Automation ROI, Hyperautomation, Generative AI for automation — What’s coming in 2024

In the dynamic world of automation, staying one step ahead can be tricky but invaluable. 

You want to ensure (as best you can) that you’re making the right moves and investments now to withstand tech developments and inevitable innovations along with your scaling business needs.

Poor planning when it comes to automating your critical business processes will have your team running at a deficit, unable to keep up with workloads and working ineffectively. This will negatively impact operations, any competitive advantage and, ultimately, business outcomes.

As the leader in workload automation, we’re sharing our predictions of what’s on the horizon for automation in the coming year. We hope this information equips you to adapt and scale through the changes and drive greater financial success. 

We’ve talked about the Great Replatforming, the reckoning of automation and the application boom, and we’ve all experienced AI infiltration, seeping into almost every technology and business application conversation, including workload automation.

So, now, what’s next?

Automation will become easier to use

As enterprises focus on creating greater efficiency and unlocking savings, many will wisely look to automation. Most IT teams already have a backlog of automation opportunities and “low-hanging fruit.” 

Most smart IT leaders recognize it’s more urgent than ever that automation becomes faster and easier to set up. Many are exploring a self-service approach, with employees becoming more hands-on in managing their automated business processes. 

Stakeholders will need to participate actively, forcing automation providers to make their products easier to use. The barrier for workload automation will be broken down even further with less technical and more business process-oriented skillsets needed. 

What to do now

Use a workload automation platform that can ramp up reliable automation quickly and easily, taking into account the different applications and environments within your tech stack. Look for things like automation wizards, drag-and-drop interfaces, pre-built templates and intuitive tools for configuration and deployment. How is the platform leveraging AI? 

Question the provider’s migration process early if you’re exploring a new solution. We all know the commitment and risk of moving to a new system, so check all your bases.

Enterprises will move from silos to connections to hyperautomation 

Silos across different platforms will continue to cause problems and breakdowns within automation. The multitude of solutions like Service Orchestration and Automation Platforms (SOAPs), robotic process automation (RPA) solutions, integration platform as a service (iPaaS) tools, business process management (BPM) solutions and enterprise applications integration (EAI) tools will need to work together in a unified ecosystem.

SOAP will drive the interoperability of automation platforms by progressing the orchestration capabilities of the hybrid IT tech landscape. This is necessary, with so many companies managing a diverse, hybrid environment. The automation rate will rise sharply as more and more customers use this interoperability to realize their own vision of automating all the processes they can across their entire organization.

Hyperautomation will be within reach for IT leaders as it becomes feasible to connect a variety of automation, and even AI tools, to drive business outcomes. Enterprises will continue to elevate how technology is used for business growth and profitability. Going into 2024, there will be an increased focus on how your IT landscape, including automation platforms, works in tandem to drive end-to-end automation and realize desired business outcomes.

What to do now

Evaluate your business processes and automation systems. Use a full stack workload automation solution that automates end-to-end with the flexibility to work across and orchestrate any application, middleware and IT infrastructure. This is the only way to ensure that business process automation will continue to work seamlessly, no matter what the tech stack is now and in the future.

Generative AI will bring exciting innovations

Generative AI can provide valuable insights into a company’s overall usage of an automation platform and even recommendations on improving automation — everything from how workflows are built to how jobs are scheduled for better optimization and fewer failures. 

The integration of generative AI into various automation platforms, such as SOAP, RPA and low-code application platforms (LCAP), will further improve the capabilities of these platforms. 

Generative AI can summarize data, create reports, generate personalized responses for customer service and rapidly handle level 1 support to improve CSAT scores — and that’s just scratching the surface. Generative AI will expand the scope of automation, moving from only automating repetitive, rule-based tasks to handling more complex, creative and data-driven processes, opening up new automation possibilities. 

Expectations are that generative AI (and we’ve already seen some of this) will begin automating content creation, design generation and product customization, along with personalized marketing campaigns, sales communications and customer support. 

Many believe that generative AI tools will revolutionize the automation experience so that non-technical users can be empowered to automate their own tasks and processes easily. More advanced AI models will help automate components of humans’ decision-making process by analyzing vast amounts of data, identifying patterns and making informed recommendations. 

Think of a loan approver where AI can analyze dozens or hundreds of variables and recommend approving or rejecting an applicant. AI will handle this complex manual process with the ability to comb through and make sense of massive amounts of data in a way unattainable by humans.

What to do now

Begin embracing generative AI and keep yourself informed on the latest developments. The key here is to leverage technology in a way that helps your people do more and focus on what they do best. Evaluate where human talents and capabilities would be most effective within your IT team and organization. Make sure your SOAP platform has the capability to integrate AI to automate decision-making tasks to improve your automation coverage. At Redwood, our mission is to unleash human potential through enterprise automation, and we believe the focus needs to be on empowering and optimizing your human workforce.

Automation ROI will be measured on targeted business outcomes

Some C-suite leaders are tracking automation ROI based on basic metrics or alignment with corporate KPIs. Going forward, many CEOs and CFOs will demand that automation platforms be connected to business intelligence dashboards and advanced data visualizations to track critical metrics and KPIs that show automation’s impact on business outcomes.

Many digital companies with automation baked into their DNA have experienced a tremendous competitive advantage. The vast majority of other companies have been playing catch-up. 

IT and business teams will increasingly work together to develop dynamic and flexible measurement frameworks for automation, taking into account evolving circumstances and goals, all in an effort to improve business agility.

What to do now

Ensure your workload automation solution connects with critical business intelligence tools and tracks what executives want to know. This will inevitably show the value that automation brings to the business while also unveiling potential areas of improvement. Greater efficiency and productivity can be directly attributed to automation, and its contribution needs to be visible across the company to prove value. This will make sure your automation journey continuously bears rewards along the way.

Are you ready for 2024?

This year will bring even more significant advances in automation and more opportunities for enterprises to lean into these powerful solutions. While automating more of your business processes may initially feel like an intimidating lift, it’s the only way to stay competitive and drive better business outcomes.

With the right platform, your business will unlock so much more potential and achieve more significant milestones than you could have imagined before. May the automation force be with you! 

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