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“Strukturieren, Strukturieren, Strukturieren” in the Era of Robotic Process Automation

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The Art of Structuring

Abstract

While, in the first machine age, physical power was automated, intellectual power is automated in the second machine age. This development has interesting implications for Jörg’s leitmotif “Strukturieren, Strukturieren, Strukturieren”. In this article, we add to this discussion in the context of structuring processes. Therefore, we first structure the discussion about robotic process automation. After that, we illustrate how robots can support the structuring of processes. Our article concludes with some general remarks on process automation.

“The computer and the new decision-making techniques associated with it are bringing changes to white-collar, executive, and professional work as momentous as those the introduction of machinery has brought to manual jobs”.

Simon (1960, p. xi)

“Es ist Aufgabe des Wirtschaftsinformatikers, in schnelllebiger Zeit sein Erkenntnisobjekt so zu strukturieren, dass die konzeptionellen Überlegungen längerzyklischer sind als technologische Entwicklungen, dennoch aber die Möglichkeit eröffnen, jene zu integrieren.”

Becker (2001, p. 14, original without page numbers)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Saarland University, Saarbrücken, Germany

    Peter Fettke & Peter Loos

  2. German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), Saarbrücken, Germany

    Peter Fettke & Peter Loos

Authors
  1. Peter Fettke
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  2. Peter Loos
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Correspondence to Peter Fettke .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Information Systems, University of Münster, Münster, Germany

    Katrin Bergener

  2. Department of Information Systems, University of Münster, Münster, Germany

    Michael Räckers

  3. Department of Information Systems, University of Münster, Münster, Germany

    Armin Stein

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Fettke, P., Loos, P. (2019). “Strukturieren, Strukturieren, Strukturieren” in the Era of Robotic Process Automation. In: Bergener, K., Räckers, M., Stein, A. (eds) The Art of Structuring. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-06234-7_18

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