We are excited to announce our Community member of the month for June: @ManpreetKaur1
It has been a pleasure to interview Manpreet, who has shared an insight into her personal and professional life, as well as some of her experiences a woman in RPA and what she has learnt from this.
Manpreet is one of our most helpful members and has stood out for her ability to celebrate others achievements. She's always on hand to congratulate other members, so I hope the whole Community will join me to celebrate Manpreet's achievement!
Tell us a bit about yourself and how did you start in RPA / Blue Prism?
My name is Manpreet Kaur, I have 8+ years of IT experience and I'm currently working with Deloitte India as RPA manager. My journey with Blue Prism started 6 years back when I found using an automation tool to automate applications could cut down on manual effort. I first tested an automation tool by automating my timesheet, and to my utter surprise it went really well! I was really excited and realized the benefits and the value which automation can bring and I started exploring more Blue Prism Products.
Most interesting automation using Blue Prism? / Best tip you have learnt for Blue Prism?
The "30 second automation" is my most interesting automation with Blue Prism, which involved working with several excel files with integrated formulas and macros. The manual task was being performed by 7 resources and took over a week. Using my Blue Prism expertise, I created a solution where the task was completed in less than half a minute which resulted in huge time and money savings while having the highest level of accuracy.
You clearly know your stuff - why do you come to the Community everyday?
"Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow" - I come to the Community to share my knowledge, to learn something new, and keep up with latest Blue Prims Product developments. The Community gives me access to innovative ideas and key facts about the different Blue Prism Products and it is one of the best platform for any kind of answers you are looking for, related to Blue Prism.
Tell us a fun fact about yourself
I have two opposing passions. I love cooking different cuisines and I am a fitness enthusiast. So most of the times, I cook food I can't eat.
What automation have you been involved with that you’re most proud of?
I'm proud of a very complex automation consisting of 10+ applications(SAP, web based, scanned PDFs, excel and emails) and multiple APIs. The automation was targeted for multiple regions(around 40+ countries) and FTE savings of 114. The success of the automation was a huge achievement for our organization.
What's your favourite use case?
My favourite use case was when I started exploring the Graph API required to perform several uncommon outlook actions/functions. Every time exploring and consuming API to add new outlook function(e.g. adding colour category, flagging etc.) and getting the desired results was like an achievement since Graph API was very new to the market.
If you could change one thing about Blue Prism what would it be?
Blue Prism software is smart enough to tell errors e.g. environment variable not available, data item is touching the block stage etc. But it doesn't remove these errors, I would love to add some additional features to automatically fix these errors.
Tell us about a current hobby.
Spending time with my rescued and adopted dog Leo (below)
What would you most like to automate that you haven’t been able to yet?
I would like to implement a real time use case which involves usage of all Blue Prism products(Interact, Decipher, Desktop, Decision) together in single use case.
Do you have names for all your digital workers?
Not every digital worker has a name, but my favourite ones with super natural powers got their names from the Harry Potter Characters.
What do you love most about the Community?
The best part of Community is that it's a one stop for any kind of technical issues or challenges you are facing and Community members are always available to respond to your queries. It's very easy to approach other professionals and get a proper response. It doesn't matter if the problem is low, medium or high complexity, the Community is there to help you out.
Have you faced any extra challenges being a woman working in RPA? And how did you navigate/overcome these?
Women working in our industry face a daily challenge to prove their selves equal in a male dominated industry. I was also the victim of gender bias in the workplace and this phase of my life taught me a lot, it has been said “There is no force more powerful than a woman determined to rise”. I know now I need to be vocal about my thoughts, ideas, and opinions. We should be courageous and have the confidence to keep ourselves and others accountable, and question "why can't I, if anyone else can". With time I have also learn that for a woman to grow, her leadership & the workplace culture plays a crucial role. In workplace that celebrates you, you will get limitless opportunities to set yourself ahead of others in a male dominated industry.
