I have been reading many stories about organisations using Robotic Processing Automation (RPA) to enhance their existing IT landscape, close product gaps, increase efficiency and other goals.聽These are all worthy reasons to wade into the world of RPA, but a comment from an organisational leader that I read recently reminded me of a lesser mentioned, perhaps overlooked benefit of RPA, employee聽.
We live in an age awash with聽, mental health days, and modern benefits like聽聽which all revolve around the idea that it is important to recognise employee well-being for a variety of reasons.聽But what does Robotics Automation have to do with employee well-being?聽In some ways it seems like organisations are interested in the well-being of robots more than people. 聽And aren鈥檛 these BOTS just here to take away our jobs?
鈥渋ts is about enhancing the experience and putting people where it matters, so automation is highly used鈥�
In a nutshell RPA, when done correctly, can remove the need for some employees to engage in tasks that are largely repetitive but perhaps high value. 聽By doing this, these employees can instead focus on other, higher value tasks that more fully use their skill set.聽聽I was very privileged recently to meet with Tammy Ryder, General Manager of People and Culture Central for聽聽and discuss this topic with her.
I was interested in her view on this topic as she runs Coles HR Shared Services as well as People and Culture Digital Transformation.聽She was deeply involved in the rollout of聽, integrated with聽聽for Talent Acquisition where much of the RPA solutions implemented were used.聽As part of that project Tammy implemented RPA in the form of several BOTS to close some gaps and bring greater efficiency to the whole process.聽In discussing this topic, she said that one of her team鈥檚 key learnings was 鈥溾�� it is about enhancing the experience and putting people where it matters, so automation is highly used鈥�.
Tammy mentioned that early on there was a misconception at Coles that RPA automation would take away jobs or replace people.聽Tammy and her team were careful to select automated tasks that were important to the business because they are related to critical processes like pay or hiring but were also highly repetitive.
These choices meant that these workers could use the time that automation frees up to instead train team members, interact with customers and other higher value tasks for example, however the BOTs were also providing a valuable service.聽She said 鈥淸Coles employees] want to do worthwhile work, they want to do work that makes them feel that it has real purpose and meaning behind it.鈥�
鈥�83% [of Australian consumers] are prepared to pay more money for products or services that enhance their feelings of well-being鈥�
While well-being itself as a concept is a hot topic in HR circles these days, trying to quantify the business benefits of well-being can be challenging for HR professionals.聽Tammy mentioned that when meeting with the executive board, they were, not surprisingly, interested in facts and figures more than feelings.
So how does an HR executive get funding or support for programs like this that support well-being?
We discussed what metric could be used when proposing one of the benefits of RPA as being related to employee well-being.聽At present there isn鈥檛 any such industry metric and it is challenging to articulate the benefits in numbers, but she was optimistic that over time this kind of metric could be developed and socialised, especially given the strong support for well-being and well-being programs at Coles like聽.聽A recent Australian聽聽showed that 鈥�83% are prepared to pay more money for products or services that enhance their feelings of well-being鈥�, so the desire for support of well-being programs is real.
I asked Tammy what were some of the challenges in implementing effective RPA?聽She said there were challenges around understanding how the technology works of course, but an unexpected challenge was the misperception and stigmatism among employees that 鈥淏OTS are going to take over the world鈥� and people would lose their jobs.
Therefore, being clear that, in reality, the aim was to have 鈥減eople where it matters鈥� so that employees could instead focus on high value work was key for success.聽Tammy鈥檚 advice was to carefully examine if the proposed RPA solution had any measurable benefit, not just automation for the sake of automation. She said that in the end her team got very proficient at looking for tasks that had a clear decision tree, and minimal human centric intervention.
In conclusion, RPA can be a strong contributor to employee well-being by聽, allowing employees to focus on high value work and potentially reducing employee turnover, which is a useful metric to justify such a program.聽The key, as always, is not to assume that any given automation is a benefit just because it automates something.聽Additionally, leaders need to be sensitive to employee鈥檚 perception that BOTS are here to take away their jobs.
With the right discussions, and communication, RPA can be a benefit to the organisation, to employees and even to customer鈥檚 well-being.聽I, for one, embrace the arrival of our robot friends and look forward to less drudgery.
