By: Chandan Ghosh, Automation Expert and COE Head - Intelligent RPA Practice, LTIMindtree

Hyperautomation offers a plethora of benefits, but the most valued is profit maximization — the ultimate responsibility that every decision-maker has on their shoulders. As recession sinks in and dampens demand by lowering affordability, optimizing profits seems to be the only hedge against it. The global economy is prone to the ebb and flow of business cycles. While that’s inevitable, there is a lot that decision-makers can do to remain afloat even amid sluggish global markets.

So how does the magic happen? Well, labor accounts for 50% to 60% of a Fortune 500 company’s spending, and a similar situation can be witnessed everywhere, regardless of the scale and volume. So, by optimizing their workforce, businesses can fortify themselves from the after-effects of a staggering economy.

LTIMindtree’s hyperautomation bots do just that without disruptive system changes. As the focus is entirely on goal-oriented automation, it reduces human-machine interaction. This makes all the difference because present-day businesses don’t use manual processes but rather rely on a combination of human capabilities and technologies to run the show.

In fact, a study indicates that an enterprise uses around 464 applications on any given day, which is understandable because business processes have become increasingly complex. Now comes the million-dollar question — if apps are so popular, why is hyperautomation even necessary? Let’s find out.

Why do businesses need hyperautomation?

Let’s assume you are a B2C manufacturer focused on increasing market share by lowering profit margins. So, you are counting on the sales volume for profitability, but that can backfire if you don’t have a seamless manufacturing process. Now, that requires tracking finished goods, stock-in-trade, and several raw materials. Based on the stock levels, actions must be taken to ensure prompt replenishment of the various raw materials.

Besides that, the billing and invoicing team will be flooded with redundant tasks. To simplify this, enterprises use the most sophisticated CRM, ERP, cloud storage, business intelligence tools, emailers, etc. However, this increases the human-machine interaction timeframe, which adds to the overall costs.

More so because specialists are required to handle specific applications; for example, if you use the SAP ERP, you need experts specialized in that, and the same applies to CRMs and other tools. This adds up to the overheads, but the number of resources can be reduced by reducing human involvement and leveraging LTIMindtree’s digital workforce. This makes the existing workforce more productive because they can focus on value-driven tasks.

Unleash the digital workforce

We are in the middle of the fourth Industrial Revolution, and the very foundation of people-process-technology is being recast and re-molded. Manufacturers and services are moving rapidly to sustainable, independent, and intelligent systems. However, unlike what most people are given to believe, automation does not replace human resources – it enables them to focus on more productive, more creative tasks. Rather than have their human resource process repetitive, rule-based, time-bound actions, which an automated ‘digital workforce’ can almost completely take up at present – organizations can focus on creating value that is human-independent.

LTIMindtree and its team of experts leverage hyperautomation to help organizations achieve their business goals through intelligent automation. This transforms how your resources interact with technology. That makes a huge difference because the human mind is inherently designed to do one thing at a time and is prone to cognitive fatigue, but that’s not the case with hyperautomation bots.

These programs can interact with various applications to perform the same tasks over and over until infinity and not waver from the logic embedded into them. This allows organizations to dedicate their resources to decision-making tasks, which usually refer to dealing with exceptions.

So, when an LTIMindtree hyperautomation robot is confused or unsure about the outcome’s accuracy, it isolates that particular entry and forwards it to a predefined email ID for human intervention. Now, that is only the tip of the iceberg, and there is much more a hyperautomation robot brings to the table. Below mentioned are some of the core benefits.

Faster processing

Humans have limitations because they take time to gather inputs, process them, and act, but that is not the case with hyperautomation robots. They are much faster and don’t mind working 24×7, so even a minute less could translate into a noteworthy cost saving. Let us assume that a real person takes five minutes to perform a task while a hyperautomation robot takes two. So, what’s the big deal? Well, a human works only eight hours a day for 20 days per month, 160 hours or 9600 minutes per month, just enough to complete 1920 tasks at full efficiency, which is humanly impossible.

According to a study, an average employee has 31 percent productivity, meaning a single person can perform only 595 tasks per month. At the same time, a hyperautomation robot can go on 24×7 and process 21,600 tasks in the same month. In the case of Global Products North American AP, the invoice processing time taken by a human was five minutes, whereas LTIMindtree’s hyperautomation robots took only two, and the result was USD 443,520 worth of annual cost savings.

Higher accuracy

Did you know that human errors are one of the most dreaded cost drivers? Think of all the things that can go wrong if there is just one mistake in a purchase order. Human errors can seep at any time, and the best way to cut back on them is by letting the hyperautomation robots make the entries. They can be designed to detect and handle exceptions according to the workflow, which minimizes human intervention and the possibility of errors.

Efficient order fulfillment

If you run a B2C business, you definitely know how critical order-related KPIs are, but procuring them can be overwhelming because too many applications are involved. Most order-to-delivery workflows use a CRM tool, ERP software, cloud storage, and emailer working in tandem. This multitude of applications brings two major challenges — increased manual intervention and scattered data. This was pretty much the case with a large equipment manufacturer.

As data was collected at various stages through multiple applications, order management and entry modifications became complex and time-consuming. Also, accessing valuable insights was a tedious process, and this lack of visibility made it difficult to generate business reports, which are critical for decision-making. However, after automating the process, LTIMindtree overcame these hurdles by reducing the per transaction time from 20 to five minutes. This was achieved by streamlining the end-to-end equipment sales process, resulting in annual benefits worth USD 229,417.

Automates redundant tasks

For the smooth functioning of a business, the organization must dedicate its resources to what makes a difference and adds value to a business. Let us understand this by studying the onboarding process, which happens in every industry.

Large organizations frequently hire resources every time they do this. The HR department is flooded with a series of tasks — recording employee data, scheduling induction training, process training, sending emails with links to mandatory certifications to understand company policies, and so on. If done manually, these can be time-consuming, so robots can be deployed to automate them.

In fact, predefined rules can be applied to forward different sets of training sessions based on prior experience, qualifications, and KRAs. The same goes for other processes like credit card or bank account application processing that involve repetitive tasks. However, at LTIMindtree, we do not merely focus on automating redundant processes to maximize ROI but believe in end-to-end automation for long-term profitability.

Key takeaway

Robotic Process Automation has numerous applications, and at LTIMindtree, we have automated over six thousand processes with our innovative plug-and-play bots. In times of uncertainties like the ones we live in, hyperautomation can boost productivity and reduce costs considerably, so businesses hit their breakeven faster. Hence, it would not be wrong to conclude that hyperautomation can be a strong hedge against the looming recession, which can be devastating after the pandemic-induced slowdown. So, before the sales begin to plummet and supply chain bottlenecks seep in, decision-makers must act and bolster their infrastructure with the right technologies.