Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is one of the most misunderstood concepts and has unfortunately managed to garner not so positive reviews over an extended duration of time. Before going onto understanding how RPA can help your business, it is essential to get a clear picture of business process management (BPM) and areas where it is falling to meet expectations.
One major area of concern for BPM projects has been its inability to access existing systems at work. This is more so in the case of organizations which do not have the right APIs in place. The complicated process of gaining access to the necessary data as and when needed has led to the demand for a platform which makes it rather simple and hassle-free to gain said access – that too in a cost-effective manner.
How can RPA help BPM?
The new block in the process automation environment, RPA, is basically a software platform which enables the creation of software robots which can automate the entire process by mimicking human behavior in a process environment. Though this might not sound like something ‘monumental,’ given that this is what is expected from an automated process platform; what adds value to the entire process herein is the way in which it covers up the loopholes in the existing BPM.
As APIs are generally not integrated seamlessly, there are several occasions when organizations end up building new and needlessly expensive APIs to bring data from the different processes onto a common platform. It is in tricky situations like this that RPA emerges as a savior by not only integrating all the loose ends of various processes, but configuring it intelligently through its sophisticated framework. It successfully does the job of capturing the data even in cases wherein the system lacks a proper programmatic interface and is placed in an external environment.
In short, RPA bridges the gap between ‘islands of automation’ by doing away with the need for humans to be points of integration between various systems. Thus, even though RPA may not be the ultimate solution to all automation queries, when synchronized with BPM, it plugs in all the gaps left out in the process. In fact, some of the best examples of RPA and BPM working efficiently is when businesses connect their present platforms with other disparate enterprise systems without any complications.
It’s not BPM vs. RPA, rather BPM with RPA
While critics keep chanting that RPA is nothing but ‘screen-scraping on steroids,’ it is one technology which has emerged as the antithesis of ERPs. Not only is this system quite uncomplicated, with zero database intrusion and rather minimal involvement of the IT department, industry experts see RPA as a cost-effective technology solution. According to them, the future does not belong to those who seek a choice between BPM and RPA – rather it belongs to those who know how to synergies both the systems in the most sensible manner.
