Despite the evolution of contact center technology (think conversational AI), the spread of digital channels (think smart speakers), and the dramatic change in the ways companies interact with customers (think mobile-first), the industry KPIs for measuring the impact of these transformations remain limited. CSAT, NPS, and more recently, Customer Effort Scores (CES) measure different elements o[...]

  I recently attended the WNS influencer conference in New Orleans, the theme of which was 'Co-create to Outperform’. WNS believes that the marketplace understands what transformation means for their businesses, but the challenge is how to achieve this vision. WNS’ view is that, for transformation to be effective, it needs to be customized for the client with their full[...]

  In this blog, I look at how NTT DATA worked with a large Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS) health insurance carrier to establish an enterprise governance structure for automation, and at the lessons learnt along the way. Like many other large BCBS carriers, the company had piloted RPA initiatives, and from the somewhat frustrating results of these experiments, it had formed two conclu[...]

  This past month, NelsonHall published its annual Next Generation Payroll Services report, which found that buyers and clients of managed payroll services are keenly focused on engaging ‘next generation’ technologies that can enable payroll operating model transformation. Thus, organizations are increasingly seeking out managed payroll services providers that can provide a[...]

  In recent years, many IT services firms have been aggressively acquiring new capabilities in creative areas such as design. One of the key challenges they face in acquiring such firms is managing what can be a significant culture gap between the flexibility of small creative firms and the regimented, industrialized nature of a global IT services firm. Successful acquisitions strik[...]

Blue Prism adopted the theme “Connected RPA – Powering the Connected Entrepreneur Enterprise” at its recent Blue Prism World conferences, the key components of connected-RPA being the Blue Prism connected-RPA platform, Blue Prism Digital Exchange, Blue Prism Skills, and Blue Prism Communities:   Components of Blue Prism's connected-RPA   Blue Prism i[...]

  In my previous blog, I described how, since 2017, Sutherland has created a shared services model that obviates the need for participating California health plans to separately build and update parallel databases to track the availability of providers of nonurgent care for Medicaid recipients. The company estimates that through its consortium of member health plans it has reduced a[...]

Consumers are evolving their preferred ways of interacting on social media: ‘spontaneous’ stories are replacing produced content, transparency and privacy are driving the spread of private groups and influencing regulatory push, and machine learning is personalizing conversational commerce. The impact on brands is greater need for new types of content, investments in automation and[...]

Automation Anywhere’s current Bot Store contains ~500 bots and has received ~40K downloads. In January 2019, these bots were complemented by Digital Workers, with bots being task-centric and Digital Workers being persona- and skill-centric.     So far, downloads from the Bot Store have been free-of-charge, but Automation Anywhere perceives that this approach potentiall[...]

Automation Anywhere, as with the RPA market in general, continues to grow rapidly. The company estimates that it now has 1,600 enterprise clients, encompassing 3,800 unique business entities across 90 countries with ~10,000 processes deployed. At end 2018, the company had 1,400 employees, and it expects to have 3,000 employees by end 2019. The company was initially slow to go-to-market in Europ[...]

  Benefitfocus, the cloud-based benefits management platform and services provider, recently hosted 1,200 benefits professionals at their annual One Place conference in Charleston, S.C. The conference featured updates on Benefitfocus’ strategy, enterprise benefits management technology platform, and partners from its ecosystem; and presented an opportunity to learn from[...]

  NelsonHall has been commenting recently on the future of testing, looking at how AI algorithms and RPA tools fit in the context of QA. This blog takes a different perspective by looking at how one of the tier-one software testing service vendors is approaching its testing of bots and connected devices. With the fast adoption of connected devices, automating testing of consumer or ind[...]

  ADP held its 26th annual Meeting of the Minds (MOTM) client conference recently, celebrating its 70 years in business. ADP is helping change the way employees work by continuously introducing new and enhanced products and services, and here I focus on three key areas: mobile, how pay is accessed, and recruiting. ADP Mobile: growth & new developments ADP has 20 million regis[...]

  We recently talked with Sopra Steria about its work and capabilities around big data and analytics. The company has created a Data Science CoE (or Technology Stream in Sopra Steria’s terminology), which brings specialized services and expertise to the various in-country systems integration (SI) business units, focusing on its key accounts and bringing vertical knowledge. Sop[...]

  In this blog, I look at how Sutherland tackled the challenge of health plans maintaining accurate provider data in the state of California. The challenge: inaccurate health plan data about providers It’s been difficult for health plans in California to maintain accurate, up-to-date information on the current status of providers in the state. According to outsourcing vendo[...]

  In NelsonHall’s 2017 report, ‘Multi-Channel CMS – Delivering Digital Customer Experience’, I forecast that the chat channel, in all its forms, would become 18% of the global CX services outsourcing market by 2020, growing by 30% CAGR. What fuels this sizable growth are the many benefits to brands offering sales and support over text channels, the advancement o[...]

  With the digital economy pushing businesses to pivot and reimagine the way they operate, HR is under considerable pressure to support new business models and shifts in strategic direction.  Further, the workplace and the way we work is rapidly evolving, adding to the complexities and challenges HR must navigate to compete for today's top talent. As a result, organizations of[...]

  NelsonHall has commented several times on how vendors have been introducing AI into their QA/software testing activities; for example, to enhance defect analysis and prediction. We have talked less about the use of RPA because it did not seem to bring much innovation on top of what testing software products already offer. Testing software products have been around for over 20 year[...]

Finance & accounting is at the forefront of the application of RPA, with organizations attracted by its high volumes of transactional activity. Consequently, activities such as the movement and matching of data within purchase-to-pay have been a frequent start-point for organizational automation initiatives. Organizations starting on RPA are initially faced with the challenges of understand[...]

Last week, AntWorks provided analysts with a first preview of its new product ANTstein SQUARE, to be officially launched on May 3. AntWorks’strategy is based on developing full stack intelligent automation, built for modular consumption, and the company’s focus in 2019 is on: BOT productivity, defined as data harvesting plus intelligent RPA Verticalization. In particula[...]