How to Take Your Automated Processes to the Next Level

A lot of businesses realize the value of the automating processes, but there’s a growing number eager to make their workflows even more efficient and productive by leveraging analytics to better understand their performance. This allows them to drill down into processes and workflows to show what’s working well and where improvements can be made.

Automation is Only the Beginning

So, you’ve embraced automation like the future depended on it (it does!), your processes are streamlined (yay!) and everyone’s happy with their reduced workload. But as with any process, it needs constant monitoring for improvements and alignment as circumstances and operating environments change. So, automation should be an ongoing, iterative process, instead of a point in time effort.

For example, entire HR teams are beginning to see the incredible strength in automating processes, providing huge benefits such as:

• A paperless process driven by data:

A massive 53% of all employee files are kept on paper. A digital process can ensure legal standards are consistently met, saving HR teams from being avalanched by paper documents.

• The elimination of human error:

An automated payroll process can calculate salaries and tax brackets instantly, avoiding admin hassles and frustrated employees. In fact, using any payroll software cuts the time needed to pay each employee by a factor of 10.

But how do you track how well the automation process is going? Let’s look at how you can use process analytics to improve the onboarding process.

Taking an Automated Process to the Next Level

It’s official; big data rules the world. Leveraging the benefits of big data-based technologies can help you do several important things, including:

• The ability to get a better view of your customers or users.
• Provide you with data-driven trends to help you make business decisions quickly.
• Help you plan your budgets by presenting you with a data forecast of the future.

However, hiring a data analyst to wade through oceans of data to drive decisions can be expensive and the level of work time-consuming. An integrated process analytics capability can instantly interpret data, and show you key information transparently – in plain, usable terms that you can apply immediately. This, when folded into a full Intelligent Process Automation (IPA) portfolio, will allow your HR team to not only automate and orchestrate their processes more intelligently, but also gain actionable insight into those processes and optimize them for maximum efficiency.

Making HR More Intelligent

When it comes to process improvement, it’s important to consider what you need to measure, at what stage of the process you need to measure it, and the best way to take that data and turn it into insight. If you do this well, data insights can help to eliminate wastage in your business processes.

For example, a new hire receives a PDF tax form to fill and e-mail back. The form is ultimately received by the line manager who then needs to check and collate the paperwork and forward it to HR. The format of the tax form has been digitized but the overall process hasn’t really increased productivity.

A process analytics tool integrated into an IPA portfolio can help identify unnecessary delays and drill down into the work hours spent on this part of the process, which is also a great place to start understanding your process and planning improvements.

A Hawk’s Vision

Nintex Analytics is a solution specifically designed for analyzing your automated processes and workflows. It gathers data from across your organization, pulling insights from all your Nintex Workflow platforms, presenting you with an aggregated view of all your IPA processes.

Nintex Analytics shines by honing in on specific qualitative and quantitative metrics, such as who’s doing the work and how many hours it takes to do the work. By providing visibility of critical business data, it helps you see which workflows are most effective and equips you to fix the ones that aren’t. After all, continuous improvement is not only about the things you do well, it’s also about removing the cumbersome processes that get in the way of your work.

Change is Good

Automated process improvement must start somewhere, and it’ll likely be a constant evolution of small changes. Therefore, using an approach that incorporates intelligent, automated, relevant, and actionable analytics is the most reliable way to make lasting improvements to your business processes. Process intelligence solutions like Nintex Analytics go beyond simple production of raw data – it determines what you need to measure, track, and improve – helping you to gain a unique insight into your automated processes.

 

Interested in discovering how Nintex could help your organization with any of its processes, HR or otherwise? Contact us today.