Paula P. Carneiro: Redefining Business Activities with Intelligent Robotic Process Automation

WonderBotz is an award-winning startup that specializes in Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and adjacent technologies that build enterprise-wide comprehensive Intelligent Automation Programs. The company helps clients with every step of the RPA journey including training services, development support, design strategy, and run-side management of the botz. WonderBotz has partnered with all the major RPA technology platforms and has a wide array of client sizes and verticals. The company’s clients are looking for material value in their RPA program, and its blend of services empowers them to do that.  

An Empowered Leader Propelling Automation

Paula P. Carneiro joined as the Director of WonderBotz in January 2020 to shift her focus to automation after an extensive operational career in process improvement. Her early career was spent on globally mapping process workflows for multi-national techs like Thyssenkrupp and BlackBerry. Some of her former Research in Motion (BlackBerry) colleagues still remember the months-upon-months of executive interviews that were required to get the company’s compliance manuals documented and approved. This happened before automation was mainstream. Paula moved into a client-facing role during her time at DFIN (formerly RR Donnelley) in Brazil where she accepted a Project Management role for the company’s virtual M&A product suite in New York City. This is where her consulting wings began to expand and she started moving towards fully client-facing roles. She learned that she was very good at simplifying complex technologies for executives, primarily Gen Xers. That is how Paula got to the East Coast. From Dallas to Rio, and then to NYC, she has been in the RPA space for a little over three years from a consulting perspective after leaving Donnelley. During that time Paula obtained functional Business Analyst accreditation through those channels. Paula’s primary focus at WonderBotz is to create new business relationships for the organization and help evangelize Intelligent Automation technologies as far and wide as she can. She also pays attention to finance leaders and their unique needs and perspective of an organization’s financial soundness. CFO involvement typically makes far more successful, comprehensive automation program, which is why Paula was also actively involved in ‘The CFO Leadership Council and the Financial Women’s Association.’  

Engaging in Female Networking Activities

Paula attended her first FWA (Financial Women’s Association) meeting in New Jersey after receiving encouragement from one of her professional mentors. When interviewing for this feature, she felt it would be disingenuous to portray herself as a feminine activist in the workplace without recalling some of her earlier career experiences soured by women being unkind.  Paula’s motive was to become more involved in female networking. In her first networking meeting,  Paula met a woman entrepreneur, whom she admires immensely to this day. The women looked at her and said that it didn’t look like Paula was getting what she came there for. Paula replied that she was not sure what she was supposed to be getting. After some time, they found themselves discussing how Paula was there to give, and not get. Both of them explored synergies together over a glass of wine and Paula realized the importance of this shift in perspective in business. The next week Paula joined the NY Chapter of the FWA. And, a year later, she signed up to become a high school mentor through the FWA. Paula shared how funny it is to recall that first hesitant moment of walking into a women’s networking group. Now, most of Paula’s professional partnerships know her as a very active networker who is completely aligned to all things of Women in Tech and Women Entrepreneurs. Paula didn’t know it was the initial nudge she needed to use her voice and her leadership to give back to young women in a meaningful way.  

An Exemplary Perspective Towards Early Career Adoption 

Paula learned very early in her career that it was important to listen to her instincts about approaching her personal and professional development simultaneously. She took a few unconventional routes in her career that gave her a unique chance to learn some lessons about how humans work at the workplace. Paula was given an incredible opportunity to join as a Process Analyst at Thyssenkrupp Elevator when she was nineteen due to a happenstance exchange with their COO of the Americas at the time. Her gateway into an early tech career was as a Business Process Analyst. Paula stood out owing to her language proficiency in Spanish and Portuguese. Thyssenkrupp Elevator had a large and immediate development project in Brazil that required some translation. That was the beginning of automation design as they reviewed SLAs through the proposed times for the systems and humans to complete their tasks. That was also the first of many professional moments where Paula found herself to be the youngest and one of the few women in her space. Paula overcame scrutiny from her senior colleagues who were skeptical of how her age and credentials matched the position she was given. That taught an important lesson to Paula to stay focused and continue to develop professionally through adversities.  About a decade later, people started calling that feeling ‘imposter’s syndrome.’ She completed her BA in History and Political Science from the University of North Texas. Looking back, Paula thinks that she had an advantage by starting her career at a young age. Paula also had first-hand exposure to ‘people versus tech’ challenges, especially with the five converging generations in the workplace. She says that these changes later shaped the “new” digital revolution, and the adoption of mass automation. The lesson that Paula learned was to find her path and shape a unique story to match life and a career where she would be happy in the long run. Paula feels fortunate to be able to trace her current RPA career to those early moments of connecting dots and writing process diagrams for a global manufacturer.  

Encompassing Transformational Leader’s Attributes

Paula suggests that all modern leaders must have a transformational mindset. She stresses that a transformational leader, above all, must have an incredible amount of empathy to understand the current situation of their employees and create motivational tactics that will work to begin the transformation. Leaders should have the ability to apply the feedback quickly, as the changes begin to cause fatigue or productivity gaps in the organization. Paula presumes organizations that are not constantly innovating and evolving will likely perish if history is any indicator. Paula recalls how she worked for BlackBerry and suddenly Apple introduced touch screen technology rendering the beloved enterprise software, obsolete. Paula opines that technology changes too quickly to be stagnant or myopically focused, and the same is true for leaders. She insists that there should be metrics coupled with the context in order to make the soundest business decisions to follow a centralized vision. Everyone wants to feel connected to the process and the outcome, and a transformational leader should find moments for inclusion and input, she adds.  

Delivering Valuable Outcomes by Being an Expert in Automation

Paula gladly shares that the fun part of working for a startup after a career at multi-nationals is the ability to pivot and redirect offerings very quickly in response to the market. She mentions that WonderBotz focuses on Hyperautomation. She adds that the entire organization is constantly in training mode, and consistently certified with the latest advancement in Intelligent Process Automation technologies and methodologies. Thus, they continue to create and deliver valuable outcomes to the company’s clients. Paula says that WonderBotz simplifies the concept of automation with its ‘Robot-Way’ mentality. This results in a best-of-breed vision taking the best from the human way of performing the activities coupled with a traditional IT approach. WonderBotz does not simply automate the human activity being performed today. Paula asks, “Why code a robot to check its math when a machine doesn’t make computing mistakes?” WonderBotz’s CFO clients, in particular, have appreciated a special approach the company has taken in designing RPA frameworks.  It is in the way the company has externalized the parameters and logic from its prebuilt automation solutions, allowing a truly low-code, no-code experience. Paula adds that WonderBotz has truly revolutionized the approach to building a business-led scalable RPA program because developers no longer need to be involved in an ongoing RPA program. The company has enabled business users to make their own robot adjustments without ever touching the underlying code.  

Staying Ahead in the Race of Implementing Disruptive Technologies

Paula recalls a Deloitte CFO Survey pre-pandemic where 73% of the respondents said they intended to implement technology to replace humans across Finance and HR, which was up by 58% from 2019. The pandemic and sudden ‘work from home’ gave them a runway to introduce disruptive technologies as mission critical enabling WonderBotz to move forward with several new clients this year. Paula asserts she is not a proponent of removing humanity from work by replacing humans with robots for the sake of advancement. Rather, Paula declares that the RPA movement is more synergistic in practice coupling the best of human discernment with the best of enterprise technology. Paula appreciates how software robots (bots) provide humans the time they need to focus on improving their valuable (and uniquely human) qualities such as empathy, compassion, creativity, and innovation, to name a few. Moving forward, she believes that disruptive technologies will continue to be a blend of hype and ‘must-have’ products. Organizations will either adapt or perish. This presents a fantastic opportunity for Modern Leadership to become a blend of what she calls the ‘C-suite trifecta: the Human Development from HR, the Value Analysis from Finance and the Traditional Framework-mindset of an IT leader.’  

Hyperautomation for the Future

Paula shares that WonderBotz is experiencing a very successful year, proudly reporting growth despite the pandemic. This speaks volumes about what is to come next in this industry’s growth! Earlier this year Gartner coined the term ‘hyperautomation,’ and this reference to Intelligent Process Automation, RPA and adjacent technologies, couldn’t have been more timely than in 2020. WonderBotz clients have experienced the hyper need for automation which allowed the company to create several unique use-cases that came with unprecedented senses of urgency this year. Every member of the WonderBotz team operated with sleeves up, even on weekends, and together have continued to deliver impressive projects this year. Paula adds that volume spikes with a reduced workforce made several companies explore automation for the first time, and in reality, some organizations had no other option. With WonderBotz’s award-winning prebuilt solutions, the company was able to quickly deliver value at a time when ‘speed’ was everything. Paula predicts that a lot more RPA intrusion will occur in Government, SMBs, etc. and it will be an answer to a future workforce for startups. She also foresees a whole new era of Higher Education majors and tech-focused certification programs for the upcoming generation of employees.  

Word of Wisdom for Women Leaders

Paula thinks that the most profound piece of advice she could offer to any emerging female leader is ironically simple: Be yourself. Paula says to be oneself in every sense of the sentiment from how leaders dress at the office to building rapport with their co-workers and staff. According to Paula, authenticity is the key to be respected. Paula adds that she has been put in positions where she had to learn how to keep her seat at the table by earning respect. She recalls a time when she had to cram for a Schneider Electrical Circuit Certification and walked into that study session, not knowing what circuit was. Three days later, she got her certificate along with the cohort of experienced circuit technicians. Paula believes that those are often the most empowering moments, when leaders are humble enough to be realistic and determined enough to get it done anyway. Paula concludes saying that it is important to be authentic. She insists that if leaders play up to their strengths and stay teachable, they can truly change the direction of a company and elevate the humans behind the tasks.