Financial IT people aren't imagining things: Their jobsare definitely getting tougher. While computing resources arebecoming less expensive and more plentiful, staffing levels, forthe most part, are remaining constant. This resource gap is puttingstress on IT organizations because the professionals in thosedepartments must deal with increasingly complex systems that don'tinteract well with each other. Furthermore, innovations such asdigital check cashing, biometric security and mobile apps haveenhanced the consumer experience significantly, but they've alsoput new strains on IT workers who must implement and leverage thosetechnologies.

Automation is essential, particularly the kind that canaccommodate the mix of physical, virtual and cloud resources thatdefine most enterprise tasks. Financial services IT departmentsmust become more agile, and fortunately, there are ways to simplifycommon processes through intelligent automation. Here are four waysworkload automation can be used in the finance industry:

Reporting. Throughout financial servicesorganizations, analysts and other financial professionals needfaster, more frequent reporting. IT departments also requireconstant reports and updates as well. The need to providemultitudes of reports, sometimes for hundreds of users and based onthousands of data sources, can be overwhelming.

Intelligent workload automation can streamline and consolidatereporting using parameters in pre-built job steps instead ofthrough hard coding. Stock notifications, for example, can bereported according to virtually any pricing parameter, along withcustom alerts as needed. By setting calls for data, triggers forspecific reports, scheduling according to business rules,distributions based on dependencies and so on, report managementcan be minimized dramatically.

For IT, automated reporting also provides greater visibilityover workload performance. Staff can quickly identify potentialprocessing bottlenecks and analyze workload runtimes, then allocateresources appropriately to ensure smooth fulfillment of reportingtasks.

Security and compliance. High-profile securityhacks as well as Sarbanes-Oxley, Gramm-Leach-Bliley and otherindustry regulations are driving top-level emphasis on financialenterprise security. Automation solutions give IT the ability topre-establish data security protocols such as requiring userauthorizations before performing tasks that require access tosensitive information.

More importantly, however, automation platforms provideready-made evidence of compliance with privacy and securitymandates. Independent audit organizations can actually use workflowprintouts to validate system backups, reporting schedules andpermission policies according to regulations.

Product/pricing information. Real-time data, aswell as calculations related to that data, are vital to financialorganizations. Terabytes of structured and unstructured data mustpass through various data systems before it can be used to supporttransactions, web services and business intelligenceapplications.

The best workload automation platforms are built for big data.Built-in integration with common ETL tools, BI solutions and filetransfer applications allow such platforms to become a hub forprocessing, instantly giving employees and customers/members theinformation they need. Furthermore, these solutions are equipped togenerate automated alerts for two purposes: One, to ensurereduction in workflow errors; and two, to notify key parties –traders, product managers, customers/members and so on – whentransaction opportunities arise.

Onboarding/off-boarding. Provisioning andde-provisioning new employees can be a bottleneck for anyorganization – and the technology-rich nature of the financialservices industry only complicates the challenge due to the volumeof devices, permissions, connections and application infrastructureinvolved. Automation can minimize the burden of employee onboardingby instantly executing pre-established protocols for employeesbased on function, department and location.

Automation solutions reduce errors when setting up or closingout accounts and authorizations. The potential of workloadautomation to simplify these routine tasks extends to new businessas well; a new customer/member or sale, for example, can triggerentries into CRM and accounting systems.

Most financial institutions understand the value of ITautomation, but they struggle with multiple automation toolsacquired over time to handle specific systems or projects.According to Gartner, the average enterprise has more than threeautomation tools in use. Typically, these are discrete solutionsthat, over time, add complexity to IT responsibilities.

To truly close today's IT resource gap, it's important to have aunified automation strategy capable of automating IT and businessprocesses across the enterprise. A centralized solution removes thesilos of automation, simplifies end-to-end processes and, best ofall, frees up IT to address other changes impacting thebusiness.

Kaitlin Olcott is marketing communications coordinator forAdvanced Systems Concepts, Inc. She can be reached at973-539-2660 ext. 165 or [email protected].