Digitizing workflows saves ASX-listed energy company 3,800 hours

Challenge: A significant number of process needs

This ASX-listed energy company had a significant number of business processes that involved the completion and approval of paper-based forms.

In order to deploy forms and workflow solutions more widely, the company chose to investigate process automation options to augment their SharePoint implementation. These solutions would need to be developed rapidly and would require less effort to manage and support than Microsoft InfoPath and SharePoint workflows. They also wanted to find software that would provide out-of-the-box functionality such as escalation and delegation.

Solution: Simple to complex solutions with workflow

K2 Software stood out for its ability to deliver on all the energy company’s needs. In the first six months, they developed 26 solutions and have now scaled to more than 40.

While some solutions—like pool vehicle booking and mobile device activation request—use simple forms to populate data fields through integrations with line-of-business (LOB) systems, others are more complex. Processes like training requisition and contractor onboarding require human interaction, so tasks such as approvals are now routed by email or via a list on the company’s intranet. Even more complicated processes—like leave applications—require the management of persistent application data as no LOB system has been implemented to provide the company’s required functionality.

“One of the major benefits of using K2 Software rather than the built-in SharePoint workflows is that the tasks created will then be displayed in a list on the intranet homepage giving our staff a unified view of all the tasks assigned to them,” a collaboration and content manager at the energy company said. “We have recently implemented a document management system using SharePoint and will definitely use K2 Software to automate the document review and approval process.”

Challenge: Long process completion times

Prior to implementing K2 Software, manual execution of processes resulted in completion rate delays, reduction in productivity of those participating, inconsistent storage of data about the status of the process, the introduction of errors through manual data entry, issues in status reporting and more.

While suffering through these issues, the technical team realized that digitizing their workflows and incorporating forms would not only reduce process completion times, it would increase productivity throughout the company.

Solution: A more productive team

In the first six months of operation, a single form and workflow specialist developed 26 solutions, saving 3,800 man-hours—or more than $500,000.

Both end-users and business process owners are saving time through the implementation of K2 Software with benefits of additional functionality, such as escalation, out-of-office, and reporting capabilities. Business users have rapidly adopted these solutions and reactions have been positive. For instance, after a recent issuance of the leave form, numerous successful requests were logged within just a few minutes.