Sander J. J. Leemans

Queensland University of Technology, Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology

Papers

Total Citations

540

H-Index

About

Sander J. J. Leemans is a prominent researcher at the intersection of Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and process mining, fields that sit within the broader discipline of business process management and intelligent automation. His work explores how organizations can better understand, analyze, and optimize automated workflows by leveraging the data trails left by software robots. Leemans made a significant impact with his 2019 paper on contemporary themes and challenges in Robotic Process Automation, which has accumulated an impressive 520 citations, establishing him as a leading voice in the RPA research community. This work helped define the intellectual landscape of the field by systematically mapping its key challenges and emerging directions. Building on this foundation, he pioneered the concept of "bot log mining," introducing methodologies that bridge RPA and process mining by extracting meaningful process insights directly from bot-generated logs — a contribution documented in both his 2020 and 2024 publications. His research is particularly valuable for practitioners and scholars seeking to move beyond deploying automation toward deeply understanding and continuously improving automated processes, making his work essential reading for anyone working in intelligent business process automation.