Business Process Management (BPM) and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) are tools that many companies still are not using to their full potential. BPM and RPA combined can revolutionize the way businesses perform tasks and complete projects.
Automation technology is an essential tool to help future-proof your business. In order to keep up with increased customer demand, ever-changing industry regulations, and an evolving workforce, you need to take advantage of automated solutions.
While businesses are adopting some kind of software robots with the goal of saving time and money, most lack the experience to maximize the value of these tools. Businesses often still use legacy applications and systems on a day-to-day basis, which can slow down the workflow.
BPM software and RPA software work together to create a seamless digital transformation for your business. A solution that combines BPM and RPA helps you get the most value from your tools, analyze crucial data to improve your overall business strategy, and streamline important tasks.
BPM vs. RPA: Which One Is ‘More Important’?
You may be wondering if you need a solution that incorporates both BPM and RPA. These tools have different strengths and applications that complement each other.
Robotic Process Automation
RPA is focused on automating high-volume repetitive tasks. This automation enables these tasks to be accomplished much more quickly and efficiently than an employee can complete them.
RPA solutions help employees maximize their time by automatically handling predictable tasks, such as processing transactions and sending data to other digital systems.
What RPA Can Do
This type of software bot is capable of such everyday tasks as:
- Data entry
- Data migration
- Forms processing
- Appointment scheduling
- Data collection
- Help desk assistance
RPA can help businesses lower overhead and labor costs, and complete large tasks rapidly. It cannot, however, make complex decisions without human intervention or a rule-based system in place that tells it how to sort and manipulate data.
This is where BPM comes in, ensuring that automated processes move forward through clearly laid-out procedures on how to handle exceptions.
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Business Process Management
BPM encompasses a wider range of processes and actions than RPA. BPM solutions seek to improve business processes by increasing efficiency and maximizing value. BPM assesses current processes to see which areas may be redundant or not functioning smoothly.
BPM has a wider focus than RPA. It manages end-to-end processes, allowing users to easily monitor and evaluate every step that leads up to a result.
What BPM Can Do
This type of high-level software assists with more complex tasks with many different steps, such as:
- Acquisition and procurement
- Claims management
- Compliance management
- Employee onboarding
- Healthcare and insurance approval process
- Project management
BPM enables businesses to increase productivity, reduce wasted time, lower costs, improve scalability and boost efficiency overall. BPM needs RPA, however, to complete all the basic tasks it delegates.
When evaluating RPA vs. BPM, it is important to realize that these tools relate to different processes and serve different (yet linked) functions.
Benefits of BPM and RPA
With RPA and BPM, employees no longer have to perform mundane tasks manually. With skilled employees in high demand and many employees still working from home, RPA is an essential tool to help you reduce time-consuming tasks.
RPA helps scale down repetitive workloads for employees, enabling them to focus on other important tasks. Alleviating basic tasks contributes to overall employee satisfaction and retention. RPA tools also make it possible for critical tasks to still be completed even if the office is not at full capacity.
Business process automation helps streamline an employee’s workload, by identifying challenges and points where progress is slowed. By finding inefficiencies, an automated BPM solution can improve work processes and eliminate unnecessary steps.
Thanks to the increased accuracy and efficiency that BPM and RPA provide, an often-overlooked benefit of these tools is a boost in customer satisfaction.
No matter how dedicated an employee is, there will always be tasks that are not completed or fall behind. An example is forgetting to send out an email reminder that a customer’s appointment is coming up soon.
Using automated tools to assist employees ensures that no task is overlooked and the customer feels well cared for. Employees can also now devote more time to interacting with the customer for more complex issues.
Why BPM and RPA Combined are So Effective
RPA combined with BPM empowers businesses to run more efficiently, while accomplishing a high level of tasks. Employees can spend their valuable work time on tasks that require human interaction, while remaining confident that essential yet tedious day-to-day tasks are being automatically handled.
In addition to reducing workload and creating efficiencies, BPM and RPA combined also help eliminate human error. Although automated solutions are not foolproof, they can complete repetitive tasks with precision and speed.
BPM focuses on the big picture, while RPA takes care of simple, important tasks.
Discover How BPM and RPA Can Transform the Way You Do Business
Still confused about BPM vs. RPA? We’re here to answer your questions. 1Rivet offers expert RPA consulting to assess and support your business needs. We are a cost-effective alternative to the big RPA consulting firms. Contact us today to learn how automation can streamline your workload.
1Rivet is a consulting firm that provides industry-leading consulting, outsourced RPA services, and managed RPA services to assist companies with top-quality automation. We connect IT and business, and we service diverse industries including healthcare, law, finance and more. 1Rivet partners with UIPath for all RPA services.