Posted in Workflow Automation

4 Business Process Solutions Proven to Drive Efficiency and Growth (with Examples)

While 65% of organizations say that transforming processes is a good way to improve productivity and efficiency, 80% aren’t deploying business process management solutions.

Here’s the thing. 

If you want to maximize operational excellence and efficiency, you must get a handle on your processes. Not only do sloppy processes produce poor results, but they’re also slow, error-prone, and costly.

The best way to iron out the wrinkles in your workflows is to find business process solutions that help you spot bottlenecks, design and implement improvements, and track changes.

Read on to learn about the best business process solutions and how frevvo can help.

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Why is it so Important to Evaluate Your Business Processes? 

To spot room for improvement, it’s important to check on the efficiency and effectiveness of your processes.

By continuously tracking and improving each process in your business, you’ll be able to spot bottlenecks and deal with them as they arise. 

Not only does this prevent delays, lower costs, and improve the quality of your outcomes, it also drives operational efficiency, productivity, and flexibility within your organization.

By looking into your process analytics to understand how your performance is affecting your business operations, you’ll get information on how inefficiencies in your existing processes are leading to unfavorable outcomes.

This makes it easier to create an effective solution that solves your business needs without causing domino-like knock-on effects that negatively impact other areas of the business.

Cricket Australia case study using frevvo

For instance, after looking into the issues surrounding their accounting procedures, Cricket Australia found that their biggest delay was due to inefficient invoice processing.

This insight enabled them to tackle the problem head-on. 

Previously, it took the organization four days to process an invoice. By switching to frevvo, they were able to automate the workflow, which cut their invoice turnaround time in half.

7 Typical Business Process Issues 

When you’re analyzing a current process, there are numerous parts of it that you should consider improving.

Here are some of the top business process issues that may be affecting the performance of an existing workflow.

1. Speed

Manual processes are slow.

Manual workflows often require a lot of slow, labor-heavy tasks such as data entry. Not only that, but data entry mistakes and lost paperwork often cause unforeseen delays in processing. 

Delayed processing doesn’t just mean slower business outcomes. It can also lead to unhappy suppliers, low levels of customer satisfaction, and disgruntled staff.

2. Accuracy

Manual processing is error-prone. 

There are two main types of processing errors: skill-based errors and mistakes. 

different types of process errors

Skill-based errors occur when someone knows how to carry out a process, but the constant repetition of a menial, mundane task leads to a lapse in memory or a slip of action, such as an administrative error.

Mistakes come when someone isn’t sure how to do the process properly. They may perform it incorrectly or apply the rules inappropriately because of their limited knowledge.

Both of these types of errors are apparent in manual processing. When there aren’t special quality assurance measures to check for these issues, you’ll experience process delays and extra remedial costs correcting them.

3. Cost

If you’re experiencing high processing costs, your workflows are inefficient and ineffective. That’s why 50% of organizations agree that process transformation is the way to lower costs. 

process automation cost reduction statistic

Inefficient workflows are slow and unproductive, resulting in high labor requirements and extra resource costs.

Ineffective processes don’t work well and are often characterized by abundant errors and poor quality outputs, resulting in high remedial costs.

4. Poor Quality Outputs

Poor processes lead to inconsistent outcomes. 

When processes are full of errors, you’ll end up with poor quality results and ineffective outputs. Workflows characterized by low productivity also tend to have low-quality outcomes.

This means you’ll experience bad products and sub-par results. It also leads to unhappy customers, suppliers, and other stakeholders who follow on from these processes.

35% of organizations say they’re concentrating on improving workflows to enhance existing products. By doing this, they can prevent reputational damage and extra remedial costs.

5. Unhappy Customers

Customers are often dissatisfied because of delays, errors, and poor products. All these issues can be rectified at the process level. 

process improvement customer satisfaction statistic

With more efficient and effective processes, you’ll clear up delays, produce consistent results, and prevent errors. In fact, 53% of organizations agree that you can improve customer satisfaction through workflow transformation, as it improves quality and efficiency.

6. Labor Shortages and Low Productivity

Low productivity can be a result of labor shortages or inefficient working. This manifests as low output, poor quality results, continuous errors, and a discontented team.

All these issues mean that staff has to go back and remedy their mistakes. This takes them away from producing more, which further reduces productivity in the pipeline.

According to 50% of firms, process transformation can help lower costs and reduce labor demands, improving productivity through better resource management. 

7. Scalability

If you’re trying to grow your business, you need replicable processes that produce the same outcome every time. This allows you to scale production and ensure the same quality of results. 

It’s not just that manual processing is slow. Its error-prone nature also makes scalability a real challenge. 

Working on your workflows can seriously help with scaling your business. That’s why 56% of organizations are focusing on operational excellence to drive growth.

4 Business Process Solutions to Solve Common Problems 

One in five organizations is turning to business process management (BPM) as a solution for their workflow issues.

BPM helps you to solve problems by modeling, digitizing, automating, and monitoring your processes. 

Let’s break that down.

1. Mapping and Modeling

To analyze your process efficiency, you should start by mapping the current process

Mark down what happens at each stage, who performs each task, when these tasks are performed, and any conditions that may occur throughout the workflow.

This will help you identify the points where bottlenecks most commonly occur and flag unnecessary and overly complex steps.

With a clear map, you’ll find that it’s more straightforward to redesign better solutions. 

Once you’ve pinpointed the issues with the existing process, you can use business process modeling to shape the new process.

business process model of an ordering process

With a concrete business process model in place, you’ll find it simpler to train everyone to perform your workflows in the same way every time. 

You’ll also find it easier to quickly identify any bottlenecks that appear in the future.

2. Digitization

With a clearer map of how your processes should be performed, you’ll be able to spot places where manual processing is slowing down your workflows and causing avoidable errors.

By digitizing your workflows, you can reduce error-prone manual tasks and speed up workflows while reducing labor demands. All these improvements lead to significant cost savings.

Digitizing your administration also makes it easier to keep up-to-date, accurate audit trails to ensure compliance.

Software like frevvo enables you to digitize all forms, signatures, and paperwork for a faster, more accurate paper trail.

3. Automation

You can combine digitization with automation to kickstart a full digital transformation. Where digitization refers to the transfer from physical paperwork to electronic paperwork, automation automates the processing of this electronic paperwork to remove manual handling. This leads to digital transformation which results in more innovative and efficient processes. 

how digitization and digitalization lead to digital transformation

When considering all the processes in your organization, there are plenty of opportunities to boost efficiency and drive growth through process automation. In fact, 74% of employees believe that at least part of their job could be automated.

48% of organizations are working on business process automation that automates manual tasks, with 51% of automation initiatives focused on boosting efficiency.

According to 42% of business leaders, process automation accelerates repetitive task completion, and 31% agree that automation can lower labor costs.

On top of that, more than 1/2 of all organizations believe that automating processes can reduce errors in the pipeline.

Automation can help scale your organization, which is why 49% of automation initiatives aim to drive growth.

Because it reduces the human resources demand, improves accuracy, and speeds up workflows, 80% of business leaders believe that automation can power their companies forward.

Part of this is because employees can turn their attention to more meaningful tasks rather than getting bogged down by administrative work. As 85% of business leaders see it, automation allows them and their teams more time to concentrate on what really matters to the company.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that the transition to process automation has to be a complex affair. 1/4 of firms are already implementing low-code workflow automation software like frevvo.

With frevvo, you can easily design and implement dynamic, automated workflows without programming skills.

4. Performance-tracking

One of the most important process solutions to help guide you on how to improve workflows is performance-tracking.

Workflow analysis technology like frevvo allows you to track how your processes are performing so you can benchmark existing behavior and compare it to your process improvements.

This helps you to see how well changes perform and makes it easy to identify bottlenecks and areas for process improvement as they come up.

frevvo workflow analysis software dashboard

An in-depth process-tracking dashboard will also help you to spot any unpredicted knock-on effects that may arise from changing your workflows.

4 Examples of These Business Process Solutions in Action

Don’t suffer from ineffective processes. Check out how these four firms implemented process solutions across their organizations to boost productivity and efficiency while driving growth.

1. Onboarding

Beauty retailer Yves Rocher found that its manual onboarding processes were overburdened during peak season.

Processing was so slow that people would often start work without payroll having been processed or without the uniform they needed.

By switching to frevvo, Yves Rocher was able to digitize and automate its onboarding workflow

Digital, customizable forms are now automatically generated, saving time on data entry. And because these forms also validate automatically, they prevent errors from delaying the process.

employee onboarding workflow on frevvo

All onboarding forms are automatically routed through the correct approvers, who sign them electronically. 

Forms are then sent to the right departments so that uniform orders can be processed promptly and payroll can be organized immediately. All documentation is updated on the HR software automatically. 

2. Contracts

Initial Saudi Group’s manual contract process was highly error-prone and very slow. 

Not only did physical paperwork have to be sent to multiple approvers manually, but paperwork was also often lost during transfer. This meant that contract processes typically took between seven and ten days.

By implementing Frevvo, Initial Saudi Group slashed this processing time by 92%.

Contracts are filled out using digital forms, which are dynamically routed to the appropriate approvers using custom logic. Approvers receive an automatic notification that they need to approve a new contract, which they can sign digitally.

Now, contract processes take no more than six hours to complete.

3. Sales

Solar energy company Activ8 was suffering from long, complex sales cycles filled with manual paperwork and back-and-forth quotation processes. 

Salespeople would visit potential customers to provide a quote, take the paperwork back to the office, send the client a copy from there, and wait for client approval before any work could start.

Aside from the process being inherently slow, mistakes in the paperwork often caused unnecessary delays. This gave clients a lot of time to change their minds.

Having switched to frevvo, Activ8 was able to digitize and automate its sales process. 

Sales quotations are generated on the spot, and online sales forms are completed in the client’s home using a tablet. All documentation is then automatically forwarded to the sales office and the customer.

sales order workflow on frevvo

Automatic validation prevents errors in the paperwork, and online approval speeds up the sales cycles, leading to quicker conversions.

4. Procurement

Central Wyoming College (CWC) was using manual purchase order (PO) forms for its procurement processes. Errors in the calculations and delays in approvals were significantly slowing down procurement workflows.

By switching to frevvo’s digital PO forms, all POs are now automatically validated to prevent calculation errors. Once ready to go, forms are automatically routed to the correct approvers, who are notified that an approval is required. 

Approvers can digitally sign all POs online, meaning that purchasing processes are far quicker.

Conclusion

Business process solutions help you tackle your workflow problems head-on. 

You need a solution that helps you to identify inefficiencies, improve the procedures behind these, and track changes. 

That way, you’re better able to create reliable, repeatable systems that are simple to teach new staff and easy to scale.

With frevvo, you can create dynamic, automated workflows that digitize all audit trails while enjoying real-time performance tracking to measure your success. 

Sign up for a free 30-day trial of our software.