Reasons Why Your RPA is Failing

Implementing Robotic Process Automation (RPA) might sound easy enough, but there’s actually a lot of skill and expertise involved, which is why many companies find that their RPA systems are failing.

Gina Schaefer, an American intelligent automation practice lead at Deloitte, commented on RPA failures which she thinks; “stems from a lack of overall vision and direction for the program, defined by the leadership and embraced by the business”, but then she also stated that “scaled automation programmes have proven time and again to drive impressive impacts and measurable financial returns”, but only when done right. So why might your RPA systems be failing?

You’re experiencing management challenges

Sometimes, RPA failures can be as a result of management techniques used to motivate digital workers. It’s a common misconception that, once the bot is built, the work is complete and it will continue to run both smoothly and completely autonomously, but this isn’t always the case.

This is because, much like when you take on a brand new employee, the bot will experience a few teething problems in its early days. It often takes time and experience with the RPA to iron those issues out in order for it to become a well-oiled machine.

If management of the RPA and your digital workforce is second-to-none, with time and dedication pumped into it as well, you’ll soon start to reap the benefits of a solid, reliable RPA system that can be utilised with very few problems arising. In turn, this helps to improve productivity and efficiency as well as save you time and money.

You’re having scaling issues

RPA bots are the perfect solution for those who are looking to copy data from one system to another, however, scaling challenges could make this difficult to execute, even if you have the most advanced RPA bot on the market that’s managed by highly-experienced professionals.

You’ll be able to iron these issues out by throwing more computer resources at your RPA system as well as reducing the frequency of data depth and breadth that’s moved by the bots and switching to a more direct integration system that falls outside of the bot technology.

Third-party problems are arising

RPA can also pose problems when retrieving data from third parties. This isn’t because there’s something wrong with the RPA. The problems come as a result of third party interfaces not being uniform enough. For example, a lorry driver might have to provide a certain amount of paperwork to show proof of delivery.

However, this could become an automated process, meaning that data would be retrieved with the help of RPA rather than being handed over to an actual person at the gate. This will save time and money as well as make operations far more efficient and productive. But despite this development, a company will still have to hand over or display the information that an RPA system needs to see.

For example, an RPA system might want to retrieve the lorry driver’s date of birth, but if the paperwork doesn’t display this information, then the RPA bot cannot do its job. But then a different lorry driver from another company could present you with, nearly, the same documentation but it will also provide a date of birth.

If such paperwork isn’t uniform across the board, then the RPA bot won’t be able to retrieve the data you need, therefore giving you the impression that it’s failing when it’s actually performing as it should be.

You have unrealistic expectations

It’s easy to think of an RPA bot as a highly-advanced, futuristic, modern system that’s fully-automated. If this was the case, you’d be able to leave it to do its job and never have to check in on it or worry about it again, but this view is unrealistic.

RPA is still in the relatively early stages and so it will still need a person to implement it and manage it accordingly. It cannot be implemented and then left for the foreseeable future to do what you’ve programmed it to do.

If you aren’t sure about how to implement or manage your RPA, then you should look to a professional to help you, such as the specialists at Cleardata. They’re able to provide RPA services to clients across the UK, regardless of the industry you work in.

Cleardata are leading document management specialists with many years of knowledge and expertise to draw upon. No matter what you need, from document scanning and RPA services to digital mailroom and archive storage, you’ll always be able to rely on our expert team of professionals. For more information about how we can help you today, get in touch with our dedicated team – we’re always happy to hear from you.