Top Ways to Kickstart Your Automation Journey & Stay Ahead of the Curve

Automation increases staff productivity, streamlines activities, saves time and money and provides higher efficiency, error reduction, and better uniformity, among other benefits. However, in order to reap these benefits, businesses must properly comprehend the automation process. Let’s take a look at how you may get started with automation and improve your digital corporate culture.

Businesses worldwide are exploring ways to automate their manual processes to drive efficiency, attain greater ROI and achieve digital transformation. According to new market research commissioned by IBM, worldwide AI usage has consistently increased over the last year, reaching 35% of those surveyed in 2022, indicating that the adoption of AI is set to further escalate as it continues to evolve, becoming more accessible and simpler to deploy.

In this article, we gauge expert insights on how businesses can effectively commence on their automation journeys and stay ahead of the curve in the coming years.

Ways To Kickstart Your Automation Journey

The automation process needs research, preparation, and enough communication, paving the way for higher productivity and seamless and streamlined workflows that reduce human errors. Let’s have a look at the best ways to start your automation journey.

Identify, evaluate, prepare, choose, and implement

Identify: According to Anjan Pathak, CTO and co-founder, Vantage Circle, the first step of automation is identifying the process and areas of automation. For instance, some departments are showing low productivity, and some tasks are time-consuming, creating issues at your back office. Thus, once you’ve identified the issue, you can target your automation accordingly regarding specific departments. 

“Also, while you’re identifying the issues and the need for automation in the said department, you must consider the business case for each. After all, everything does not require digitization. Thus, choose wisely.” 

Evaluate: The second step Pathak suggests to consider is to evaluate your chosen departments and issues. You must identify the problems associated with your current workflows. 

“So, analyze the process and look for issues, inefficiencies, and irregularities. This is important because automation cannot fix broken workflows. And rather, it will act the way you want it to act.”

Secondly, you must evaluate the risks of implementing an automated system and ways to mitigate those risks, he says. Risks involve security issues, disruption, and the impact of anxiety. If your automation tool is meant to hold sensitive and confidential data, you must start evaluating them immediately. 

Prepare: You’re now slowly approaching the main step, which is prepping – states Pathak. “Once you’ve identified the issues, departments, needs, and risks of automation, you can start preparing for your automation solution. You can start by reducing the risks you’ve identified until the benefits of automation overpower them.”

Communicate with your team how new roles and responsibilities will unfold. Once that is done, you must emphasize the training and help team members understand the process. This is a way to tell people that automation is not taking your job away.

– Anjan Pathak, CTO and co-founder, Vantage Circle

Here, you can change your management plan slightly to take your employees’ confidence. 

Choose: If you followed the first steps of business automation, you’d land up at this stage.” Pathak adds. “There are many options available. If you’re looking for an employee engagement platform with digital R&R and employee feedback and HR functions, there are options like Vantage Circle’s AIRe framework, Bamboo HR, etc.” 

It depends on which products “suit your needs the best and which will benefit you more” considering your business needs. 

According to him, you can also choose to build your own automation system. “Yes, this is a valid option. All you need is a good team of front-end developers, product design, UI/UX and design team, and an amazing content team. If this is not feasible, you can look for a third-party or outsourcing option.” 

Make sure you develop or build an automation system that caters to both employees and your end-users. Check for vendor track records, privacy, and security to mitigate other risks. 

– Anjan Pathak, CTO and co-founder, Vantage Circle

Implementation: After all the research, preparation, risk assessment, and choosing the right automation solution, you’re finally ready to implement. This is where, Pathak thinks, you start to understand the process, where it needs improvement and its best practices.

“When using it for the first time, start small. Do not go overboard. It is always better to use an easy and small bit to recognize the areas of improvement and risks. This will allow you to test the water and give necessary feedback to the service provider on what system integration needs to be done. This will also not hamper major and regular workflows. The initial implementation is always a trial and error method”

Once all the amendments are done, you can use the automation system satisfactorily for a seamless working and employee experience, he adds.