Artificial intelligence (AI) is making a big splash in enterprise applications across the board, but most of the attention has gone to public-facing functions like chatbots and personal or professional assistants. But this masks the fact that much of the real action is taking place behind the scenes, in the myriad back office processes that contribute to the costs and complexities of running a modern organization.
AI is not like previous generations of technology, however, which were targeted at specific operations and crafted to operate in a predefined manner. Instead, the challenge for the enterprise is to create the kind of training and development processes that allow AI to place traditionally manual processes under fully automated control – essentially assuming the day-to-day work of running the office while the labor force focuses on continued optimization and strategic development.
Right AI for the Job
Not all back office processes are the same, however, and some will take to this new paradigm more quickly than others. The task at hand, then, is to determine which functions aren’t just the easiest to automate but will contribute most directly to the bottom line.
According to Automation Anywhere, a developer of robotic process automation and other technologies, organizations that are seeing the best results from back office transformation have focused on these key areas:
AI is not like previous generations of technology, however, which were targeted at specific operations and crafted to operate in a predefined manner. Instead, the challenge for the enterprise is to create the kind of training and development processes that allow AI to place traditionally manual processes under fully automated control – essentially assuming the day-to-day work of running the office while the labor force focuses on continued optimization and strategic development.
Right AI for the Job
Not all back office processes are the same, however, and some will take to this new paradigm more quickly than others. The task at hand, then, is to determine which functions aren’t just the easiest to automate but will contribute most directly to the bottom line.
According to Automation Anywhere, a developer of robotic process automation and other technologies, organizations that are seeing the best results from back office transformation have focused on these key areas:
- Accounts payable: AI is far more capable of scaling operations in response to incoming workloads than a team of clerks. This takes the bite out of time-consuming tasks like data extraction and validation, proof-of-delivery and posting to ERP and financial platforms.
