Although it’s difficult to accept in retrospect, the potential of the internet and cloud computing was significantly undervalued when they first appeared, about thirty years ago. As we now know, individuals who completely embraced new technologies—not just as instruments for increasing efficiency, but as catalysts for a profound change in business—went on to create the biggest, most potent companies in history.
Many people believe that such a revolution will never occur again.However, history indicates that steam power and electricity were also initially underestimated, but they both brought about a period of unparalleled transformation.
Agentic automation is a new technology revolution that we are witnessing today.
However, let’s take a moment to clarify what we’re talking about before delving into how agentic automation is set to transform business as we know it.
In Any Case, What Is Agentic Automation?
A combination of artificial intelligence, automation, and orchestration, agentic automation is “basically a set of technologies that help us deliver AI autonomously.” “The ability to perform a human activity entirely on your own is what’s truly transformative.”
According to Accenture live guest Ariel Bernstein, agentic automation is a significant advancement over robotic process automation, raising the bar for automation and significantly expanding its surface area within a company. AI agents, who use a mix of automation and agentic AI to dynamically perceive their surroundings, interpret data, negotiate evolving workflows, and make decisions independently, are at the center of this revolution.
AI agents can now frame, plan, and oversee the completion of complicated activities without human assistance thanks to agentic automation. Even in dynamic scenarios when a rules-based approach would fail, agents are able to assess the situation, determine what needs to be done, and carry out the required actions.
What Makes It So Fantastic?
For businesses, this opens up a whole new labor pool—a virtual workforce—that can handle complicated jobs on its own. Along with a variety of other advantages, this in turn creates exciting opportunities for various operational models that are marked by creativity, adaptability, and the full use of both internal and external data. Tom Davenport, an AI expert and best-selling author, walked us through several of them:
Better judgment at warp speed. Businesses always have to make critical decisions that depend on quick analysis of enormous volumes of data, from detecting fraudulent transactions to optimizing the supply chain in real time.AI agents ensure that your decisions are always based on the most current and correct data by processing and analyzing information at superhuman rates and providing high-quality insights instantly.
Happier and more involved workers. Employees can devote more of their time and effort to strategic, creative work when a greater variety of laborious tasks are delegated to agents. Employees benefit from this since they are able to have a greater influence on the objectives of their company and are happy at work.
Ongoing enhancement of the process. The most successful agents never stop learning and changing, which makes them more efficient over time and promotes constant process enhancements.
Businesses can position themselves for success in the agentic age in five ways.
“Agentic AI is still in its infancy,” said Mary Tetlow, UiPath’s Chief Brand Officer, during the most recent UiPath Live event.”The majority of people are still unaware of what it is.”
Organizations have a great opportunity here because implementing this technology early on can offer you a big advantage over rivals. Some tips for doing so were given by live guests:
1. Expand upon what you already have. Despite the novelty of agentic automation, most businesses do not need to start from scratch. Bernstein stated, “One of the biggest advantages for larger enterprises is that they have troves of processes and years and years of data that they can feed these machines to make them more valuable.” “Organizations that have a clear understanding of their end-to-end processes will have an easier transition,” Tom Davenport noted.
Furthermore, it’s possible that you currently have automated procedures in place that can more readily transition to agentic automation. For instance, you are already deriving meaning from documents if you employ sophisticated intelligent document processing (IDP). By automating the subsequent acts, agentic automation can go one step further.
2. Establish a solid agentic framework. In a chaotic environment, even the most intelligent and productive workers find it difficult to thrive. Agents require a well-structured infrastructure in order to function at their best.
Businesses will utilize a range of agents, from specialist ones that are focused on particular duties (such as processing bills) to more adaptable agents that can handle a wider range of jobs.There is no one “best” agent that works for everyone. Orchestration is the secret to success.
I would be unable to name a single agent as superior to the others. It will depend on how they are ultimately used and—above all—how they are used in a broader ecosystem.
“There is no agentic AI without orchestration,” Daniel stated simply. Although AI agents are excellent at completing tasks across systems, this also makes it more likely that their wires may be crossed. The necessity for a central coordinator becomes evident when other actors are included, such as robots and GenAI.
The fundamental framework for guiding the activities of several agents and making sure they cooperate to accomplish organizational objectives is provided by orchestration. It ensures that humans have the right amount of control and agents have the right amount of autonomy by facilitating human monitoring and central governance.
3. Keep in mind that both agentic and robotic automation are the way of the future. RPA is not a substitute for agentic automation. Instead, agents will use RPA robots to do repetitive, organized, rules-based tasks that are common in all end-to-end work processes and at which robots excel. These precise, effective robotic tools will be more important than ever for agents. Consider RPA as the orchestra and agentic automation as the conductor. Each is essential to the creation of a flawless, end-to-end automation symphony.
4. Examine the procedures you haven’t been able to fully automate. Agentic automation significantly broadens the scope of automation in the business to encompass intricate, end-to-end procedures that you may have desired to automate completely but were just too complicated and uncertain for RPA to manage alone. Perhaps starting with this lengthy tail and seeing what’s new is a good place to start.
Additionally, agentic automation could assist you close some of a process’s obstinate gaps. For instance, the requirement to separate an address into its component parts is a frequent issue that hinders numerous businesses.Due to its great degree of variability, the work is more complex than it first appears. Agents make the procedure far less burdensome, even though Kevin Bernstein claims that “in concept, [this process] is something you could have done with RPA.” “It gets easier—less code, more context—and agents can go farther.”
5. Recognize your data and procedures. A thorough grasp of the data and procedures used by your company is essential to maximizing the potential of agentic automation. According to Kevin Bernstein, this is where task mining and process mining are useful since they highlight the complexities of your processes, highlighting inefficiencies, bottlenecks, and excellent chances for agentic automation.
Knowing your data is just as crucial. For AI agents to make wise judgments, they require access to precise and pertinent internal data. While a knowledge graph arranges and links your data, enabling agents to comprehend the many interactions within your information ecosystem, context grounding approaches give agents the background knowledge and situational awareness they need.
The Era Of Agentic AI Is Upon Us. Are You Prepared?
In five years, successful, modern businesses will hardly resemble the ones that exist now. They will be quicker, more effective, and more efficient thanks to the agentic operating model. They will stand out for their outstanding customer service, flexibility in the face of change, and empowered staff.
Now is the moment to take action. Start small and progressively increase your agentic capabilities as you embark on your agentic automation path. By doing this, you will acquire the skills and expertise required to advance to bigger and more significant use cases prior to the competition.