Setting Up a Robotic Process Automation Center of Excellence

Abstract

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) has proven a solid and affordable solution for organizations in order to tackle the repetitive, low added value work. Not only that this solved another issue (e.g. high turnover rate), but came with further opportunities that raised the moral in the organization. Humans working side by side with (software) robots it’s not anymore something science-fiction, but already in place in many organizations worldwide, including in Romania. The RPA path has been so far the following: organizations started with a Proof of Concept (PoC) validating the concept, then moved to a Pilot where a full process with all exceptions was automated end-to-end. After developing more than three Pilots organizations have realized that a team should be handling the robots inside the organization. This team should not only monitor the current robot, but also should have look for additional processes to automate. On the long term the most efficient way to treat this challenge is for a big organization (e.g. from banking, retail, oil&gas etc.) to create a Center of Excellence (CoE). By doing that each organization should take some follow some steps. These steps will be analyzed and developed further by the author of this paper, which is also a Subject Matter Expert for one a worldwide consulting firm.