New Community
Introducing the New Robotic Process Automation Community of Practice
Originally published on the GSA blog
Emerging technologies are rapidly changing the way government and industry do business. In order to prepare for and fully leverage this technological revolution, GSA is forming a community of practice (CoP) for robotic process automation (RPA). The new RPA CoP will allow federal government leaders to explore opportunities, share ideas, and collaborate on how RPA can be effectively implemented in their respective agencies.
The Executive Sponsors of the RPA CoP are GSA Chief Financial Officer Gerard Badorrek and GSA Technology Transformation Services (TTS) Director Anil Cheriyan. The CoP will be chaired by Ed Burrows of the GSA Office of the Chief Financial Officer (CFO).
With the advancements in emerging technology, it’s important for the federal government to capitalize on technological solutions in order to obtain the benefits of cost-effectively automating manual, repetitive, and rule-based operations. Many agencies are currently piloting RPA or already have bots in production, but so much more can be learned, accomplished, and shared with the collective efforts of industry and government.
In addition, RPA will advance agency missions by helping shift the federal workforce from low-value to high-value work, which supports the President’s Management Agenda, Cross-Agency Priority Goal 6. Other benefits include:
- Re-engineering and improving processes as they are automated;
- Increasing the efficiency of existing operations;
- Completing more work with less resources (e.g., more frequent and timely processing, improved data quality through full reconciliation);
- Reducing costs over time by creating capacity to maintain quality of service and absorb new work requirements without the need for additional hiring;
- Reducing processing errors and labor costs related to rework, delays, and customer dissatisfaction; and,
- Reducing process cycle times and thereby improving service to internal customers, agency partners, and U.S. citizens.
By creating a RPA CoP, the federal government can reduce duplication and streamline efforts to implement RPA across government to help advance agency missions today, and into the future. The GSA Office of the CFO will leverage the existing TTS CoP management capabilities and expertise to lead the RPA CoP. The CoP will mobilize federal RPA leaders to share information, define technical options, and outline best practices for implementation in order to accelerate operational achievements and the benefits of RPA.
GSA looks forward to helping agency partners take important next steps to successfully implement RPA programs and strategically position the federal workforce to engage in higher value work to deliver on their mission.
To learn more about how to get involved with the RPA CoP please contact rpa@gsa.gov.
