Chapter 8: Return on Investment from BPA

One of the questions repeatedly asked by top management of an organisation is about the benefits obtained from investment made in process automation. These benefits are measured in terms of direct impact on the business, which translate to increase in revenue, productivity, cost of operation, etc. Many initiatives taken to automate business processes have failed because of inability to measure the business benefits obtained from this automation. The other main reason of failure of these initiatives is the inability to manage the implementation of automated systems by failing to manage organisational change associated with the implementation. Also many times, incorrect assessment automation requirement and integration of business processes with technology. In other instances, returns from automation have been found to be low in information intensive industry. The reason being, in information intensive industry business processes change rapidly and this has an impact on the automation. In reality, the failure is not because of the automation of business processes, but because of lack of correct integration of technology and business processes. Here, correct integration can be interpreted as degree and level of automation.