Workflow Automation Explained: Explanation and Use Cases

Reducing time spent on routine tasks is paramount for companies interested in minimizing expenses. Devising a sustainable strategy necessitates deploying systems and software products to expedite internal procedures. Digitization helped businesses to diminish the amount of paperwork and speed up project completion. However, it may be arduous to implement workflow automation solutions without a solid technical background. Learning how to leverage technological developments is a must for enterprises seeking to maximize financial gain, improve employee satisfaction, and build a loyal client base.

What is Workflow Automation?

This approach involves handling tasks, managing documents, and analyzing information using dedicated solutions to simplify and speed up routine processes. Businesses introduce clear guidelines to ensure employees follow pre-established rules to boost productivity. Facilitating decision making, automation allows firms to achieve the following goals:

• Eliminate human errors
• Increase efficiency
• Enhance customer experience (CX)
• Free employees to solve creative issues

An automated workflow enables firms to reduce manual workloads by utilizing software trained to follow instructions and resolve issues. In customer support (CS), such tools answer basic queries and escalate complex tasks to human agents. Moreover, they can be integrated into larger systems built to assign tasks and monitor progress.

Implementing such solutions requires following these steps:

• Analyzing the workflow and task distribution between different departments;
• Setting project finalization criteria;
• Increasing integration between systems;
• Discovering issues hindering task completion;
• Eliminating bottlenecks;
• Building software capable of routing tasks between employees.

When staff has all the necessary information, it streamlines decision-making. While some companies benefit from pre-built solutions, others prefer to use programs that allow them to customize automated operations and set specific triggers.

After the integration and deployment, firms should conduct testing and further optimize processes if necessary. Performance metrics facilitate tracking the results. Training employees is also crucial to ensure they can utilize the tools to expedite resolution.

We are confident that we have what it takes to help you get your platform from the idea throughout design and development phases, all the way to successful deployment in a production environment!

Why Implement Workflow Automation Solutions?

Enterprises embrace technologies, allowing them to save less valuable resources on daily operations. Integrating software built to streamline task completion and make procedures straightforward has multiple advantages:

• Increased productivity: Employees are no longer forced to spend hours solving repetitive problems, which enables them to fully dedicate themselves to creative pursuits and discover new ways of increasing the company’s profits.
• Lower expenses: Even though the integration costs may seem too high for small companies, this investment will generate extra value in the long term. Companies spend fewer resources on solving issues.
• Streamlined collaboration: Members of different teams and departments can open, edit, and comment on files. Managers configure access rights and assign roles to ensure seamless cooperation between participants. Communication also becomes efficient as automated systems send emails, messages, alerts, and notifications without human input.
• Lower number of errors: As the manual input stage becomes unnecessary, automation results in enhanced accuracy.
• Improved tracking: Monitoring project progress is easier, as every task contains information about responsible employees and the deadlines they have to meet.
• High speed: There is no need to wait until employees enter data manually, so staff finalizes assignments faster.
• Increased accountability and transparency: Every step is assigned to a specific individual, making progress tracking more straightforward.

Workflow automation software makes it easier to avoid mind-numbing routines and enhance CX. No longer tasked with a heavy workload, staff members can focus on bringing a company’s strategy to life. They achieve consistent results by using technologies to enter data, perform calculations, and process information. Utilizing in-built time trackers, they communicate with team members, share feedback, and coordinate efforts.

Shared workspaces allow teams to foster collaboration and get real-time feedback. Such systems also send notifications about recent changes. Dedicated software lets businesses expand the scope of operations and handle workload even during peak times with fewer mistakes.

Examples of Workflow Automation

Efficient project management requires using professional software and algorithm-based solutions. Technological innovations are in high demand in the healthcare industry, where pre-programmed bots can expedite patient registration, form filling, appointment scheduling, and other related tasks to improve every stage of a client’s journey.

Similarly, in finance, task management programs facilitate fraud detection and allow employees to manage operations automatically while ensuring regulatory compliance.

In retail, automated solutions facilitate organizing an inventory, handling orders, and providing top-notch CS. Such programs are also used in logistics and the real estate industry. In manufacturing, they allow for expediting production and QA.

Most enterprises have procedures that could be optimized using programs. Notable cases of workflow process automation include the following:

• Writing emails and filling out forms
• Distributing the workload between employees with relevant skills
• Scheduling events and sending invites
• Routing tasks
• Publishing information on Slack channels
• Sending alerts
• Setting triggers
• Monitoring deadlines
• Preparing documents and collecting eSignatures
• Sending approval requests

Employees use special software to send files for review, synchronize data, generate reports, and perform other tasks. Optimizing complex operations requires more advanced solutions.

The Role of Human Oversight

The success of robotic process automation (RPA) technology heavily depends on programmed bots. While more basic strategies do not require significant investments or hiring specialists with extensive backgrounds in coding, RPA necessitates coordinating multiple bots and integrating them into a single complex system. So a human expert is at the center of the process.

Adding humans to the loop allows firms to control everything and ensure the consistent functioning of integrated systems. Seamless process orchestration requires conducting training sessions for managers and teaching them how to keep track of multiple operations.

Traditionally, businesses of all sizes rely on spreadsheets. However, when it comes to business process automation (BPA), their usability is limited.

Using professional tools, employees troubleshoot issues without advanced coding skills. Such programs typically have drag-in-drop interfaces and intuitive functionality, allowing authorized users to make the necessary changes. Low-code tools are best suited for companies that want to expand operations while maintaining top-grade security and remaining fully compliant.

Tips and Reminders

Before implementing automation strategies, it is crucial to set the desired objectives. Some firms need to speed up data entry, while others are interested in complex tasks. Follow these recommendations to streamline internal processes:

• Analyze the workflow: Discover what actions constitute it and what results an employee achieves at the end.
• Identify responsible employees: It will make it easier to decide what tasks should be routed to a specific person, who should sign documents, who can fix tech bugs, and perform other tasks.
• Create a list of programs and services used by the staff members: This step is crucial, as a firm should integrate all the tools into a single system. Legacy solutions, such as CRMs should also become a part of it.
• Discover data input points: A company may need to process data from many sources, including chatbots, emails, or online forms.
• Create a blueprint: Outline the actions you want to perform automatically and the objectives you want to achieve using the software.
• Build a workflow automation system: Entrust experienced developers with creating a tool with an intuitive UI or outsource this task to a trusted service provider.
• Perform testing: At this stage, enterprises eliminate issues that may result in silos and compromised data.
• Organize lectures for the team: This step ensures that the staff will leverage the advantages of the software to achieve maximum efficiency.

• Deploy the system: After launching automated solutions, monitor the performance and tweak processes to boost productivity.

Streamlined operations facilitate achieving sustainable development goals and getting a cutting edge over competitors. When selecting a suitable solution, consider the following:

• Intuitive functionality: A well-thought-out interface will make it easier for employees to launch processes, send progress reports, and request approvals.
• Extensive integration with other programs and services: Embedding the automated system into a larger infrastructure will reduce the probability of data silos.
• Customization: Every business will benefit from fine-tuning programmed tools according to its needs.
• Reporting tools: Deploying algorithm-based solutions to process large volumes of data will allow companies to gain valuable insights and increase efficiency.
• Scalability: The most reliable systems handle increased volumes of tasks and allow companies to automate multiple workflows.

Besides, it is recommended that companies choose a tool with robust data protection measures, including encryption, access controls, and other options, allowing them to safeguard data from unauthorized users. Some programs also have versions for mobile devices, which facilitates using them on the go.

Bottom Line

While automated solutions allow firms to reduce expenses, expedite project completion, and handle data while adhering to privacy laws, they may be challenging to implement quickly. Such products are used across many industries and have rich functionality. However, relying on RPA without supervision can be risky.

Building a powerful workflow automation system and fine-tuning it to a company’s needs may be a time-consuming endeavor without the assistance of top-level professionals. The Global Cloud Team has experienced professionals who know how to develop complex software products. They provide support and maintenance services to ensure high customer satisfaction. Get in touch with our team now and explore how to leverage BPA tools to succeed.

Author

Alex Johnson

Total Articles: 111