It goes without saying the way information flows around your office directly affects productivity and efficiency. Delays caused by employees unable to access the information they need can also directly affect customer service and the overall profitability for your business.
Most organizations today rely on complex systems to run their day-to-day operations. Line of business applications like ERP (SAP, Oracle, and Dynamics), CRM (Salesforce, ZoHo), and productivity applications (Microsoft Office, G-Suite) have proven themselves to be invaluable in this regard.
To add an additional layer of complexity to the equation, many businesses have also leveraged the cloud to some degree for information storage and sharing, whether it be through a simple cloud repository (OneDrive, Google Drive, Dropbox) or through some other content service.
One area that is often overlooked is the manual processes and manual information sharing that occurs to enable these systems to work together. Too often businesses find themselves ill-equipped to combat these challenges and find themselves piecemealing workflows together. Many times, these workflows can be automated to improve operational efficiency and to get the information in the hands of those who need it faster.
Three Questions To Determine If
Workflows Could Benefit From Automation
When it comes to workflow automation her are three questions business owners can ask to determine if their workflows could benefit from automation:
1. Is it Repetitive?
When analyzing your business workflows does the same process(s) need to occur repeatedly (i.e., paying invoices)?
2. Is it Recurring?
When analyzing your business workflows does the process(s) occur on a regular basis (i.e., paying invoices every month)?
3. Is it Rules-Based?
With your business workflows are you able to chart out the steps involved and need to ensure they are followed to assure success (i.e., set approval process for paying invoices)?
Common Examples of Business Workflows
That Can Be Automated
Here are some common examples of common business workflows that can be successfully automated:
Data Entry and Extraction
Pulling out addresses from invoices, identifying keywords in a resume, or converting written forms to electronic data all benefit from automation. Artificial intelligence (AI) combined with optical character recognition (OCR), can take over these time-consuming tasks giving employees more time to focus on important assignments that need human expertise.
Approval Processes
Many business processes require sign offs from certain people. Algorithms can automatically determine if specific tasks have been completed with a document or project and send approval notifications to the right people.
Accounts Receivables
From automatic invoicing to purchase order matching, automation can eliminate many of the role processes associated with payments and accounts.
Pollock Company - Workflow Automation
By streamlining and automating business processes, workflow solutions from Pollock Company can improve productivity, ensure compliance and reduce downtime. Our team can take your current document processes and design custom software to work seamlessly in your organization. Contact us today for a free assessment.
