The term Robotic Process Automation (RPA) refers to a set of tools that enable to mimic human actions on a computer.
To explain the RPA, I typically use two metaphors:

1. A software-robot is like a macro on steroids – working across applications, able to execute complex processes with many steps, decision points and calculations
2. A software-robot is like a virtual employee working autonomously, receiving inputs, executing processes and sending or publishing the outputs, using own PC – physical or virtual, own logins and accesses.

The RPA tools typically provide an environment that enable to manage whole team of software-robots. This virtual workforce can work for you 24/7 and is scalable within seconds to reflect the variation of volumes of tasks that need to be processed.

Almost any industry vertical can benefit from the RPA. Naturally, the impact tends to be higher in organisations with higher proportion of back-office employees. We have experience with successful automations in large corporates such as financial institutions or telecommunication, mid-size companies as online retailers, manufacturing companies, shared service centers and BPO organisations as well is with companies with very small back-offices e.g. small franchises and hotels. Having worked in Australia, Asia and across Europe, I would have difficulties to recall a company where we wouldn’t find at least one process worth of automation.

There are plenty of examples in any company function. In general, a wide variety of business processes can be automated. There are several factors to consider. The processes to look for are those that include routine, rules-based and repetitive tasks, which require little or no subjective judgement. Other factor to consider could be error prone processes, specifically those in which compliance plays a major role and non-compliance may lead to costly fines or painful brand damage.

To name a few examples:
Finance: procure to pay process (incl. AP) – automated purchase order generation where triggers can be defined, supplier invoice receipt and processing, payments processing – finance overall is one of areas where the RPA is used a lot; Account Receivable (AR) – timesheets checking, application of correct rates, etc.
BI & Reporting: data gathering and report generation
HR: multiple activities from Hire to Retire – new employees on-boarding into the systems and deletion of leaving employees; transfer of  applicants data from recruiting agencies into company systems
Supply chain: stock levels actualization between company and suppliers
Sales back-office: commission calculations, sales orders processing

For more details, see  Automated Process Examples

To begin, we recommend looking at 3 initial steps:

• First, learn more about how the robotics can help your business, expected benefits, prerequisites, learnings and concrete examples from other similar companies. This can be easily done by setting a free consultation session with us.
• Second, select and automate one to three processes for which deploying software-robots is a non-regret. This means they represent a low investment with a high ROI and make a case for automation on their own. Doing so has several advantages: firstly, the business and IT will get familiar with the technology and will be able to come with further suggestions where the robots could be deployed. Also, with first robots in place, the organization begins to think differently – it will progressively change and standardize the processes to make them automatable. Many companies would be surprised how low can be the required investment.
• Finally, define and deploy new operating model using the robotization as a driver and enabler for change.

At this stage of market maturity, there are many lessons learned you can draw upon and using an experienced partner will help you avoid common mistakes that we have seen during early implementations. For anyone interested in hearing more, my team and I are available to chat. Please address us your questions.