Robotic Process Automation

The primary concern of the business associations or organizations has always been to perform or execute their different objectives such as scalability, security, compliance etc in unison with making the process cost-efficient. To achieve cost-proficiency several approaches have been implemented by the organizations and automating the services using robotic process automation (RPA) is one of the most significant one (Ghosh, 2018).

RPA is a software dependent approach that performs different iterative manual operations in a system which otherwise are performed by several human workers. Some of these operations are updating, analyzing, processing data etc (Aguirre & Rodriguez, 2017). In simple words RPA can be defined as an approach that enables configuration of a software robot which executes the iterative tasks which are performed by humans in an organization. Thus to summarize, it can be asserted that the work done by a robot in one minute is equivalent to the work done by a human in 15 minutes (Penttinen, Kasslin, & Asatiani, 2018).

RPA has been employed in several business processes like billing system, maintaining the records of employees etc. In order to perform the business processes such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management (CRM) etc the time consumed by human workers is comparatively much more than that taken by robots since these tasks is repetitive in nature and is associated with migration of data from one system to another (Aguirre & Rodriguez, 2017). Apart from reducing time consumption, the tasks performed by robots allow humans to invest their time in other value-added tasks. Thus RPA enables automation of tasks on rules-based process (Willcocks & Lacity, 2016a) Some studies have discussed the advantages of implementing RPA in different business processes (Asatiani & Penttinen, 2016; Willcocks & Lacity, 2016b) while some studies emphasized on the criteria for employing RPA.

Hence from the above discussion it can be affirmed that RPA is the technological version Siebeck & Oulabi, (2012) of a human worker employed for executing tasks automatically enabling speed and cost-efficiency for the organizations. It is noteworthy here that though the term RPA brings to our minds a picture of physical robot, it is completely a software based approach for executing iterative tasks performed by humans (Willcocks & Lacity, 2016a).

As per the Institute of Robotic Process Automation (IRPA) (Frank, 2015), some of the key characteristics that differentiate RPA from other automation technologies such as Business Process Management Systems (BPMS) are as follows:
• RPA lies above all the existing systems and accesses them via presentation layer in such a way that the programming logics implemented in other systems are not disturbed.
• Contrary to the other approaches, RPA solutions are not dependent on any programming skills rather they are executed by just dragging, dropping and linking icons.

Advantages of RPA
Some of the key advantages of implementing RPA in an organization are as follows (Naveen Reddy, Harichandana, Alekhya, & S. M., 2019):
1) Continuing service: Since the approach is based on software or employs robots for its functioning, it should be noticed that there is not required any break while performing the tasks.
2) Scalability: The task assigned to one software robot can be applied to n number of robots and thus there is no need to modify the process even if the task is assigned to another robot.
3) Truthfulness: Contrary to humans, the RPA solution ensures that the task assigned is completed without any fail.
4) Time: It has been clearly mentioned that the time consumed by robots for executing a particular task is much less than that consumed by humans.
5) Improved Efficiency: RPA approach enables faster execution of tasks assigned and that too in an efficient manner.
6) Greater Productivity: Unlike human effort, the robots perform tasks in comparatively reduced time and thus offer higher productivity. In addition they also allow the other human resources to be free and invest their time to gain additional knowledge and use their skills towards innovative and growth giving projects, rather than performing iterative tasks.
7) Elimination of human error: The RPA approach does not leave any scope for occurrence of error while performing the tasks thus exhibiting higher accuracy and saving time in performing the same task again and again.
8) Lower turnover: Since the iterative tasks performed by humans make them feel boring after a certain extent, it leads to low turnover or lower productivity. This issue is completely alleviated in case of RPA solution.

Disadvantages of RPA
1) Monetary Expense-Since implementing RPA solution in an organization can be beneficial but it also imposes certain restrictions related to cost, as the approach is costly.
2) Lack of technical ability-In order to implement RPA, the end user should be equipped with appropriate technical ability.
3) Redundancy: One of the most common causes to resist RPA is that implementing RPA will completely replace humans, while its primary objective is to support humans in their work.

Thus taking into consideration the advantages of RPA for different business processes, it should be mentioned that implementing RPA in the business organizations is necessary in order to maximize the profits of company, in terms of finance as well as human resources. Implementing RPA in the business organizations can be helpful for the business organizations to face the tough competition in future (Madakam, M. Holmukhe, & Kumar Jaiswal, 2019).

Applications of RPA
Some of the key applications of RPA are as follows:
• Healthcare and pharmaceuticals
• Financial services
• Telecom
• Energy and utilities
• FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) etc.
ov, 2019).