how does randstad digital implement your RPA strategy?

You’ve finally made your decision. You’re sure that RPA will be an added value for your company. Now for the next step: finding a good partner. Every company has its own methods and works with its favorite software. You’ll have to pick the RPA partner that suits you best.

what should you pay attention to when selecting a partner?

Your partner should deliver 2 things: knowledge and software. Sometimes your partner will ask you to take over the software that they work with. Other companies will look for the perfect fit for you. If you have to take over your partner’s software, you should make sure that you can carry the costs and that it’s user-friendly. 

Furthermore, you should also keep in mind the experience your partner has. Your automation partner will have to train you, so that eventually you’ll be able to do it all yourself if you want to - including the maintenance of the software.

Of course there are always companies that are cheaper. But don’t fall into the trap. Cheaper is often equal to less knowledge and less experience. They won’t offer great quality.

Our Randstad Digital RPA experts are always ready to help companies automate their processes. In this article, we’ll tell you more about our methods.

our RPA methodology.

Our experts distinguish between 4 stages in every automation project:

• discover
• develop
• deploy
• evaluate

In each stage, they’ll take you through a number of steps. Depending on the processes you’re looking to automate, some steps may take more or less time. 

1. discover.

The real RPA work starts in this stage. We will help you define a list of candidate processes and create an RPA Center of Excellence (CoE). 

candidate processes.

The first step in the automation process is defining your needs. Which tasks are repetitive, boring and prone to error? From which processes would you get the most ROI if you were to automate them? But also: what is the final goal of the automation? Do you want to generate knowledge or awareness, or do you want to lighten the workload? We make sure everyone works towards the same goal.

Then we’ll start collecting ideas, together with the employees that execute the tasks to be automated on a daily basis. We often do this during a workshop or a meeting with all the stakeholders.

The feasibility of the automation also has to be tested. To help you with this, we will create a scorecard for you. This card will help you eliminate certain processes that can’t be automated, because they are too complex or too expensive.

Once the results of the scorecard come back, we will write a business case. You’ll get a clearer view of what your company will gain by using automation. We’ll use the scorecard to set the right priorities.

rpa center of excellence.

When the scorecard has been defined, it’s time to create an RPA Center of Excellence (CoE). This is an RPA team that guides your automation process with the right energy, knowledge and tools.

The CoE usually contains the following roles. These roles can be assumed by your colleagues or by our experts. Depending on the size of your company, these responsibilities can be combined or even skipped.

rpa sponsor.

The RPA sponsor is responsible for positioning RPA as a strategic priority and for freeing up the necessary budgets. Moreover, the RPA sponsor decides which processes will be prioritized, and make sure all goals are reached.

automation manager.

The automation manager makes sure the entire organization is on board with the automation project, and they collect ideas to fill your pipeline. They are also responsible for the operational management of the bots. 

rpa change manager.

The change manager informs all stakeholders of the automation project and the upcoming changes. They will also communicate the results and make sure everyone is on the same page.

rpa business analyst.

The business analyst is responsible for mapping out and analyzing the processes. They will also design the automation scenario and present it to the business.

rpa solution architect.

The solution architect defines the technical tools you will work with during the automation process. This person works out the end-to-end solutions and makes sure everyone follows the guidelines.

rpa developer.

The RPA developer designs, develops and tests the solutions. They work in close collaboration with the business analyst and solution architect. Each step is extensively documented.

rpa infrastructure engineer.

This person is responsible for installing and maintaining the infrastructure.

rpa supervisor.

The RPA supervisor is responsible for the daily maintenance of the bots. They manage and control the activities using reporting and monitoring tools. Their goal is to improve the operational performance of the bots.

rpa service support.

This is the first point of contact for questions and help with automation.

2. develop.

In this stage, we help you develop your bots. There are 2 different approaches - depending on the situation and the complexity of the process.

1. Company-driven approach: in this approach, our focus is the business. The Center of Excellence looks for the best processes to be automated. The CoE leads the entire automation process.  
2. Employee-driven approach: in this approach, we give the employees the tools to automate their own processes - we assume that no one else knows these processes better than the people that execute them on a daily basis. 

Both methods can be combined. Our developers can contribute to your Center of Excellence, or can even take over your CoE completely.

If you choose to automate your processes independently, we can offer your employees the right trainings, so they can use the tools we deliver as efficiently as possible.

3. deploy.

In this stage we’ll put your bots to work. From now on you can give all your boring, repetitive tasks to your new best friends: the robots.

We work out the deploy stage in 3 steps.

manage.

The automations that you’ve created with our help, have to be maintained and updated on a regular basis. We’ll help you with that. In this step we monitor and measure the performance.

run.

Robots execute your automations. Each company is structured differently and the robots have to be adjusted to your unique way of working. Should they work in shifts? Only at night? For 5 hours straight and then a break of 2 hours? You will determine this in the run phase.

engage.

Bots may work autonomously, but they sometimes still need a human to show them the correct process. For example when they encounter exceptions. This is also called the human in the loop. You’ll need someone to watch over them in the engage step.

4. evaluate.

It’s important that you measure the impact of RPA on your organization. Only in this way will you be able to make the right decisions in the future and automate those processes that are most suitable for automation and will have the highest ROI.

Together, we will figure out what the right tools are to measure the impact of RPA on your company.