Automation lifecycle

Stage 1: discover is comprised of the identify and evaluate phases. In the identify phase, find and combine potential processes for automation to create a master backlog or ‘pipeline’ of use cases. Assess the business benefits to validate priorities using a standardised approach for consistency. In the evaluation phase, your organisation evaluates the pipeline of automation opportunities and develops corresponding business cases.

Identify phase: opportunities pipeline

Description: explore your organisation’s operations to discover automation opportunities. Define objectives and identify key stakeholders. Identify and log tasks, processes, or workflows that may benefit from automation.

Objective: discover and identify current process state and verify existing hypothesis. Capture potential automation opportunities in a pipeline backlog.

Inputs: systems and data logs, process documentation, and business objectives.

Outputs:  

• opportunities pipeline: a list of potential automation opportunities, often ranked by priority and feasibility. 
• process discovery outputs: visual process graphs, process, and task-level info such as steps, resources involved, deviations or exceptions, frequency, cost, and time.

Technology role: process discovery, screen recording, audit trail, customer interactions.

Process intelligence: including process, data, communication, and task mining.

Human role: business analysts, data governance, and business process owners (BPOs). 

Evaluate phase: prioritised pipeline

Description: evaluate and prioritise opportunities from the identify phase.

Objective: assess each opportunity’s feasibility, complexity, estimate ROI, and prioritise them based on strategic alignment with the business goals. 

Inputs: list of prioritised opportunities, cost data, and business strategy.

Outputs: a prioritised list of opportunities, often with an understood business value for each.

Technology role: decision-support tools (AI/ML) and cost-benefit analysis software.

Human role: business analysts, financial analysts, legal and compliance officers, and automation architects. 

Follow the steps below to design and develop your automation solutions. In the Design phase, produce a comprehensive process design document and implementation plan. In the Develop phase, create and configure the solution, including RPA bots and AI models, to perform the identified automation tasks.

Design phase: project plan

Description: plan detailed steps for the automation opportunities you’ve chosen. Defining workflows, UIs, exceptions management and technical architecture. Then develop the designed workflows.  

Objective: create detailed plans and designs for the selected automation projects. This includes defining technical architecture, workflow designs, resources, UAT plans, and user interfaces, ensuring that the automation solutions align with your organisation’s requirements, objectives, and regulatory compliance requirements. 

Inputs: prioritised pipeline log, technical requirements, and design specifications.

Outputs: project plan implementation, deployment and user acceptance testing, process design documents (PDD), development assets, mock-ups or prototypes.

Technology role: prototyping tools, workflow design tools, development environments, and integration platforms. 

Human role: solution architects, developers, UX designers, and specialists as needed (e.g., legal, ethical, and privacy advisors), along with business process owners (BPOs).

Develop phase: solution implementation 

Description: build, configure and deploy automation solutions iteratively, including alpha and beta versions. Create software agents or bots to execute tasks and processes.

Objective: build and configure bots that will execute the tasks or processes, making sure they are functional, efficient, ethical, and compliant. Using alpha and beta release cycles ensure human-centered design and supports change management, addressing employee resistance and ensuring successful implementation.

Inputs: project plan (implementation, deployment and UAT), process design documents (PDD), development assets, and prototypes/mock-ups. 

Outputs: an automation solution, including alpha and beta product releases, bots, operational support guide, roles and responsibility documentation and, associated software.

Technology role: automation platform, development environments, and integration tools.

Human role: RPA developers, system administrators, IT operations teams, and specialists as needed (e.g., legal, ethical, and privacy advisors), along with business process owners (BPOs).

In Stage 3: run, your organisation will operationalise the implementation plan. After a rigorous testing phase, you can deploy your plan into a production environment.

Test phase: user testing and go-live plan 

Description: automation solutions undergo rigorous testing to ensure they work as intended before production deployment. 

Objective: thoroughly test the automation solution, including associated software and AI components, to ensure it meets design, quality, ethical and legal compliance, and performance standards.

Inputs: solution design document, built automation solutions, alpha and beta product releases, test plans, and deployment schedules. Defects are managed and resolved.

Outputs: completed testing, release management plan, final operational and end user support material, and go-live plan. 

Technology role: testing frameworks and automation scripts.

Human role: QA testers, deployment engineers, release managers, technical writer, automation coordinators, and specialists as needed (e.g., legal, ethical, and privacy advisors), along with business process owners (BPOs).

Deploy phase: go-live and stabilise production 

Description: once your automation solution is tested and validated, they are deployed into production.

Objective: solutions are deployed into the production environment and assessed for stability. 

Inputs: go-live plan, code and data releases, and solution design document.

Outputs: execute deployment in production, stabilise production and manage defects.

Technology role: deployment tools and scripts.

Human role: QA testers, deployment engineers, AI technology owner, data governance, business process owner, and automation coordinators.

Stage 4: maintain, includes the measure and monitor phases, where your organisation monitors the deployed solution. This includes assessing automation’s impact. It also means following business and regulation rules. It means finding optimisations and new opportunities to feed into the pipeline. And includes continuous auditing, validation, and revaluation of ingested AI models.

Monitor and maintain phase: performance reports and data insights

Description: ongoing monitoring and measurement via tracking the performance of automation solutions and assessing their impact. Stakeholders monitor and manage automated workflows resolving production issues.

Objective: continuously monitor the deployed automation solutions' KPIs and performance. Assess their impact on business operations and identify and correct any variance from expected performance targets. The goal is to optimise the solutions and ensure risk management. 

Inputs: deployed automation solutions, performance metrics, and business objectives.

Outputs: performance reports and logs, optimisation recommendations, and insights for continuous improvement (feeds back into master log). 

Technology role: auditing and monitoring tools, analytics platforms, reporting systems, exception management, and change management.

Human role: automation support teams, AI technology owners, data governance, business process owner, and business analysts.