Process Automtation - The cost of NOT Automating may dictate your companys' future

The cost of not automating is the question.
Not what is the cost of the software to automate. Get a firm handle on what you are losing to perform business manually.
- Loss of potential sales
- Loss of customer satisfaction
- Poor views into data and daily processes
- Silo'ed views of data limited interaction with departments
- Lack of communication with trading partners
- Intense tracking of data and processes are time consuming
- Missed errors that cost you big dollars
- Slower time to market with your products
- Decreasing competitive advantage as other automate to compete swiftly to market changes.
- and so much more.....

Benefits of Automation of Business Processes:

- Decrease the time employees spend tracking down and managing
business information
- Respond to errors or request promptly - recieve alerts
- Increase your visibility into your processes
- Make informed decisions on daily tasks and long term projections
- Increase automated collaboration internally and with trading partners
- Decrease resposnse times to action items
- Get a handle on your "business in-motion"!
There are many more benefits - this is just to get you thinking!

What can you do to start to automate processes?

Fist off you need to have the right data on what is going on in the company to see what can be automated.
• Personnel - personnel can be interviewed to collect information on their roles, geogrpahic locations etc. Define what their daily routines are with fellow employees, software and the company’s processes. co-workers and partners.
• Departments – You can review a Companys'organizational charts to see the department structures. This will also give you an idea of individual roles for each department and their reporting structure.
• Processes – You will then need to see what specific internal processes the company uses within and across departments to determine what they do on a daily basis. This will include all external processes they use to interface with suppliers, partners and customers.

Here is a typical company model (1 billion+ in sales)

• There are approximatley 61 “user profiles” (people) that represent an organizational view of inidviduals based on user roles. A role is defined as a specific grouping of tasks that a person is responsible for or is active in.
• There are five midsize business departments which include; Operations, Finance, Human Resources, Sales & Marketing, IT & Partners.
• There are typically 15 departmental organization charts that show how these people are organized in the five departments.
• There are about 33 process groups that represent the work people do within daily business scenarios.
• And finally - there are 155 processes and associated tasks defined across the 33 business process groups.

Now you can see why automating these daily tasks can really impact the bottom line of a companys overall performance, customer service and ultimately the revenue and shareholder value.

Technology Partners
Once you have this data you can document it so you can have it for internal use. You will also need to provide this to an expert to begin to evaluate and assist you with automation and fine tuning of your processes. You can then begin to review review proven technoliges that can automate tasks and processes to effectively imporove your companies daily operations. Just take a look at a company similar to your company.

- Industry Leader - See if a specific technology is a leader and why?
- Well Funded - For business process automation - you need a true leader and a company that is well funded. This is not an area you want to skimp on either - as they will be a key partner to your organization's success.
- Proven track record of decades - if possible!
- Experts in technology, process automation, security, standards and implementation
- Go with a true sofware development firm - not companies that resell. This is key as you need in-house experts to execute. IF a company has to go to antoher company to get your questions answered - you will be disenchanted with the process and it will take long to implement.
- Ask for benchmarks of performance
- Get client references
- See demos that apply to your needs!
- Make sure that you like the people at their company - they are a key partner - this matters- trust me!
- There are more - but you can get the idea!

Keep reading this blog as we will unfold areas involved to assist you in the process.