Automation of Routine Work: A Case Study of Employees' Experiences of Work Meaningfulness

When robots join our team: A configuration theory of employees’ perceptions of and reactions to Robotic Process Automation

“…Despite the call for new ways of theorising consequences of the new class of technologies, including RPA (Wessel et al, 2021), the employee's perspective appears to be under-theorised (Seiffer, Gnewuch, & Maedche, 2021;Staaby, Hansen, & Grønli, 2021). Our study focuses on developing an understanding of employees' experiences with an RPA implementation.…”

“…Many studies have demonstrated that RPA has the potential to reduce repetitive and mundane tasks and allows employees to take on more complex tasks that require critical thinking, decision-making, problem-solving and human judgment (Castelluccio, 2017;Penttinen et al, 2018). This shift to more value-adding tasks can lead to increased job satisfaction and work meaningfulness for employees (Denagama Vitharanage et al, 2020;Eikebrokk & Olsen, 2020;Staaby et al, 2021). Several case studies have also shown that employees experienced an increase in their work responsibility through RPA implementation (Staaby et al, 2021) that extended their knowledge and skills, especially around automation technologies and process automation (Denagama Vitharanage et al, 2020;Eikebrokk & Olsen, 2020;Lacity & Willcocks, 2016a).…”

“…This shift to more value-adding tasks can lead to increased job satisfaction and work meaningfulness for employees (Denagama Vitharanage et al, 2020;Eikebrokk & Olsen, 2020;Staaby et al, 2021). Several case studies have also shown that employees experienced an increase in their work responsibility through RPA implementation (Staaby et al, 2021) that extended their knowledge and skills, especially around automation technologies and process automation (Denagama Vitharanage et al, 2020;Eikebrokk & Olsen, 2020;Lacity & Willcocks, 2016a). Some employees moved to new roles that require more technological skills or roles that allow a company to offer new services to their customers (Eikebrokk & Olsen, 2020;Lacity & Willcocks, 2016b).…”

“…Although some employees view learning new skills as an opportunity, others are worried and more resistant to adapting to these new challenges (Fernandez & Aman, 2018;Hallikainen et al, 2018). Further, while the reduction of mundane and repetitive tasks is one of the most significant benefits of RPA, some employees experience an increase in workload as they have to cope with more of the same kind of tasks or new tasks (Staaby et al, 2021). Also, while standardisation of work can be perceived as liberating and allowing employees to gain more time, it also affects employees' autonomy, leading to work alienation (Staaby et al, 2021).…”

“…When robots join our team articles are peer-reviewed, confirming the predominance of grey literature in this field of study. Second, while the existing literature highlights organisational benefits, best practices and provides guidelines for successful RPA implementation or RPA governance (Aguirre & Rodriguez, 2017;Alberth & Mattern, 2017;Lamberton et al, 2016;Plattfaut, 2019;Rutaganda, Bergstrom, Jayashekhar, Jayasinghe, & Ahmed, 2017;Syed et al, 2020), only a few studies take an employees' perspective to highlight their perceptions of and reactions to RPA (Waizenegger & Techatassanasoontorn, 2020;Eikebrokk & Olsen, 2020;Staaby et al, 2021). Further, those studies that outline the benefits or drawbacks for human employees often draw their conclusions from participants of the RPA team, management level or RPA vendors (Denagama Vitharanage et al, 2020;Eikebrokk & Olsen, 2020;Ratia, Myllärniemi, & Helander, 2018).…”