Therefore you want to know about the commercial models used by the service provider in order to minimise implementation risks and to make sure that your financial goals are realistic and attainable. Choose an RPA provider who is willing to commit to your expected cost savings.
2. Assess the capacity to innovate and design processes
The wise choice of automatable processes is the first step of a successful automation journey. Hence, a top criterion to be considered when picking out a potential automation partner is how well they understand the processes that make up the workflow in your business.
It goes without saying that the deeper this understanding, the easier it is to produce innovative process design. Since there are specific automatable processes across branches of industry, it follows that you will generally prefer professionals who are experienced working with other companies in your own industry sector.
Intelligent automation partners should be seen as engaging in team work with your company’s employees for process design, and this is a good reason to favour partners who also have counseling skills beyond the IT-related skills.
3. Check the automation delivery capabilities
When evaluating different service providers, you should keep your eyes wide open for relevant delivery information such as:
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Amount of automations delivered;
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Complexity of the delivered automations;
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Categories of automated processes;
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Categories of supported customers (easy to get via customer references);
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Time needed to deliver certain automations;
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Governance model;
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Approach to the development of comprehensive solutions.
Having enough data of this kind ensures the good fit of your company with a robotic process automation partner. To this end, you can ask specific questions in the request for quotation (RFQ), for instance, how long the candidate partners would take to automate a list of processes ordered by degree of complexity.
4. Gather workforce-related information
Knowledge about bench strength is the top priority here. Since you are looking for an RPA partner that is able to stick to your delivery timelines without paying the price of lower quality for this, it is important to know the competence, average experience, and number of employees ready to fill developer positions.
More factual data about the workforce may be valuable for your decision, such as the kind of training and support the employees receive from the prospective partner. If you know this, you can estimate the amount of time they need from hiring until they can actually deliver, and this is a relevant criterion for your choice because it tells you something about the partner’s role in accelerating projects.
5. Evaluate providers’ openness to intelligent automation
Intelligent automation platforms go beyond streamlining your business processes, towards making them smarter and better adapted to fulfill predictable future needs. An intelligent automation partner can better understand the peculiarities of your business processes (see also point 2 above) because its AI and machine learning capabilities allow more data and more kinds of data (i.e., structured and unstructured) to enter the automation platform.
Other positive effects of working with multiple data formats include accurate generation of customer data, effective risk identification, etc.
Conclusion
Long-term automation success is a matter of partnership between your company and the service provider. Just consider the intricacies of software integration, the numerous trial-and-error stages of pilot implementation, the complexities of project management, or the need for well-articulated development strategies.
A wisely chosen RPA partner allows the C-suite leaders and robotic Centres of Excellence to invest more cognitive resources in boosting and quickening ROI and devising optimal strategies for growth.
If you want to find out more about how to implement RPA in your specific industry, check out an eBook we recently released: Complete Guide to Implementing RPA Across 11 Industries.
