Labor Department Expands Adoption of RPA Bots

The Department of Labor has expanded its pilot program on robotic process automation and is now reaping the benefits across various mission areas.

The agency started in 2020 with just one RPA bot, which was deployed in the procurement space. Since then, additional bots have been created for human resources, automated regression testing, automated performance reporting and claims evaluation, GovernmentCIO Media & Research reported.

Krista Kinnard, the department’s chief of emerging technology, said there is now a growing ecosystem of bots, with some more in development and even more in the backlog.

“I’m really excited by the successes we’ve had from these bots because I think we’re only going to see more benefit to the mission areas,” Kinnard said at a virtual event hosted by GovernmentCIO Media & Research.

In particular, she touted the agency’s HR bot for saving more than 72 hours of work and around $30,000 in labor hours since it was deployed.

When building bots, Kinnard said the main priority is to provide added value to employees and workers so they can deliver on their missions.

The department does not build bots just for the sake of doing so, she added.

Using RPA is becoming a trend across government agencies, with the Defense Logistics Agency recently turning to such technologies to increase productivity and improve accuracy in supply chain management.

The Central Intelligence Agency also developed bots to free its employees from performing transactional, routine, rule-based tasks. The agency’s bots perform digital labor and deal with clients in logistics, finance, travel, and information technology.