Forrester forecasts $6.5 billion RPA software and $16 billion RPA services sales in 2025. RPA vendors are doing their best turning crisis like COVID 19 and impacts of new workforce generations to companies into profits. Some vendors even do not hesitate to penetrate micro markets where the buyer hardly experiences the automation benefits. In some cases non-value adding processes are automated instead of being eliminated or RPA is applied to as-is processes. Hidden unemployment rate among robots may be higher compared to humans.

C level executives are always proud of their RPA implementation in the highlighted sections of tech-magazines. However, most of the business users are still doing their jobs as they did for many years. On the other hand, there are desperate mid-level managers searching for any opportunities to make the promised RPA ROI real. In the meeting rooms, coffee breaks and the corridors there is a question:

"Do you have any jobs for robots?"

Yes, there is. 

The secret sauce of ROI for any investment is to have a valid implementation methodology. Here are the 4 main ingredients:

1. Your organization’s end to end value chain acknowledged by all senior management team members
2. End to end as-is process maps tied to the value chain
3. List of your assets (systems, capabilities and resources)
4. Your strategy and KPIs

Blend these in cross-functional workshops and decide on:

• Non-value adding activities
• Value adding activities
• Mandatory activities (legal etc.)
• Improvement opportunities

“Step 0” of your RPA implementation plan is to eliminate non-value adding activities. Even without setting up the RPA infrastructure, now you started creating ROI. Your next step is to apply Robotic Operating Model.