Choosing Business Process Automation Software

In my last post, I described the benefits and approaches behind business process automation (BPA). If utilized correctly, these tools can save you considerable amounts of time and money for your business. Today, I want to now share with you how to choose the right BPA software for your specific needs.

When initially looking for BPA, I recommend the following features-

Easy and intuitive to use

• No programming required

• Drag and drop user interface

• Online training videos available for staff

Scalable and transferable

• Remote deployment capabilities

• Ability to be scaled based on future process needs

• Ability to be easily modified based on future process needs

• Ability to be used in different business applications once introduced

Smart

• Reporting capabilities - Ability to easily see process health metrics that you assign.

• Analytical capabilities - Ability to easily analyze different parts of the process.

• Optimization capabilities - Program should automatically flag optimization areas.

• Technical support - Technical support should be readily available for the program.

Once the ideal features are selected and several potential softwares are identified, I recommend ranking these for final selection based on 4 criteria:

• Opportunity - This will include how much time and cost it will save for your business from automation. Not all processes will fit well with program automation. The opportunity should be quantified in clear terms up front.

• Potential Challenges- This will include any downsides of automating, or of the software application itself. Often, there may be incompatibilities that should be flagged up front.

• Cost to Implement- This will include the cost of the program, and any associated IT costs in implementing. I encourage people to have an exhaustive list here. I've seen budgets blown because unexpected costs creep up during implementation that weren't planned for. Sometimes these costs become so high that the project would have been reconsidered up front if the costs had been known.

• Time to Implement- This includes how much time it will take to fully integrate the program. Include staff time and support time from the automation company. Be realistic here if you work for a large company, as integrating IT software can take quite a while in some cases, and can impact project ROI.

The considerations I've presented here will all differ business to business and application to application. Make it fit for your unique purposes. You can create a weighted ranking for these 4 criteria, or you can create a numbering system for each that will allow you to sort and filter the different options you are looking at.

All that's left is to implement, and see the dollars roll in!

© 2017 by The Process Maven

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