How Automation is Helping During COVID
The pandemic truly stilled many of the industries, factories and companies that relied on large manpower and workforce. With people fearing for the safety of their person and their health, the shift from the need for manpower to automation was inevitable as companies and many of the necessary industries couldn’t stay closed forever. The pandemic thus acted as a boon for automation provider companies and manufacturing industries that were in process of shifting with the times, heralding it to a new age of automated industries.
Robotics Process Automation or (RPA) helped industries to pivot during the trying times with the need to resolve many issues like supply chain logistics, agility, workplace disruption due to the pandemic and more. RPA uses bots and other automatic machinery that can help with the better management of workflow, and help the companies achieve a new level of normalcy. Employing of Graphical User Interface can help in observation and then repetition of tasks without errors and with a speed unachievable by humans. Robotic processing can also give human workforces the opportunity to relieve themselves of mundane jobs which can be automated and increase their interpersonal skills, creativity thus improving their work and enriching their lives further.
The development of automation has truly played a boon in the essential industries of healthcare and food production among others. In healthcare, applications like Aarogya Setu by the Indian government which helps citizens to check if they have any COVID symptoms or analyze the number of patients within their vicinity. Another example is Medscape which helps doctors and practitioners to know the latest technologies and advancements in their field alongside readily available drug information. Such apps help provide online consultations, appointment booking and more thus reducing interactions during this trying period. Drug discovery has also been aided and made faster by the use of technology and RPA as it helps in faster data gathering and computation be it for repurposing a drug or making an entirely new one.
Manufacturing industries have also expressed the interest in this shift owing to the pandemic since such technologies can not only reduce the cost and increase productivity, but also help in the maintaining the important social distancing protocols without affecting the productivity. Warehouse manufacturers are keenly interested in implementing AR/VR tech into their work system to make it more efficient in the long run. Cloud based technologies are yet another area of advancement whose demand increased during the period making 3D visualization of automotive designs and manufacture easier.
The automotive industry is yet another arena that took a hit due to the pandemic and with worried workers remaining home for fear of their health and the operations having been scaled back during the beginning. With investments in automation of this industry, this industry can scale up to its old production levels and be more organized and resilient to any further changes.
Banking, insurance and travel are yet other sectors that can be benefitted from automation as it can be used in providing customer service that doesn’t rely on human agents rather voice activation services which can ease the queries of customers without sacrificing their health.
Yet another area that has been propelled to its future is the scholastic field. Children, parents and teachers everywhere had to face a major shift from the regular mode of offline education and make the move to online platforms to carry out their education, activities, exams and PTA. Forums like Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams are in the forefront now not only for educational activities but also for desk jobs that had to make this change be it for daily meetings to even carrying out their regular teamwork while keeping only the important and crucial meetings offline thus ensuring employees safety and well being mentally and physically.
Even though automation can’t entirely replace the human work front in any arena be it in healthcare, supervising and creative fields, it is still marvelous to see how the era of automation is rising our civilization and societies to heights never achieved before. Dealing with the aftermath of the pandemic is yet another important scenario to be addressed and this can be done with the help of automation and robots that can make cumbersome tasks much easier for people to manage. The aftermath of this pandemic will possibly see the advent of a hybrid working mode between bots and humans freely working with technological aids to help with all manner of tasks that need to be performed.
