If you’re like most business leaders, you're constantly looking for ways to improve your company’s efficiency. You’ve probably already heard about Robotic Process Automation (RPA), and maybe you’ve been thinking about implementing RPA in your business. But how does RPA work, and how can you connect with affordable RPA developers?
This article will tell you everything you need to know about the benefits of RPA. You'll also learn how to hire RPA engineers, no matter how lean your budget is.
What Is RPA?
RPA is a technology that makes it easy to automate business processes — especially the tedious, repetitive tasks necessary to keep your business running. By handing over mundane tasks to software applications, or “robots,” RPA frees up your human workforce to focus on more challenging projects.
RPA makes it faster and easier to perform routine tasks like invoicing, payroll, and data entry. Automating those processes also means avoiding costly human errors. We tend to make careless mistakes when working on lengthy and repetitive tasks. But robots won’t get tired or cranky, and they don't make data mistakes. That’s what makes RPA invaluable for businesses.
Why Do Companies Hire RPA Developers?
RPA developers are in high demand. In fact, in some areas, the demand for RPA developers exceeds their availability.
And it’s not only tech companies seeking RPA professionals — IT and consulting firms are scrambling to hire them, too. Here are some of the biggest reasons why.
Labor Cost Savings
When it’s successfully implemented, RPA can yield significant labor savings for your business. RPA can automate tasks like invoicing and record-keeping and even some aspects of customer service. These are all time-consuming jobs that can eat up many hours of your employees’ time.
Turning those projects over to robots means that businesses won’t have to pay employees for the hours and hours spent on mindless jobs. In fact, RPA could save companies up to 75% of their labor costs.
But labor cost savings aren’t the only benefit of RPA. Switching to automation for many processes will also free up employees for more complex and meaningful tasks. This will likely result in greater job satisfaction as your employees will feel more challenged and engaged at work.
Improve Employee Productivity
Implementing RPA will increase the productivity of your whole workplace by making the mundane business processes that your company relies on faster and more efficient. But RPA will also increase the productivity of each employee by speeding up workflows and cutting back on enforced idleness.
For example, your accounting department may have grown used to waiting for hours as your clerks finalize the invoices. But that kind of downtime is turning into a thing of the past. RPA speeds up tasks like data entry and invoicing, so your employees can move on to the next step in the process right away.
Minimize Manual Errors
Human error can lead to a number of serious problems. In IT, careless mistakes can create holes in your network that allow hackers to break in. In fields like retail and communication, human error can result in mistakes in customers’ orders or communication inefficiencies.
Even the most reliable employees can make mistakes with data entry or other manual tasks. It’s just a matter of being human. But robots programmed to handle routine tasks aren’t prone to the same kinds of errors. When they do make mistakes, it’s usually because they’ve been programmed incorrectly — and that’s something you can correct by simply hiring a skilled RPA developer.
Streamline Processes
We’ve already seen that RPA can speed up repetitive, large-scale tasks, like entering employees’ hours into your payroll system.
By speeding up these processes, RPA also streamlines the larger workflows that keep your business running. It minimizes enforced idleness and virtually eliminates human error, reducing the time you’d otherwise be spending on correcting those errors.
Simply put, RPA allows your employees to perform at their best by streamlining workflows and speeding up the processes that underpin their functions.
Different RPA Development Roles and Their Responsibilities
Robotic Process Automation is an umbrella term that involves several different job functions. Here are some of the key RPA development roles, along with a run-down of their usual responsibilities.
RPA Analyst
An RPA analyst is tasked with designing and implementing automation throughout the business. A successful RPA analyst needs to have a solid understanding of business processes as well as how your particular business operates. This knowledge allows an analyst to put together a vision of which processes can be successfully automated in order to save your business time and money.
You can think of the RPA analyst as the big picture thinker on your automation team. They assess the business and develop a plan for introducing RPA. They also work closely with the rest of the RPA team to implement the automation and keep tabs on how the process is operating once it’s up and running.
RPA Architect
There’s some overlap between the roles of the RPA analyst and the RPA architect. Like the analyst, the RPA architect specializes in identifying business processes that can be successfully automated using RPA. And, like the analyst, the architect plays a key role in designing and implementing RPA solutions.
But the architect is also instrumental in collaborating with all of the stakeholders in the business before, during, and after the automation is implemented. The architect is responsible for making sure that all the practical steps in the implementation process are well thought out and closely followed.
That means, for example, assessing the budgetary costs of the project as well as the likely time frame. It also entails setting up proper coding guidelines and making sure that the steps of the project are well defined and used to guide the process.
RPA Administrator
An RPA administrator is not usually involved in the conceptual stage like the RPA architect and analyst are. Instead, RPA administrators are responsible for deploying RPA solutions and making sure they continue to function.
RPA administrators need to have a solid background in programming, ideally in more than one of the widely-used programming languages. A successful administrator will be able to configure RPA solutions and monitor them, debugging them as the need arises.
RPA Engineer
Like RPA administrators, RPA engineers are concerned with the successful deployment of automation solutions. Engineers are responsible for designing and developing automation workflows. On the front end, engineers also routinely test the automations to make sure that they're performing as they should.
RPA engineers can be called on to deploy robots, logging tools, development tools, and other relevant automation solutions. They can also be responsible for launching RPA solutions and for creating the end-user documentation.
Product Manager
An RPA product manager acts as a bridge between the more technical side of RPA and the decision-makers who approve the spending on automation solutions.
The RPA product manager must have a strong background in programming and a strong understanding of how automation solutions work. But a successful RPA product manager also needs to be able to convey those benefits to stakeholders. This usually involves creating use cases and building detailed cost-benefit analyses.
Skills Required for RPA Development
RPA development requires a certain skillset for it to be carried out correctly. Like many other tech jobs, RPA development requires a combination of “hard” and “soft” skills.
Successful RPA developers will have hard skills like coding and knowledge of the most widely-used programming languages. They should also have experience using automation programs. But the best RPA developers will also have soft skills, like the ability to communicate effectively with people from a variety of technical and non-technical backgrounds.
Depending on the position they're seeking, developers may also need to have a strong understanding of business processes, finances, and negotiation practices.
Here are some of the most important skills that RPA developers should have.
Coding Skills
- Microsoft .NET and C#
- Java
- Python
- JavaScript
Experience With RPA Tools
- UIPath
- Automation Anywhere
- BluePrism
- Microsoft Power Automate
Soft Skills
- Excellent written and verbal communication
- Ability to find common ground and forge compromises
- Managerial skills (depending on the position sought)
RPA Developer Salaries
RPA developers are in high demand. Their take-home salaries depend on the region they work in. Of course, the compensation for these roles will also vary from one business to another. But broadly speaking, RPA developers command high salaries.
In many cases, this can be a drawback for businesses seeking to automate more of their processes. Some executives may be discouraged at the thought of paying out a large salary to an RPA developer, especially if the company is already operating on a lean budget.
However, it’s important to remember that introducing RPA will ultimately yield considerable long-term savings for your business. It’s also worth considering working with developers in another region, where the cost of labor may be lower.
RPA developers can easily work remotely. That means that even if your business operates in the US, you can hire an RPA developer to work from Latin America. The time zones are close enough so that the time difference won’t pose a challenge. The cost of living is generally lower in Latin America too, which means you can save money while still offering your developers a fair salary.
Average RPA Developer Yearly Salary by Region
Here are the average salaries that RPA developers earn based on the region they live in.
United States
According to ZipRecruiter, the average RPA developer in the US earns a salary of $107,239 a year.
ZipRecruiter notes that RPA developers’ salaries can vary quite a bit within the United States. The salary depends on an individual's experience level, among other factors.
At the top of the scale, RPA developers in the US may earn as much as $153,000. On the other hand, new developers in entry-level positions can expect to earn closer to $59,500 annually.
Developers in California and Massachusetts earn well above the national average, ZipRecruiter says. San Mateo and Santa Monica in California and Boston, Massachusetts, are among the cities that pay the highest annual salaries to developers.
Of the many different RPA roles out there, ZipRecruiter shows that RPA architects tend to earn the highest salaries.
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is a broad geographic region, and salaries vary quite a bit from one country to another. Generally speaking though, developers are paid much less than they would be in the United States.
In Poland, the average RPA developer earns 124.872 złoty per month. In US dollars, that's about $30,588.84 per year.
In Estonia, RPA developers have an average annual salary of $49,200 per year.
South Asia
South Asia has a growing cohort of well-educated, tech-savvy workers. The salaries for these developers vary considerably from one country to another. The salaries may also vary within each country. But broadly speaking, RPA developers in South Asia earn significantly less than developers based in the US.
In India, the median RPA developer salary is about 500,000 rupees per year. This converts to an annual salary of about $6,500 in US dollars.
Another estimate for the salaries of developers in India put the average a bit higher — just over 566,000 rupees annually or $7,420 per year in US dollars.
There are also substantial salary fluctuations depending on the particular city in which Indian developers are based. Developers in the city of Pune can expect to outearn residents of other cities. Developers in Mumbai and Delhi are also relatively high earners. Developers in Hyderabad generally earn much less.
In Pakistan, robotics engineers can expect to earn an average of 2,484,167 Pakistani rupees per year. That’s just over $8,642.08 annually. There are no figures readily available for the salaries of RPA developers in Pakistan.
Latin America
Latin America is a generally stable region with a growing middle class. Most countries in Latin America also have increasingly well-educated populations, and there is a growing emphasis on English language learning throughout the region.
The cost of living is lower in Latin America than in the US. Salaries may be higher in some Latin American countries than in South Asia or Eastern Europe, but Latin America is close to the United States, making it a convenient area in which to do business. There's little to no issue with time differences due to the overlap of time zones between the US and Latin America, and the region is largely free from political turmoil.
The average annual cost to hire RPA developers from Latin America is around $82,000.
Where to Find RPA Engineers
If your company is interested in automating more of your business processes, then it’s time to start looking for a qualified RPA engineer. There are a number of ways to go about this, and several places to start your search. However, bear in mind that finding a well-qualified RPA developer in a different region poses some unique challenges.
If you’re hiring somebody locally, you’ll be able to easily check their references, speak to their former boss, and maybe even speak with some of their colleagues. In fact, chances are that if you hire someone local to you, you know something about their last place of work. You’re well-positioned to determine whether they were a good worker. You may even know something about where they studied.
These things may be difficult if you’re hiring a developer from another part of the world. Let’s imagine that you want to hire a candidate from Latin America because you know that the region has plenty of well-qualified developers and the labor costs are relatively low. That’s a great idea — but how will you determine which candidate is right for you?
It’ll be more of a challenge to check on references and educational qualifications when you hire someone from another country. It can also be difficult to make sure that the candidate has the right experience.
None of these obstacles are insurmountable, of course. You can solve all of these problems — it’s just a matter of finding the right partner to help with your hiring. That’s why it’s so important to look for your RPA developers in the right places.
Here are some of the best ways to find RPA developers to bring onto your team.
RPA Job Boards
Job boards can be a great way to find RPA developers. You likely already know how they work — you write up a job post and add it to the site, welcoming qualified candidates to submit their application materials. Your job posts can target certain countries or cities or allow remote workers from all over the world to apply.
Once you start getting applicants, you have to sort through them, set up and conduct interviews, and pick the candidate who best fits your needs. This process can be tedious, especially if there isn't much existing knowledge of RPA within your company. But it's probably the hiring workflow you're most familiar with.
RPA-Jobs is a reliable job board frequented by RPA professionals, and UiPath is a good option as well.
Outsourcing Agencies
Outsourcing agencies can help you find partners to carry out a specific project with your company. Outsourcing allows you to hire a third-party company for short-term help. Depending on the agency, you may be able to contract with companies overseas, or you may be working with companies based in your own region.
Talent Marketplaces
Talent marketplaces are similar to outsourcing agencies in that they help connect businesses with people who can perform specific tasks. However, talent marketplaces connect businesses with individuals who are looking for long-term work, whereas outsourcing agencies connect you with other companies looking for short-term projects.
Revelo
Revelo is a premier technology company in Latin America. We specialize in connecting companies with highly skilled and experienced technology professionals in Latin America for a permanent place on your team. Revelo pre-screens and vets developers, doing all the work necessary to ensure that the person you hire will be the best person for the job and integrate seamlessly into your crew.
How to Hire RPA Developers
Vetting candidates and checking references are two of the most important steps in every hiring process. These steps can be especially difficult when hiring remote workers. That’s why it’s so important to work with a trusted partner, like Revelo.
When you work with Revelo, you'll share details about your company and the position you want to fill and receive a shortlist of qualified, vetted candidates in return. Hiring workers through Revelo means that you can always expect experienced, reliable tech experts who can hit the ground running.
Job Description Example
Every job description looks a little bit different depending on the particular needs of your company. Here’s an example of an RPA developer job description to provide some inspiration.
RPA Developer Interview Questions
There are several important questions you should ask any potential RPA developer before hiring them. Here are just a few:
- What is your work experience? How long have you worked on RPA?
- What do you consider to be the most important capabilities of RPA?
- What kinds of business processes can you imagine automating at this company?
- What are the steps involved in creating an RPA bot?
- What would you do if you ran into a major bug in your program?
- What are your favorite RPA tools?
Source, Hire, and Pay Latin American RPA talent through Revelo
Revelo is a talent marketplace that matches companies with top Latin American tech talent. We take pride in connecting companies with the best engineers possible to help you scale your business and achieve its maximum potential. Visit us today to learn what Revelo can do to help take your business to the next level.
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