The Rise of Automation Democratization: Robots of the People, by the People, for the People

Abstract: The concept of automation democratization has been a subject of interest to many businesses for some time, however, it has received little attention in academia. This study aims to understand how citizen developers - non-IT experts given the right training and knowledge - experience automation democratization; and to investigate how their perception of automation is shaped by introducing the term "democratization". To do this, we adopted a multi-theoretical lens. First, given the novelty of this topic, we relied on political science literature, as it is the original field of democracy theory. Second, we reviewed and applied democratization of technology literature, which is closely related to our field of research. While academic literature has previously outlined the employees' perception of Robotic Process Automation (RPA) when implemented by IT within an organization, it has not hitherto studied their perception when robots are created and utilized by citizen developers themselves. Our research aims to fill this gap. We adopted a single-case study approach, wherein data is collected and analyzed in a qualitative manner through in-depth interviews, preparatory ethnography, and related research. Our findings reveal that citizen developers' experience of automation democratization is positive. When citizen developers are directly involved and engaged in the creation of robots, they feel empowered and emancipated, while the process nurtures a sense of belonging that drives the success of automation implementation initiatives. Citizen developers experience automation democratization as an inclusive and participative enterprise that facilitates their personal and professional growth. The program contributes to the emergence of a community, where people freely share knowledge and bots. Our findings demonstrate that citizen developers perceive RPA robots as tools, colleagues, or freshers; not as threats, contrasting with previous academic studies. This research provides insights into automation democratization and suggests that automation initiatives are likely to be successful when democratization is introduced into that process and citizen developers are empowered to create and consume bots.