RPA Literacy: The Driver for Automation’s Future

We’ve discussed at length in previous blog entries how RPA has arrived as a truly disruptive force in how companies conduct their business processes and operations. But while RPA has certainly staked out ground in the automation landscape, there are still many companies across a wide variety of industries for which RPA is still an unrealized value proposition. This is in large part due to the lack of knowledge and visibility about how exactly RPA technology can be deployed, which situations best suit implementation, and how companies can successfully scale automation solutions based on the scope and breadth of any given project.

Simply put: If companies don’t understand the principles on which RPA is based, they won’t be able to understand RPA’s value and place in their operations. Without a hands-on sense of training and understanding in how RPA deployment can and should function in a variety of contexts, automation platforms won't find the home their deserve inside companies. 

To help address this problem, UiPath has worked to unveil a handful of critical resources to help companies understand the innerworkings and capacities of an automation solution. With the end goal of helping to promote and deepen RPA literacy on a global level, UiPath is working to give companies the keys to start their own automation engines.

The democratization of RPA

Expanding the range and scope of RPA literacy is also commonly referred to as the democratization of RPA in that the end goal is to provide enough information, resources and demonstrations so employees within any given company at nearly each touch point across the value chain understand the benefits and implications of RPA deployment. 

Because one of the more misunderstood elements of RPA deployment in today’s market revolves around the concept of scale and the necessary scope of RPA implementation for a specific project, UiPath has created two fairly comprehensive guides to help companies understand the challenges and opportunities of scaling a RPA solution to suit a variety of needs.

First, UiPath Academy provides users across the world with free, instant, and comprehensive access to training and other interactive learning for certification on UiPath's automation product and services. In addition, users can receive critical knowledge and insight into new positions, roles, or even departments necessary for an RPA automation solution deployment. Essentially, UiPath Academy gives users a soup to nuts approach to understanding how automation solutions function, the specific skills necessary to incorporate such solutions, and the training necessary to deploy an automation solution to fit any scale or project size.

Secondly, with the UiPath Community, customers can take advantage of the free UiPath Studio, which gives users the capability to develop automations from the bottom-up, thus creating concrete use-cases from which future automation successes can be built. The resides in giving more people direct access to how RPA solutions can and should function within a given context.

Much like how Instagram has created a culture around the importance of photos, imagining, and other optics for companies via the Instagram app but also across other social media channels, the UiPath Community strives to create a free, inclusive space for the creation and discussion of automation to exist amongst a well-informed pool of clients and customers.

The benefits and importance of RPA literacy

We just briefly discussed the holistic benefits of a more well-informed RPA consumer; however, what we mean by RPA consumer is not simply cut and dry. The fact of the matter is that RPA customers and clients can be divided in two camps: the end user (or the person/department/entity) actually working with or in an automation workflow, and the customer or company that is implementing the automation solution.

The benefits of RPA literacy for the end user include the ability to learn new skills and incorporate automation into an existing set of experiences and knowledge-base which will help prepare them for evolutions in future professional settings. It can be a path forward to engage more seriously with RPA and leverage a new brand of skills and expertise into a new position such as an RPA developer, RPA analyst, RPA manager, or other brand of automation administrator or expert.

The benefits of RPA literacy for customers include the ability to understand how to scale automation projects without putting undue stress or wear and tear on existing resources and to speed up the lead times of RPA deployment. Because both the UiPath Academy and the Community provide access to large pools of expertise with relatively little investment of time and resources, companies can quickly react and respond to their automation needs without creating bottlenecks or breakdowns in existing workflows or project management. 

The endgame for RPA literacy?

The entirety of this blog entry begs the question: What is the endgame for RPA literacy? What is the significance of the democratization of RPA? Why does this matter? For many thought-leaders within the RPA industry — UiPath in particular — the endgame for RPA literacy is to expand the understanding and acceptance of RPA concepts and functionality to help companies work more effectively, efficiency, and with greater productivity. This fosters a stronger, more diverse automation culture where more companies in a wider array of industries have a working knowledge of automation and how RPA should be utilized within their organization.

At the end of the day, so much of what global companies engage in is getting the right product in front of the right person at the right time, and automation is a key player in helping companies achieve this goal.