Agentic AI: Enterprises Guide to Building Your Automation Centre of Excellence

Many organisations have successfully piloted automation projects, achieving impressive results in specific departments or use cases. But when it comes to scaling these successes across the enterprise, they often hit a wall. Ad hoc automation efforts, without a clear strategy or governance, lead to fragmentation, inconsistency, and a failure to realise the full potential of the technology. The solution to this scaling challenge is the Automation Centre of Excellence (CoE)—a dedicated, cross-functional team that provides the strategy, governance, and expertise needed to drive automation at scale. This article provides a practical guide to building a world-class CoE that can transform your automation efforts from a series of disconnected projects into a strategic enterprise capability.

What is an Automation CoE and Why Do You Need One?

An Automation CoE is a centralised team responsible for driving and governing all aspects of automation within an organisation. It is the engine that powers your automation strategy, ensuring that your efforts are aligned with business goals, governed effectively, and delivering measurable value. The key functions of a CoE include:

• Strategy and Governance: Defining the overall automation roadmap, establishing policies and standards, and ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements.
• Enablement and Best Practices: Providing training, tools, and support to business units, and sharing best practices to accelerate adoption.
• Innovation and R&D: Exploring new automation technologies, identifying new use cases, and driving a culture of continuous improvement.
• Value Realisation: Tracking and measuring the business impact of automation, and communicating the value to stakeholders.

CoE Operating Models: Finding the Right Fit

There are three primary operating models for an Automation CoE, and the right choice for your organisation will depend on your size, culture, and automation maturity:

1. Centralised: A single, central team controls all automation initiatives. This model provides strong governance and consistency but can be a bottleneck if not resourced properly.
2. Federated: Business units have their own automation teams, with a central CoE providing guidance, standards, and support. This model is more agile and empowers business units but requires strong coordination to avoid fragmentation.
3. Hybrid: A combination of the centralised and federated models, where the CoE owns certain strategic initiatives and provides a platform for business units to drive their own automation projects. This model offers a good balance of control and agility for many organisations.

Building Your CoE: A Step-by-Step Guide

Building a successful CoE is a journey, not a destination. Here are the key steps to get you started:

1. Secure Executive Sponsorship: A CoE needs strong, visible support from senior leadership to succeed.
2. Define the CoE Charter and Mandate: Clearly articulate the CoE’s mission, goals, responsibilities, and success metrics.
3. Assemble the Core Team: Identify the key roles and skills needed, including a CoE lead, automation developers, business analysts, and change management experts.
4. Develop the Governance Framework: Establish clear policies, standards, and processes for identifying, prioritising, developing, and deploying automation solutions.
5. Build the Technology Platform: Select and implement the right automation tools. A platform like IBM watsonx Orchestrate provides the ideal foundation for a CoE, with its centralised governance, reusable components, and powerful orchestration capabilities.
6. Create a Communication and Change Management Plan: Drive adoption and engagement by clearly communicating the benefits of automation and providing the support your people need to adapt to new ways of working.

The Role of IBM watsonx Orchestrate in Your CoE

IBM watsonx Orchestrate is the perfect platform to support your CoE’s mission. It provides:

• Centralised Governance and Control: Manage all your automation assets, from RPA bots to AI agents, from a single platform.
• Reusable Components and Best Practices: Create a library of pre-built agents, tools, and workflows that can be shared across the organisation to accelerate development and ensure consistency.
• Performance Monitoring and Analytics: Track the performance and ROI of your automation initiatives with powerful dashboards and reporting capabilities.

Aligne’s Expertise: Your Partner in Building a World-Class CoE

Building a CoE is a significant undertaking. Aligne can help. Our team of experts can provide the strategy, expertise, and support you need to build and operate a world-class CoE. We offer:

• CoE Strategy and Design: We’ll work with you to design a CoE that is tailored to your organisation’s unique needs and goals.
• Implementation of IBM watsonx Orchestrate: We’ll help you implement and configure watsonx Orchestrate to provide the ideal technology foundation for your CoE.
• CoE Maturity Assessment and Optimisation: We can help you assess the maturity of your existing CoE and identify opportunities for improvement.

Conclusion: From Ad Hoc Automation to a Strategic Capability

A CoE is the key to unlocking the full potential of automation. It transforms your automation efforts from a series of ad hoc projects into a strategic, enterprise-wide capability that can drive significant and sustainable business value. By establishing a CoE, you can scale your automation initiatives, govern them effectively, and ensure that they are delivering a measurable return on your investment.

Book a CoE readiness assessment with Aligne.