Software Development Trends in 2021: The Importance of Automation in IT Operations
Manual processes like data entry or marketing campaign analysis can now be automated thanks to the modern technology revolution. However, not all businesses are involved in this revolution. Many leaders are either worried that the new technology will affect their workforce or they will overspend.
As one of the software development outsourcing leaders, we have utilized automation and know-how automation can simplify processes, improve productivity, and allow employees to do more satisfying and challenging tasks.
Below are the seven significant areas we’re still witnessing companies in various industries handling manually and how automation can streamline these processes.
Organisational socialisation
Organizational socialization, also known as onboarding, is a necessary process that helps employees to understand their new position and the job requirements entail. This process can be automated, from proposal creation to forms filling, approval, ensuring that everything is ready for a new employee to start.
The onboarding automation process also includes buying new equipment and delivering it to the employee's home (in the case of WFH due to Covid-19 pandemic). This process is essential, especially during the lockdown.
Offboarding can also be automated since it ensures security by granting/revoking employees' access to the organization's systems and applications.
Cybersecurity
As the cybersecurity field continues to grow, there will never be enough hands in this domain. The U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Information Security Analyst’s Outlook predicts that cybersecurity jobs will grow 31 percent through 2029, which is seven times faster than the national average job growth.
Therefore, by adopting automation to DevSecOps with digital experience monitoring, an organisation can boost productivity and effective operations and free up organisational strain because automation can significantly reduce human errors and oversights.
Project status update
Many businesses still rely on manual updates. But with the latest technology tools and accountability, all stakeholders are updated regarding projects’ latest status. In this new media age, leadership updates can and should be aggregated and automated via these tools to free up time for project managers and stakeholders.
Customer Service
Good customer service is the ultimate goal of any business. Although face-to-face customer service is paramount, especially in the beginning stage, we can use automated customer service as an alternative to provide 24/7 services and reduce the cost of human support representatives.
Automated customer service refers to a computerised system like a help centre, chatbot, and other artificial intelligence products. By adopting virtual customer service representatives, you can free yourself from redundant and mundane tasks. AI is more efficient for basic questions like status updates (a prominent example is FAQs chatbot), or whether customers can receive their delivery package on Saturday.
Cloud infrastructure management
Cloud infrastructure management services have grown dramatically over the past 2 - 3 years with increasingly sophisticated automation tools. This is part of the consequences of the pandemic. The cloud market revenues were up by $2.5 billion from the previous quarter. COVID-19 has been an extra boost to the market. Cloud infrastructure services like Amazon Web Services (AWS) achieved 29 percent year-on-year revenue growth during Q3, 2020 compared to the same period last year.
Even though key decision-making processes are still manual processes, you can automate cloud usage and cost data acquisition that affects critical decisions and drives ROI when investing in cloud companies.
Product integration and testing
Most software engineering building processes include a series of steps for continuous integration and testing. These repetitive tasks can be done with automation. Engineers must work to free up resources for innovation and automate continually to ensure high-quality products.
Keep in mind that Robotic process automation (RPA) and test automation are different. We’ll explore these concepts in the next article.
Digitalize paper documents
A business’s paper documents exponentially grow as they turn from a startup to an established company. Stockpiled paperwork takes up space and is hard to organize and maintain. The solution to it is to digitize everything, and the digitization of incoming paper documents can be automated.
Intelligent document processing technology, including optical character recognition (OCR) solutions, has evolved over the past few years with a higher digitisation accuracy. Operational teams can benefit from automatic data entry via digitisation.
By digitising documents with document automation software, you can:
- Access your content quickly, work with other teams in different locations,
- Reduce waste as in time, money, and paper utilised in hard copy document management,
- Retrieve all documents instantly, as well as
- Securely store and protect your company's critical documents.
Conclusion
Automation helps drive higher production rates and boost productivity, improved safety, shorten workweeks and reduce factory leads time. If you want to learn more about automation and custom software development, follow our blog post to get more IT-related news.
