#97 10 Secrets of Effective AI Automation

Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Process and Automation Podcast with the Automation Guys. Yeah, so today I'm here as always with Arno. Arno, hello.

Hi, Sascha.

So yeah, I think it's fair to say that we currently, or even last year, we can observe rapidly evolving landscape of AI and AI-powered automation. Automation. So really, really every day we see there are new things coming up. Very, very exciting times we live in. So, and here on the podcast and offline, we have the joy to talk with many experts in the space. So if you have time, go back to some of our interview episodes. Yeah. And otherwise, we talk with many, many experts in the space and also have plenty discussions with our members of the Automation Guys community. Yeah. And we find that certain behaviors then stand out as pivotal for the success of AI and automation programs. So for today, we would like to share 10 of the core behaviors significantly enhance the effectiveness of AI programs and AI-driven automation and all these type of initiatives. So let's jump into the 10 key points we think are important. And Arno, do you like to kick off?

Yes, thank you, Sascha. And I think the reason for a lot of these podcasts where we sort of talk about the 10 points of doing this, 5 points of doing this, these are sort of areas where we feel in our sort of 20-year expertise in the automation space that we feel that these are proven points that would facilitate and also sort of enable successful project delivery in this sort of space. And whether or not it's low-code AI, today's episode, we're talking about AI-driven automations. So I think it's very important for the listeners to realize that these are kind of curated points. And the first one I want to talk about today is empowering the experts in the field. And obviously, you know, if you're gonna sort of integrate AI and automation into your business, you will at some point, and probably close to, not far after you've kicked off your initiative, require the expertise of seasoned professionals. And again, these subject matter experts bring those invaluable insights to ensure, you know, you can align from a technological perspective. You know, they're gonna talk about all the sort of latest tech out there. You're gonna talk about them about that. But I also will align that with your business goals because obviously, you know, experts in the field, perhaps in a specific vertical, they would have seen similar types of problems that they've solved for well for other customers in that field. Their knowledge in, in, in that specific business domain can really guide the, the customization of the sort of automation tools you need to, to, to fit your unique business and operational needs. And, you know, and, and that would really enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of, of these initiatives once they get started. And once you start rolling out your first in this instance, AI-driven automation.

Great. So yeah, next one is value-driven metrics. So the success of these AI projects or automation projects should be measured really by that tangible impact on the business. So obviously, Beyond the deployment of technology, it's really essential to look at what these tools contribute to the key business metrics. So that's something like the productivity of the business, cost reduction, revenue growth. So because that's fundamentally really, really important, so everything else should be probably then more vanity instead of these key, key points. So yeah, look at these key points and see what what it brings to the business. And yeah, all these automation efforts, they have to be aligned to the overall business objectives. But I guess it is a bit of common sense, but I think it's very important sometimes with the excitement of technology to lose sight of that. So it's very often to sort of bring that back. It doesn't really help us here. What's the impact of that? So, but we come into that a little bit later. Yeah, yeah.

The next point I want to touch on is really going out and getting executive support. And this is sort of sponsorship from up high inside the business. And I think, you know, support from the top level management is absolutely critical for the success of if you're going to embark on an AI-driven automation project or any type of automation project. I think you need to excite these people. You need to convey to them the sort of efficiencies that you're going to bring into the business, the sort of savings you're going to, you know, realize from bringing these projects in and also the types of scalability that you bring into the business because obviously top-level management, they're sort of looking into the future, you know, what the business growth looks like. And if you've got their backing and you can articulate this in the right way and they actually get what you're trying to achieve there, This is a very critical thing to, you know, from a SuccessFactors perspective to get right. And again, you know, once you get executive backing, it provides the necessary resources. If there's any organizational challenges that needs to be resolved, they will help you with that. And, you know, I think from a sustainability perspective, from, you know, for these automation initiatives, Ape will provide that. So, so, so, so this support is, is, is really key. Also, you know, like if you look at the broader business to, to foster that culture to, you know, embrace technology, automation technology, AI technology. So it is really, really important to, to, to, to, to get this group of people inside your business.

Yeah, especially So we talked about a lot of these things in the podcast, how to start a project right, etc. And then very often we say start slow, not slow, but small, maybe also slow, but that may be from within the department. So that will be sort of the bottom-up thing. But from within the department, I guess that's fine. But as soon as it, yeah, this is wider automation across the whole business. There is no way without executive support to make that a success. But of course, that excitement from within one department, that could already as well excite the executive team to do a wider adoption. So yeah, but yeah, thanks, Arno. A very important point. Yeah, next one up, especially when we talk about automation and changes within the business, and clearly automation is changing how we do business. So yeah, effective change management is absolutely vital. So the main point maybe in that area is addressing employee concerns, especially when it comes to automation. Do I lose my job? And are the robots taking over? All these kind of things are coming up. Is AI taking our jobs? So it's obviously addressing these concerns and have really good communication, clear communication with everyone. And really engage them. So in the past, we always were talking about things like, yeah, this is your little helper. So it's not necessarily taking your job, it's making your job easier. So we're working together, it's your colleague, etc. So those kind of things are helping to transition, I guess, in these organizations. But yeah, it is super important to get everyone on board. Otherwise, those kind of big, wide AI-enhanced automation projects will be very difficult.

Okay. So the next one I want to cover is looking and evaluating the impacts of automation. And again, I think, you know, when you bring automation into your business, you have to continuously assess what the impact is on your business. You know, and you also need to look at sort of what business processes are critical, you know, to automate first. And again, you know, this involves sort of regularly reviewing how the automation is affecting various aspects of, of your operational side of your business and, and really making those necessary adjustments to strategies in order for you to sort of realize your long-term goals. And again, you know, these, these evaluations help you to understand the, the effectiveness of automation with inside your business and and really making objective data-driven decisions for sort of the future improvements, the sort of things that you feel where automation could be better, where else it can be applied with inside your business. So it is always about evaluating what is the impact. Are we actually realizing our goals? Are we actually achieving the scalability targets we've set ourselves? You know, can we actually take more customers, you know, or onboard more customers without actually going hiring more staff? You know, it is sort of having your eyes on this. And I think this is sort of your control room, isn't it? Absolutely. You know, what areas of the business is affecting, you know, where are the kind of the positive gains, you know, the really success stories where we say, well, we've achieved 90% automation in this area of finance, you know, and that's a win-win. That's something we could celebrate and say, well, where else can we do this? Or perhaps there's areas in the business that we feel the automation that we apply can be better, what other technologies can we bring in? So it is really just having those eyes on these different areas and constantly evaluating it.

Yeah, that's very important. And equally important is the innovation encouragement within the company. But that's not necessarily just for AI automation projects. That should be a general wider thing. I believe this is what every business needs. So yeah, fostering the culture of innovation within all the teams, it's absolutely essential for finding new ways, exploration and implementation of, yeah, specifically in this case automation and AI possibilities. Yeah, and encourage that creative thinking and experimentation. And with experimentation comes as well failing. So I think that culture also allows for, okay, let's try something out. We fail, we fail successful, um, and then, uh, yeah, that can lead to, to, to really groundbreaking solutions. You get maybe potential advancements in business because of that. So it really goes into that research and development area, maybe. Yeah, and that, that, that's something where your company and your organization is then suddenly at the forefront, um, and is competing very successfully in the market. So And if you don't do that, most likely you would just do the status quo and nothing will really change. So these things all go hand in hand.

Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely. I couldn't agree less. The next point I want to talk about is collaboration across business platform or business departments, right? So one platform collaboration across departments. And I think this cross departmental collaboration is really a very, very important thing to realize the full potential of. The topic of today is AI-driven automation, but I think automation in general, you know, and, and again, the reason for this is it allows for this sort of pooling effect of diverse ideas, insights across these departments, people working together, sharing ideas. And I think this fosters a more comprehensive and a sort of integrated approach to automation. And again, this collaboration ensures that all of the strategies that you put in place for your automation are sort of well-rounded. It sort of considers the needs of, you know, most of the people, or you've considered their perspectives. And also you've touched different areas of the business. I think it naturally you'll feel, you know, where all the sweet spots are, you know, when you, when you start, you know, pushing AI-driven automation within your business. Very, very key area. And again, sort of coupled with the fact that you've got a subject matter expert in as well, you've got backing of your senior leadership. You understand sort of the change management. I think this is a very important thing to bring people in together and say, listen, we've got all these things under control. We want to hear now from you, you know, what, what are the, the, the sort of things that we, we need to look at? And again, this is sort of the, the suggestion box where people's voices also heard. And I think that, that's a very, very, very good place to actually go find areas in the business or potential candidates who feel while, this is an effort because it impacts not just people in finance, but it's also, you know, people across the board with inside the business.

Yeah. And then you pick that up, you do your experimentation. If it works, you implement it, expand on it, roll it out across the whole company. Yeah. So this is how it works. It sounds simple, but, well, yeah, this is generally what's needed. Yeah. And earlier we talked about that we should measure the success of these automations. Do we gain productivity, cost saving, etc., growing the business? And of course, one important aspect of that is what brings money to the business in the first place, or in general, that's the customer. And having that focus on the customer when building automations and aligning these automation efforts is crucial. Crucial. So of course, if you wouldn't, yeah, if you wouldn't do that, your service quality and satisfaction maybe would suffer. So you definitely have to take that in consideration. So your service level is going up, your satisfaction is going up. So it should always improve these experiences, yeah, and address customer pain points, yeah, very effectively. So Yeah, so the customer-centric approach when it comes to automation and bringing these technologies in will ultimately add real value to the business and of course to the customer.

Also, what I want to discuss as another point is just continuous learning, and this involves keeping pace with the sort of advancements in automation, AI automation, you know, and that really requires an emphasis on adaptation, continuous learning, you know. So it's almost like you have to have somebody that's in charge of bringing that into the business and looking after that. So you understand, you know, what are the newest things, you know, what are the things that we could leverage to make our automation better? So, so all of these sort of training initiatives, I think organizations must invest in that. And then it has to be development programs to ensure all the teams are up to date with the latest technologies, the trends, the skills, you know, and all of these things. So, so people know when they look at problems that it is something that's perhaps in their sort of skill armory so they could say, well, you know, we've got this specific problem. We know that AI can solve this and they could talk about it and they can say, you know, the HashiCorp solution for it. And I think this ongoing learning process is really critical for maintaining, you know, a sort of a competitive edge when you deploy AI-driven automation you know, with, with inside your business. It, it is just people armed with that knowledge will look at problems and then automatically they will sort of start to see solutions based on the knowledge. So really, again, very important to, to, to, to keep on investing in that continuous learning, sort of send people, people on courses. It doesn't have to be a machine learning course. For example, that's very low level. It could just be, well, what's the art of the possible? What sort of things are out there that we can use? So that people will talk about that. So if they want to look at looking at a supplier or they need expertise out there to help them to implement a solution, at least what they're doing is that they're kind of stepping in the right direction. They know that we need to go find somebody that can help us with said problem because we know that there is this technology out there that could potentially solve that problem.

Yeah, it's important to keep up to date or definitely then filter out of all that massive bubble of AI tools coming up what is useful and what is not. So it makes it not necessarily easier, I would say, with everything what's come up, what's coming up. But yeah, important. Yeah. And then from that, of course, is that strategic scaling as a next point. So once you have your automation automation is going using automation now, it requires a strategic approach that balances that efficiency with growth. So, and then taking change management in mind and people in mind, so that should be just a gradual expanding, gradual, yeah, gradual expanding. That's the word. Yeah. In that automation initiatives and it should Of course, never let that focus slip on the business goals and the capacity. And strategic scaling ensures that the organization really maximizes on that benefit what automation gives you. So strategic scaling is sort of the next big step. And that what we heard in the past, that's where where it stopped for many companies. So there was RPA, it's new, so we could get going and then there's some success, but then scaling that is a completely different thing. And yeah, so it is important to also focus on that and maybe then look back again. Okay, we did all that, that was all successful, but why couldn't we scale it properly? And then finding maybe some clues and then restart those initiatives because, yeah, the benefits you can have with automation on a wider scale. Yeah, it's incredible. And we hear and we see these successful case studies where suddenly 100 bots, 100 automations, 100 processes have been improved. Yeah, and the results are really incredible.

It is incredible. And I think sometimes when you look at scaling, I think that if you have got the capacity to scale it inside your business and you've got the automations, let's say, in a specific vertical industry, then a lot of the businesses then start to evolve into a business tech where they could potentially use whatever they've developed internally for themselves because they've got a really, really good team that knows about automation in the field that they operate in. And that's then the sort of the point where they become the leaders in that tech space for their particular industry. And again, there's sort of revenue opportunities for them to actually outsource that to other businesses with inside their sort of space, if that makes sense. And sort of market these solutions or out, you know, sort of license these solutions to other people. For these places as well. So it's almost like, you know, you start with a sort of insurance company, but it sort of ends up as an insurance tech company. It solves its own problems, but it also helps other insurance companies. Of course, you sort of morphing into a tech company rather than just like staying in one specific thing. So there's a lot.

It is very clever. Yeah, because you will suddenly transfer from a cost center, which is purely cost center, suddenly become— becomes a profit center. So it's, it's brilliant if you can make that move, isn't it?

Exactly, because it's likely that people has got the same sort of problems. And I think that if it's not a differentiator in the market and it's something that you can monetize, why wouldn't you, right? See, the differentiator puts you in the lead. But if you can monetize some of the basic things, the fundamental things out there in the market, why wouldn't you do that? And then I think that, that just sort of from a return of investment perspective, just kind of compounds that, that business case because you look at it like, well, 5 years later, I've all of a sudden repaid all of my investment in automation and I'm actually sort of making money out of this because I'm outsourcing and sort of licensing this to other companies.

So I think a far more valuable company at the same time as well. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, 10 key points, 10 key behaviors to significantly amplify sort of the benefits of AI-powered automation within the organization. So yeah, adopting those practices will more likely bring bigger returns for your business. So let us know what you think about those 10 We thought these are sort of very important from all the conversations we had and the experience we had over the years. So let us know what you think. Send us a message on social or on the automationguides.net community. So visit us there anyway. Join us if you haven't yet. And yeah, we will Yeah, we will be back with more recordings, not recordings, podcasts. And yeah, until then, let's automate it.