The business value and benefits of hyperautomation
Automation revolutionized the way businesses operate, leveraging technology to perform tasks that originally needed human action. Today, breakthroughs in machine learning are leveraging technology to perform tasks that once required human judgment, leading to the emergence of hyperautomation.
So, what is hyperautomation?
Unlike most of the technologies that we’ll examine, hyperautomation is more of a concept to strive to achieve, rather than a specific technology you can implement.
Hyperautomation represents an optimal state of the entire business process. In this approach, organizations combine various automation tools, technologies, and machine learning algorithms. The goal is to create a comprehensive system capable of automating processes that were unable to be automated before. It focuses not only on the breadth of available tools but also on all the steps of automation itself, from discovery to reassessment.
Automation vs. hyperautomation
A useful way to conceptualize hyperautomation is to imagine an orchestra. Each instrument represents a type of technology or tool, and musicians play these instruments to create a harmonious performance. This is akin to how each technology solution performs a specific task to contribute to a larger business process.
In a traditional automation landscape, each instrument is played independently, producing beautiful sounds but not necessarily in harmony. In hyperautomation, however, the musicians are guided by a skilled conductor; artificial intelligence (AI). The AI ensures that the different technologies work together seamlessly, adapting and coordinating their efforts to create an optimized workflow.
Traditional automation is employed to streamline manual tasks, whereas hyperautomation levels up efficiency by automating parallel and nonparallel tasks when additional human insight is needed.
Hyperautomation technology, examples and use cases
The full capabilities of hyperautomation are realized in scenarios when the unexpected happens, or navigating nuance-like subtle variations in a workflow. Hyperautomation allows for active response to change management in an automated process, enabling a more agile approach. This is especially valuable in processes and operations with a lot of asynchronous tasks that require human coordination, like employee onboarding.
Onboarding requires multiple steps running in tandem, with information being collected from several internal and external systems. A large amount of data needs to not only be collected, but also coordinated with external systems, and then integrated back into an internal process. When these steps are performed with traditional automation, it is not just lengthy and arduous, but since humans need to manually connect these disparate ends of the process, these requests can spend a lot of time just sitting. There’s a significant margin of error and a greater opportunity for data to be missed. Any deviation in data collection can throw off the whole workflow, rendering the automation script useless.
With hyperautomation, throughout any workflow, AI ensures that every technology component and tool is engaged and utilized as efficiently as possible. This dynamically adapts the orchestration and composition of the data collection process to accommodate changing priorities, ensuring everything fits within the given time constraints, contractual performance metrics, or SLAs.
This allows for simultaneous execution of tasks, preventing bottlenecks and facilitating a seamless transition from one task to another, between collections of different processes that need to be automated. Various tools can efficiently collaborate, ultimately creating a symphony of productivity that outshines the disjointed and limited capabilities of traditional automation methods.
Considerations for adopting hyperautomation
Beyond process improvements, hyperautomation is a tool that helps employees focus on the work they enjoy doing. It brings about significant benefits for the individuals who were previously responsible for the traditionally automated work. Reducing monotonous and repetitive tasks improves workplace well-being and morale. This also allows employees to focus on more strategic, creative, and value-added tasks, enabling them to develop new skills and grow in their roles.
Adopting hyperautomation requires a change in the way that we think about business process automation. Instead of asking, “How can I automate this entire process from start to end?” we need to concentrate on automating the individual tasks required to move from A to B, and then use the most suitable technologies for each.
It’s important to note that hyperautomation is not a one-time effort; it requires ongoing monitoring, reassessment, and optimization. This is the only way to ensure that the implemented solutions continue to deliver value. Organizations should regularly review their automation efforts, identify areas for improvement, and adjust as needed.
As technology continues to advance, hyperautomation will increasingly become part of the business landscape. The value of hyperautomation extends beyond just employee onboarding, applying to any business operation or process that’s too complex for traditional automation. With AI synchronizing disparate tools to create more harmonious and efficient workflows, redundancies and time lost to manual processes will be a thing of the past. Plus, this creates additional opportunities for innovation and expansion as organizations look ahead to future endeavors.
Learn more about how your organization can save time and manpower by utilizing RPA and intelligent automation practices.
