Organisations are only scratching the surface of automation, says study

A new report suggests organisations are missing a massive opportunity in automation by focusing on operational benefits over top-line growth.

Capgemini’s Research Institute’s latest report “Reshaping the future: Unlocking automation’s untapped value”, shows that despite automation offering greater efficiency and gains, less than a fifth (16%) of global businesses have adopted multiple automation use cases at scale.

For over 40% of organisations, the number one objective behind automation initiatives is the aim to improve quality, only 23% are looking to gain incremental revenue. Furthermore, only 32% of surveyed organisations are focusing on use cases deemed “quick wins” – those that are not only easy to implement but also highly beneficial.

Capgemini surveyed over 700 executives from organisations that are currently experimenting with or implementing automation solutions and analysed over 110 real-world use cases across six sectors. According to the study, automation leads the way in wide-scale deployments.

According to Capgemini, within these sectors, when it comes to implementing automation, it’s the back and middle-office that recognise the biggest gains: over half (56%) of organisations using automation have deployed it in IT and over a third (37%) have implemented automation solutions in the middle office. The back-office functions of procurement and supply chain and human resources realise on average the greatest return on investment (ROI) at 18% and 15%, respectively, 29% of organisations using automation have deployed it in front-office functions such as sales and marketing.

According to Christian Gottswinter, Head of Central Business Excellence at Siemens: “Organisations need to have a strategic roadmap for driving automation initiatives and new technology advancements, with employees as their backbone in this transformation journey. The workforce needs the confidence of their job environment to support automation and build a momentum for the change. Businesses need to foster an agile culture with open-minded people who find value in taking a digital-led approach.”

Written by Andrew Ross, published by Information Age.