📋 Tender Overview
The following article by Invest Lithuanias Senior Investment Advisor Monika Vilkelyt first appeared in the OutsourcingMore magazine. You can find the original here. Lithuanias strategic approach to RPA development. Despite its proven value one issue is holding back the implementation of Robotic Process Automation RPA in GBS the fact that centres are basically on their own when it comes to getting funding creating strategies finding talent and training it up. Support from mother companies can be erratic. This is sometimes due to lack of awareness or trust in automated systems. But most often it results from the misplaced fear that RPA inevitably leads to employees being laid off. Meanwhile assistance and support from governments and other partners remains minimal. However driven by its goal of becoming the regional hub for RPA Lithuania is following a different approach one that revolves around community and support.RPA is the hot topic in GBS. This use of software programmed to carry out repeatable tasks offers centres a huge range of benefits including reduced costs and increased productivity. No surprise then that according to KPMG 72 of GBS leaders have made RPA their top service delivery priority. Everest Groups survey found that around 25 of centres have successfully implemented RPA. The RPA ball is clearly rolling.Yet implementation remains slower than expected. The reason Recent research by Invest Lithuania and Create Lithuania identified two problem areas for centres talent and strategy. Regarding talent centres have difficulties finding RPA specialists. Many of them train up talents only to see them snapped up by competitors. This skills gap feeds in to a second issue strategy. Deciding which functions to automate and how is proving challenging. Consultants are one option but they are expensive especially for pilot projects. Instead RPA is typically developed ad hoc with team members optimising their workflow using hot keys or Excel macros and then rolling out these solutions. This bottom up approach has merits but needs to be complemented by a clear strategy. Ultimately because centres lack support when training specialists or developing strategies RPA implementation is taking longer and costing more than it should.Building connections for RPA successThe solution is to facilitate knowledge sharing and develop expertise. Recognising this Invest Lithuania the countrys FDI agency has partnered with Create Lithuania a program for professional development and the applicability of best foreign practices to create a future of modern Lithuania to develop a concentrated RPA hub that brings in all players from GBS centers to various service providers as well as leading universities.Its first step was to have in-depth conversations with key GBS players. This revealed some important insights a strong business case is key for starting the RPA journey companies are disincentivized from training talent for risk of losing it and support is needed for the entire journey to Intelligent Process Automation IPA not just the RPA stage.Armed with this understanding they are now organising the first of many community meet ups where attendees will get an introduction to RPAs advantages plus examples of technical use cases. This eventually will kickstart knowledge exchange with RPA know-how made available to everyone involved in GBS industry. In support of this initiative the government is investing into tools and incentives to help GBS centres adopt best RPA practices.The second step is to ensure a supply of high calibre talent trained in RPA. To achieve this Invest Lithuania is partnering with two universities and a software provider to launch a dedicated programme for RPA. This programme is aimed at both current students and professionals looking to become RPA developers. By boosting the availability of talent this programme aims to make it easier for local GBS centres especially smaller ones to start RPA initiatives. It will also provide added impetus to the field accelerating the development of the whole process automation ecosystem.Optimized and accelerated processesWhile Lithuanias strategic approach to RPA is recent it is already bearing fruit. 34 of centres have implemented RPA solutions and over one third of these are moving towards full IPA having already deployed autonomic and advanced automation systems. In total 85 of the centres in Lithuania are developing RPA solutions in-house. And there are already notable success stories. One centre in Lithuania has already saved close to 100000 human hours through its RPA freeing up staff to work on higher value tasks.And one of Lithuanias largest GBS centres Western Union managed to automate over 1 million tasks last year. As Gintautas Jonutis Director of Automation and Robotics explains the benefits have already been significant. The technology has optimized and accelerated our internal processes and reduced errors and even risks. Unsurprisingly the centre is already looking at next steps. We are actively increasing our investments in automation and going beyond RPA in order to impact a wider range of processes especially end-to-end work flows where you are dealing with unstructured data and human interaction Mr. Jonutis explains.Transforming GBS togetherWhat is driving Lithuanias focus on RPA The answer is its potential to transform the way GBS works and the countrys desire to be at the forefront of this seismic shift. McKinsey and KPMG forecast that these technologies will fundamentally alter the role of centres. They will become value creators driving digital transformation across whole organizations.
