Interview with Anja Krusel, Borealis

„WE NEED
AN E-CULTURE.“

Chemicals company Borealis AG is planning to focus more strongly on robots for automating processes in the area of finance. We put three questions to Anja Krusel, Vice President of Group Controlling at Borealis.

WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE YOU CAN EXPECT FROM ROBOTIC PROCESS AUTOMATION (RPA)?

KRUSEL / First and foremost, I expect a substantial increase in productivity. At the moment, we expend a very large proportion of our resources on manual activities. When you look at these individually, they are very often little things, which together add up to a considerable outlay in terms of time. Since many of these tasks are structured, repetitive processes, automating them is a simple matter.

HOW CAN YOU TAKE FULL ADVANTAGE OF THE OPPORTUNITIES OFFERED BY RPA?

KRUSEL / I believe we must invest in the development of our own skills, i.e. that we must create an in-house capability for RPA, and that we must continuously evaluate current and future possibilities for the use of robots.

"Robots don't need a works council and can work 24/7." Read here the summary of Anja Krusel's presentation at the 12th Finance Excellence 2017 conference.

WHAT CHALLENGES DO AUTOMATED PROCESSES POSE TO STAFF?

KRUSEL / Some employees may be afraid that they will lose their jobs if processes are automated. In this respect, the implementation of RPA necessitates efficient change management. Furthermore, the skills required in the individual functions will probably change. This means that employees will be expected to have additional or different skills. Finally, of course, the entire organization must develop an e-culture to ensure that digitization within the company is not restricted to a handful of experts.

 

 

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