Depending on what constitutes a job in automation, respondents of one international survey shared their views on industry and career prospects

Based on a May/June 2024 survey of 1,909 automation professionals* about their views on AI and automation in the workplace,^ several findings were disclosed.

First, 90% of respondents indicated they were using or planning to use AI within the coming year. The primary motivation was increased productivity (66%), including writing code (67%), creating documentation (57%), and testing (47%).

Second, 61% of respondents indicated their organization had increased the number of people working in software automation in the past 12 months; 81% believed their organization could be hiring additional automation professionals in the coming year.

Other findings

In terms of career satisfaction, 70% were satisfied and indicated their plan to remain in the industry for the next five years. Additionally, 86% indicated their view that their current job in automation will help them with any future career moves they may make. Also:

  • 84% or more of respondents believed in the growth of the software automation space; 80% believed they will have an increasingly important role in their organization in the next year.
  • 60% indicated that their organization had used software automation for five or more years, compared to 47% of respondents in a similar survey the year before. Respondents in developers roles were creating automation, most commonly in accounting and finance (67%), IT (53%), and operations (51%).
  • 81% of respondents indicated they used AI products in their automation projects at least a few times per week, if not daily. Some 19% indicated they found it difficult to incorporate AI in automation.

According to Agi Garaba, Chief People Officer, UiPath, the firm that commissioned the survey: “The combination of business automation and AI holds incredible potential to transform organizations, increasing productivity while empowering these critical professionals to take their careers to the next level.”

*recruited from channels owned the business automation platform that commissioned the survey, in countries specified only by region — in the US (20%), the Asia Pacific Region and Japan (51%); and Europe, the Middle East and Africa (29%). Job titles included Automation Developer, Automation Lead/Head, Business Analyst, Automation Project Manager, Automation Technical Consultant, Technology Manager, Trainer and/or Professor, AI Professional, QA Automation Lead, Automation Infrastructure Engineer, Test Automation Engineer, Citizen Developer and Technical Architect.

^The methodology involved the following practices: “Respondents were often given the option to select ‘unsure’. In most cases, the ‘unsure’ responses were removed and the data was recalculated based on the remaining sample size.” Also, “Respondents were sometimes given the option to select ‘Other’ and write-in a response. For simplicity, these responses were not included in calculating the percentages.”