In the early 1900’s, industrial automation took hold of the country when Henry Ford began to revolutionize the car manufacturing business. Instead of a small group of workers building an entire car themselves, and having to learn each part of the car-building process, the assembly line allowed the manufacturing processes and machines to do specific tasks, with the human workers set up to assist them.
Automation technology has come a long way since then, and has revolutionized the way businesses work. Unfortunately, some business owners are still reluctant to invest in these processes for their company. What they still do not understand is that this cost-effective solution could save your company both time and money.
Efficiency and Effectiveness
Since the time of Henry Ford’s assembly lines and industrial automation, there have been many types of automation that have offered efficiency and effectiveness to the world of business.
From a simple solution that helps you schedule meetings, to computer aided manufacturing that will run your plants, to cognitive automation that creates bots that can have conversations on the phone, the many types of process automation have changed the way businesses are run. There are three main ways that automation is used in the current business climate.
Traits of Team Automation
Every business runs better when people are in tune with one another, and using automation is a great way to achieve these goals of teamwork. The right solution makes everything run more smoothly. Instead of having a secretary frantically running around to schedule meetings, or having an endless volley of emails in your inbox, there are automated tools to help you work as a team.
For instance, email inbox rules are a simple way to organize your emails and make everything more manageable. This saves time and makes it easier to communicate with co-workers. Automation companies can promote connect apps to promote collaboration, and even schedule meetings easily without the back and forth you’d find when working with multiple parties’ calendars. These teamwork tools will save you time and money.
Generalities about General Business Automation
Let’s face it. In every business, there are rote tasks that do not have to be done by humans, and automating these tasks is both cheaper and more error-proof. Many industries are already using business automation with great success, including the insurance industry, the banking industry, and even doctors’ offices.
There are several great uses of business automation that will help your company thrive. For instance, Document Routing means scanning incoming documents and categorizing them so they can go on to the next order of business and get put into the correct basket. Without automation, humans would be faced with an extremely tiresome and tedious task, and would be likely to make errors.
Another great solution is Automatic Reporting, which uses automation systems to generate monthly reports for customers and business associates without the need to keep inputting the information again. Again, this time-saving situation is less likely to end in errors, and you will be offering great customer service. Finally, even PTO Approvals can be automated. With a few clicks of your keyboard, you can get your paid time signed off by bots.
Clearly, business automation is on the rise, and the time is now for your company to join the party. Computers love to follow rules, so anything rules based is for them. So much of your business involves rote and repetitive tasks that could easily be done by bots.
See also: Business Automation Heals Healthcare Insurance Claims
Advantages of Automation and Digital Co-Workers
Cognitive Automation is sometimes confused with RPA software. Let’s break down the differences. RPA is the hand work, such as entering the data from one application to another. This involves any repetitive tasks that are if/then, which a computer could easily understand.
Generally speaking, the benefits of RPA can be applied to 60% of a business’s activities. Insurance underwriting, medical coding, and bank amortization would all fall into this category. RPA bots are well-versed in doing repetitive tasks, and they do so without error. Using RPA tools to accomplish these more “menial” jobs will leave your human co-workers more available for more thoughtful work and focused on customer experience.
Automated Batch Processing, as the name suggests, takes place whenever computers do batches of jobs. Use this when you have large batches of information to be processed or tables need to be joined. It's especially helpful when working with a high volume of data entry.
Intelligent Document Scanning and Optical Character Recognition (OCR), have revolutionized the way people can use and edit scanned documents by enabling a machine to read and understand the contents of written documents.
Cognitive automation, on the other hand, involves higher level tasks such as collecting and interpreting data, speech recognition, machine learning, and natural language processing. In the healthcare industry, cognitive automation can suggest better treatment options to physicians and predict a patient’s health based on the known variable.
Cognitive Computing Automation can make a customer think she is talking to or instant-messaging a human, when it is really a voice-powered bot. Banks could even use these self-learning bots to help people open bank accounts, increasing customer satisfaction in the process.
Cognitive automation is clearly the future of business. According to IDC’s forecast, cognitive and AI spending will grow to $52.2 billion in 2021, with a large chunk of it going to cognitive applications. Cognitive process automation is the wave of the future.
The world is changing at lightning speed, and it is time that your company caught up with the times. Roots Automation can get you set up with Digital Coworkers that will make your company run like a dream. Schedule a demo with Roots Automation today and we can get you moving forward!