Understanding the process automation landscape
Processes and process automation take many forms. Here’s how to navigate the growing ecosystem of tools for automating everything from simple repetitive tasks to complex custom workflows.
In 2015, Deutsche Telekom started to apply robotic process automation (RPA), one of many tools in the whole process automation space. Over time the company developed an army of more than 2,500 RPA “bots” in a huge success story. But they also had to learn that even if RPA has “process automation” in its name, it does not really automate processes, but tasks.
This is a common misunderstanding that is rooted in the complexity of the process automation landscape, where tool categories are multidimensional and difficult to capture. In this article I will answer the question I get asked almost every day (what is process automation?) and provide an overview of the process automation space.