K.V. J. Padmini, G.I.U.S. Perera, H.M.N. Dilum Bandara, R.K.O.H. Silva
Abstract
Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is the automation of Business Processes (BPs) using software robots. RPA robots automate repetitive, non-value adding human work. The extent that a BP can be transformed to a software robot and its utility depends on several factors such as task type, complexity, repeated use, and regulatory compliance. The estimated RPA project failure rates are relatively high, and transforming the wrong BP is attributed as one of the critical reasons for this. Therefore, given a candidate set of BPs, it is imperative to identify only the suitable ones for RPA transformation. In this paper, we present a Decision Support Tool (DST) to select candidate BPs for RPA. First, we identified 25 factors from the literature that capture the characteristics of a BP. We then reduced the list to 16 factors based on a set of interviews with RPA Subject Matter Experts (SMEs). Then an online survey with snowball sampling was conducted to measure the relevance of those factors in predicting the outcome of RPA transformation of a candidate BP. Finally, the two-class decision forest classification model was used to develop the DST. The utility of the proposed DST was validated by applying it to three RPA projects of a global IT consulting services company.
Keywords: business process automation, decision forest algorithm, decision support tool, robotic process automation
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