eBook-It's Time To Automate

It’s Time
to Automate.
A UiPath E-Book
Why now?
Unprecedented
challenges spark a
new era of innovation
You’re probably hearing a lot about the “new
normal” for doing business. There’s definitely a
lot of “new,” but there’s nothing normal about it.
The COVID-19 pandemic exposed a lot of shortcomings in our processes and policies. In organizations everywhere, business continuity
plans weren’t always realistic and up to date. Furloughed workers took a lot of their institutional knowledge home with them, leaving the
people still on the job scrambling to do the basics. We weren’t ready to support a remote workforce the way we needed. And we found
out that our supply chains weren’t very flexible. Business-as-usual wasn’t as resilient as we thought.
These problems don’t magically disappear when the virus does. In fact, Forrester calls the pandemic a “gray swan”—
a rare event that’s still likely to occur.1 And if it’s not a pandemic, some other form of disruption is waiting in the wings.
1
Forrester Research, “The COVID-19 Crisis Will Accelerate Enterprise Automation Plans” (2020)
Ready or not,
the future is coming
So, we don’t know what’s on the horizon, but we still need
to prepare for it. Fast. We don’t need vague talking points
about a “digital transformation.” We need immediate
action, speed at scale, and hard ROI. And we don’t have
a lot of time. Like the folks at McKinsey & Company say,
“Businesses that once mapped digital strategy in one
to three-year phases must now scale their initiatives in
a matter of days or weeks.”2 If you thought the pace of
business was accelerating before, you haven’t seen
anything yet.
2
McKinsey Digital, “Digital strategy in a time of crisis” (2020)
66%
How can we do it? We need to automate. To be more resilient and flexible, we need
automation technology that can back up people when disruption occurs and our human
workforce is stretched to capacity. We need the flexibility to scale up and down quickly as
needs change – instead of being locked into a single gear for all situations. And we need
Companies that to take the knowledge in people’s heads and systematize it so we can access it in times of
will increase RPA disruption and crisis.
software spend over The new normal? However it takes shape, we’ll see a lot more Robotic Process
the next 12 months3 Automation (RPA). And a lot more ways for living, breathing employees to gain new skills
and be more productive and creative. In other words, the new normal isn’t all doom-and-
- Forrester Research
gloom. It’s also full of opportunity and potential. Let’s take a closer look . . .
3
“The Future Of Work Is Still Being Written” (2020)
What to automate
To automate or not to automate?
For a growing number of businesses, the real
question isn’t whether to automate but where to
start. Every business is unique. Each does things
its own way. There’s no cookie-cutter solution for
deciding which processes to target for automation.
Instead, one tried-and-true tactic is
to look at the different approaches
for zeroing-in on the processes and
tasks that are good candidates for
automation.
The top-down approach
A strategic automation initiative is a big deal. It means rethinking longstanding assumptions and reengineering some
of the core processes that drive the business. This requires a centralized command-and-control, top-down approach to
target the sweeping enterprise-wide processes that deliver maximum ROI.
@
Creating a Center of Excellence (CoE) for your
automation initiative is a proven best practice
for top-down RPA deployment. Think of a CoE as
the brain trust for your automation initiatives. A
CoE can set the agenda and make sure the entire
organization is on the same page, marching in the
same direction, singing from the same songbook.
The CoE’s role is to:
Ideate – Target which areas of the business are the
best candidates for automation.
Prioritize – Decide which processes are the
highest priority and which can wait.
Distribute – Allocate technology and resources to
put the plan into action.
Govern – Ensure that the automations that get
rolled out are safe, secure, and well managed.
The bottom-up
approach
Sometimes, the best experts on your business
are the people who do the work. Fill the orders.
Talk to the customers. Those people know what
they’re doing — and how they can do it better.
They know where the bottlenecks are. They
know which tasks are tedious and repetitive.
The bottom-up approach capitalizes on that
hard-won wisdom. It allows those invaluable
citizen developers (another name for your RPA-
savvy employees) to create automations for
themselves based on governance rules and
submit them for distribution—with a cumulative
effect that can have a transformative impact.
@
The hybrid approach

So, top-down or bottom-up? Why not both? Both approaches have their merits. Each works best for certain use cases.
That’s why the solution is often a hybrid approach that combines the best of both—where your CoE and your citizen
developers work in tandem, with a governance plan for the distribution of the automations they both generate.
That way, you get the discipline, control, and governance of the top-down approach while tapping into the creativity and
crowd-sourced wisdom of the bottom-up approach. It’s like the robotic equivalent of having your cake and eating it too.
How to start
You’ve recognized the urgency to automate to help your business to
thrive in this new reality. You understand the advantages of the top-
down, bottom-up, and hybrid approaches. Now you’re wondering where
to start. How do you go about ensuring the success of your RPA initiative?
We’ve had a front-row seat for some compelling RPA success stories.
Here’s what we’ve learned about getting a fast start.
Deliver value Day 1
1. Follow the data

Start with processes that involve finding,
moving, re-keying, or comparing data. In
this new business reality, data is king . . . or
queen. That’s why you invest so much time
getting the right data to the right people at
the right time to make the right decisions.
Focus on automating work for large teams
that spend a lot of time on repetitive work
with data. RPA frees them up to do the
things that add value to your business.
2. Build on the work of others
You don’t have to be an RPA genius to get started. In fact,
UiPath’s partners are like on-call RPA geniuses. You can
use their experience to jumpstart your project. And you
don’t have to start an automation initiative from scratch.
Using turnkey solutions for your first two or three bots
can help you see where you can get the biggest impact.
These quick wins will become showcases that help you
build momentum. When people see what RPA can do,
the light bulb goes on.
And finally, take advantage of the people who are willing
to share their experience. Check out the 1000+ reusable
components built by UiPath customers and partners on
our Marketplace.
3. Get your systems talking to each other through automation
One of the key building blocks for RPA is integration. You want internal and external
systems to share what they know. RPA can weave together data from systems across
your company more efficiently than traditional development projects.
Not only do you save the time you used to spend finding and rekeying information
from multiple systems, you also see some major transformations. Like breaking down
functional silos. Improving data quality. Creating accurate and reliable audit trails.
Accelerating new ideas. And simplifying compliance with regulations like GDPR.
Build a future-ready,
resilient workforce
UiPath
4. ACADEMY
Empower power users
You need a way to increase the number of
RPA power users in your organization. For the
up-and-coming generation of workers, RPA
skills will be as common—and as essential—
as Microsoft Office skills are now. Through
programs like Academic Alliance, UiPath is
working with leading educational institutions
to build a global RPA knowledge ecosystem
to support the future of work. It’s a game-
changer for achieving your strategic goals.
5. Train your employees
Individual businesses will also need
to train and certify their existing
workforce for RPA competencies. No
matter what you do, you’ll probably
have a digital assistant in the near
future. You might even have a robot
for a boss. They’re a blast at holiday
parties.
All the training on UiPath Academy
is free for every role, from business
analyst to hotshot developer. Sign up
now. Sign up your team.
6.
Shift people to higher value work
RPA makes you more efficient, which is
an important quality in an unpredictable
business climate where demand swings
up and down and you don’t always know
how much of your workforce you’ll need or
where they’ll be. Robots don’t take holidays.
They don’t take sick days. They don’t punch
a clock. They can help keep your business
running in the midst of disruption and help
you respond to sudden spikes in demand.
And they free your employees to do the
things that people do better than robots.
Like serving customers. Solving problems.
Inventing new processes and products.
Follow the money
7.
Start in the C-suite
How can you tell what a business really
thinks is important? Look at its budget.
That’s how you determine its priorities.
It’s great to send out a company-wide
email about your company’s RPA
vision, but until the occupants of corner
offices are ready to assign budget to Mr.
make the vision part of the culture, all Corner
you have is good intentions.
8.
Rally the entire organization
Everyone in your company has vested
interest in your RPA initiative—and
everyone is responsible for its success.
Think of automation as a cause. Pick a
person to champion the cause. Choose
someone passionate about the RPA
vision and its possibilities. Someone
with the authority to get things done,
allocate resources, and break down
barriers. Someone like a superhero,
but without the Lycra bodysuit.
9.
Measure. Measure again
Accountability drives performance, so your leaders need to be accountable for RPA outcomes. Otherwise,
not much happens and not much changes. Start at the top. Link your RPA outcomes to the company’s
strategic objectives and roll them down into individual performance goals.
You need to know where you start so you can quantify the impact of RPA. Your business will improve in
multiple ways, so be sure to have the before and after snapshots that measure and show your progress.
As you add more value with each automation—and
document the improvement—you can make the case
for more RPA funding.
Here’s your mantra: Innovate. Measure. Learn. Repeat.
The future of automation is already here.
The future sure got here fast. Almost overnight, a lot of what we thought was rock-solid best
practice turned out to be outdated, inflexible, and unreliable. We’re still figuring out the new
reality, but we know a few things for certain. We need to be more resilient. We need to be more
agile. And we need to be more creative. The good news is that automation can do a lot more
than help us weather the current storm. It can also help us be ready for a new future.
Start your tomorrow today. Read our blog to learn more.
© 2020 UiPath All rights reserved

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It’s Time

The hybrid approach

1. Follow the data

© 2020 UiPath All rights reserved

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