Automating tasks can lead to an average cost savings of up to 30 percent within five years for a company.
...HUGE savings.
That said, it’s not an easy lift.
Setting up process automation across an entire organization is a company-wide initiative that requires ample time and resources. This article will dive into what process automation is, the benefits of it, and why your company should invest in the right tools to streamline processes within your company.
What is process automation?
Process automation is the simplification of business tasks with technology. Automation software is set up to instantly perform time-consuming, repetitive, and manual tasks—reducing human errors, increasing productivity, and improving the overall efficiency of the company.
Workflows (a defined sequence of events that are triggered by specific events) are set up so the software can execute automatically once an event triggers the sequence. For best results, you’ll need to make sure the process automation software you use integrates (connects the system to allow data to flow uninterrupted) with the various software applications and systems you use for specific events.
9 Benefits of Process Automation
Odds are, if you’re using process automation in your business already, you understand some of the powers it holds, but probably not the depth of it. Here are 9 of the biggest benefits of adding process automation throughout your company that will help you save big.
- Increased Efficiency: Streamlines tasks and workflows—increasing the speed at which tasks are completed.
- Reduced Errors: Minimizes the risk of human error (mistakes happen!). With predefined rules and a set of instructions, the chance of a mistake occurring when entering data or computing calculations is significantly reduced – there’s no talk of last night’s football game to distract the software.
- Reduced Costs: Organizations can reduce labor costs and better allocate resources.
- Increased Consistency and Compliance: Reliant execution of tasks that are automatically following predefined regulations—this is especially relevant to finance and healthcare.
- Better Scalability: Can easily handle increased workloads—allowing more flexibility for growing businesses.
- Improved Customer Experience: Faster response times and increased customer service quality lead to happier end-users.
- Increased Data and Insights: Provides valuable metrics for business improvement and informed decision-making with updated, timely
- Risk Management: Continuous monitoring to identify and flag risks faster.
- Increased Company Collaboration: Eases collaboration between employees to increase the flow of information across the company.
Company Sectors Impacted by Process Automation
- Operations and Production: Assembly lines; inventory management; order fulfillment; shipment tracking
- Finance and Accounting: Invoice processing; expense reporting; financial reports; approval workflows
- Human Resources: Candidate screening; salary disbursement; leave requests; employee onboarding
- Customer Support: Ticket assignment; responses for frequently asked questions (FAQs); AI-chatbots
- IT: Threat detection; software updates; scaling; cloud resource provisioning
- Compliance: Risk analysis; mitigation strategies; compliance reporting; data encryption
Almost every business unit can benefit from process automation—the trick is just finding what tasks are repetitive and which solutions are best to solve those problems. Process automation comes down to giving your company a competitive advantage over everyone else in your industry. The more you use the technology you have access to, the better off your business will be. Technology is meant to help you (increase sales, productivity, and efficiency), not hinder.
