Is Automation in BPO a Threat or a Blessing? Can the BPO industry survive Automation?

“Automation is cost-cutting by tightening the corner and not cutting them.”

Is Automation a threat to humanity? Do you agree or disagree? You are not forced to make a decision right away. However, after reading this article, you will be able to make a decision.

But first, let us define what the BPO industry is all about.

Business processing outsourcing BPO ). Outsourcing employs third-party vendors to do routine business operations that are not critical to the organization. This enables the companies to retain key personnel while focusing on high-value activities. Manufacturing and workflow management are examples of regular and well-understood operations that can be assigned to external providers.

Now let’s come back to our main topic.

Is Automation in the BPO sector good or bad?

Over half of BPO contracts copy client processes at a cheaper cost today. However, in today’s fast-paced, digitally disruptive environment, BPOs may discover that their traditional approaches have become outmoded.

Automation of procedures is essential to end-clients when choosing a BPO service provider. Robots have replaced traditional human workers who undertake repetitive manufacturing jobs.

Meanwhile, software automation is taking over various repetitious duties that BPO back offices traditionally did. For example, simple data transportation, checking, validation, and aggregation processes can be automated to eliminate errors.

Here are some of the most common challenges BPOs face that can be overcome with Automation.

SLAs that are hostile

A service-level agreement (SLA) is a contract between a service provider and its clients that specifies the services that will be provided and the service standards the provider must meet. A service-level commitment (SLC) is a more generalized version of an SLA.

To win employment in a highly competitive environment, BPOs would frequently sign aggressive SLAs. This creates a very narrow margin of error, and if your internal procedures need to be fine-tuned correctly, you may be under delivering on what you’ve promised. It’s the staff under immense pressure.

Tight Operational Margins.

Building on the previous point, BPOs often must be extremely lean and run with shallow operational margins. If they encounter unanticipated challenges or complexity, their profitability will suffer soon.

Staff turnover is very high.

Because of the nature of the sector, BPOs have a relatively higher turnover rate. This implies you’re constantly striving to train new employees and integrate team dynamics while presenting a strong and stable organization to your clientele. This may be exhausting and resource-intensive, not to mention the opportunity cost of losing a great employee.

As you can see, there are many difficulties that a BPO faces while attempting to provide value to a client. They will constantly remain behind the trend if they need to optimize their internal processes.

The solution lies in Automation.

In recent years, the concept of corporate outsourcing has risen, and the BPO industry has flourished as a result. BPO firms have begun to take over critical components of modern business for organizations of all sizes, allowing clients to concentrate on their core capabilities.

Higher Productivity

A list of jobs must be accomplished for each type of operation. With Automation, you may establish a list of these tasks that need to be completed, modify them, and then delegate them to AI or robotic processes.

They can be activated in real-time when you get an email request. These automated operations increase productivity.

Help Desk Automation.

Without modern technology, assisting clients and maintaining connections can be exceedingly resource-intensive. AI helps automate many everyday customer support tasks, allowing your team to focus on more complicated and sophisticated use cases while knowing that the banal ones are already being handled at scale.

Online Reputation Management.

Nurturing your company’s communities on social media and other channels requires significant time and work. AI can assist you in triaging the inputs you receive, automating the basic ones, and consolidating the others, allowing your team to optimize their influence while decreasing the time necessary.

Better Decision Making.

AI is beneficial when it comes to making data-driven decisions in a highly exact and accurate manner. Identifying abnormalities and patterns in data can improve your day-to-day decision-making and propel your company to the next level.

As data is the new oil, every business is leveraged in that data. However, it takes time to manage data simultaneously with another core task. Thus companies nowadays Outsource Data management services for their work.

Automation, AI & ML together also improve your employees’ experiences by allowing them to focus on the things that provide value while leaving behind some of the more monotonous and time-consuming duties. As a result, you should expect lower turnover and a more positive team culture. All while providing a significantly better experience for your clients.

Automation of business processes boosts efficiency, which means less staff is required to manage your company’s growth. You can grow your company by expanding your automation systems to accommodate more customers. It is only sometimes necessary to hire additional employees or establish new departments.

How can BPO survive Automation?

Educating people and assisting them in gaining highly specialized abilities will assist them in moving up the value chain and into more advanced jobs. You can also teach your personnel to use these automation technologies, allowing them to provide higher-value services in the long run.

Despite this new trend, BPO companies with an in-depth understanding of specialized areas will remain in demand since these service providers may provide tremendous value to enterprises. Furthermore, because they are experts in their fields, they can demonstrate their confidence in delivering the needed results.

Delivering technology-enabled services and demonstrating great technological capacity would assist BPOs in adapting to changing times.

Conclusion

BPO also enables firms to gain access to cutting-edge technological breakthroughs. BPO providers and businesses constantly use new technology and strategies to improve business processes. Artificial intelligence & automation is here to stay, and if your BPO company wants to be ready for the next revolution, Automation is the way to go.