The New Automation Mindset

CHAPTER 9The Back Office

“Quality means doing it right when no one is looking.”

—Henry Ford

In the first era of digital business, customer‐facing roles were a top focus. Many now realize customer‐facing roles are only as good as the back‐office processes supporting them. A great omnichannel customer experience, for example, will not overcome operational breakdowns. Any goodwill created by customer experience investments will dissolve with poorly executed back‐office processes. Therefore, operational excellence is a priority.

Of any department in a company, few have seen more change than the pillars of the back office: IT and finance. The functions reporting to finance have increased by 50% over the past few years.¹ CFOs are being asked to resolve issues in areas that are relatively new to them. CIOs have been elevated to business strategists as technology has become central.² Collectively, these evolving and critical parts of the organization are known as the back office.

While the back office is still “in the back,” with minimal customer interaction, their perception is changing. No longer can we say the back office is an administrative cost center. Performance management, corporate strategy, digital transformation, and others belong to the back office. They are now vectors for competitive advantage. Back‐office functions are crucial for a company with the new automation mindset.

Despite evolving mandates, the traditional responsibilities still matter. Back‐office work enables ...