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What is a Business Process?
Business processes are activities and tasks that work toward an outcome, typically an end result. A description of these processes, such as an illustration model or map, must encompass tasks related to it and any systems and people dependent on it.
Business processes can be divided into core, long-tail and support categories. With the appropriate strategy and software in place, each type of business process can be automated and optimized to reach excellence - here is more info below.
What is Business Process Automation?
Business Process Automation, more commonly referred to by its acronym BPA, refers to software designed to reduce human effort within any particular business process and automate as many steps as possible - each process typically consisting of numerous tasks and workflows that need to be completed manually by humans, according to one study conducted on U.S.
employees' work tasks which could potentially be automated through BPA technology.
BPA stands for Business Process Automation software that automates and optimizes processes across many businesses, often via low-code automation solutions.
Business Process Automation Types
BPA refers to one process management component; however, it also encompasses various forms of automation technology like these.
Automatism
Task automation aims to minimize or remove manual work within specific processes - which may involve emailing, creating documents, collecting signatures or updating statuses - to increase efficiency.
Automated Workflow
Workflow automation seeks to automate a series of tasks. Some workflows allow every step to be automated, while other, more involved activities that necessitate decision-making or critical analysis may still need to be performed by employees.
Process Automation
Process automation differs from task automation in that it entails looking at an entire process from its inception to find as many automation opportunities as possible.
Process automation involves automating the tasks and workflows of activity within that particular process.
Automated Robotic Process (RPA)
Automating certain tasks using custom-coded bots is an excellent idea for repetitive, structured work that always co-occurs.
An employee who spends part of their day entering data into one system and then into another performs repetitive, structured, repetitive work, and RPA can provide solutions that do not involve decision-making processes.
Intelligent Automation
Intelligent automation combines task, RPA, process and AI automation technologies with artificial intelligence and data analysis to automate more complex tasks - like making decisions - such as decision making.
Why Automate Business Processes, and What are its Benefits?
Automation makes processes more efficient; however, it only partially illustrates its effects or benefits to companies.
BPA reduces spreadsheet use while simplifying repetitive tasks - but its purpose goes far beyond freeing up time for more productive endeavors. Standardizing business processes is one of the primary benefits of automation.
Standardizing processes enhances business performance by:
- Security and compliance can be enforced more easily.
- Consistency of employee/customer experiences.
- Reporting and monitoring process KPIs can be simplified.
- Reduce errors and delays.
- Increasing predictability.
- Enabling the orchestration of processes across teams or departments.
- Extending existing app capabilities (also known as stack extensibility).
Standardized processes make scaling simpler. Scaling can be significantly simplified when each repetition uses comparable data and workflows.
Standardizing processes makes them more efficient. Business process automation gives us control, consistency, and coordination across the fabric.
How to Automate Business Processes
Understanding a business process is vital when automating it, and Low-code automation provides a visual interface which enables teams in businesses to modify and track processes without needing to file tickets with IT every time something needs updating or changing.
Which Business Processes are Automatable?
Automation of any business process is possible - all it takes to get going is understanding 1) which steps can be automated and 2) the ideal automation solution.
Answers to such queries depend upon which process is under discussion. Still, here we explore examples of business processes that could be automated.
Core Processes
Core business processes in an organization are those which generate revenue and directly relate to its core activities, with significant tech components such as ERP, CRM or point solutions typically responsible for automating these core processes.
Core processes may include the following activities:
- Sales processes.
- Market processes.
- Customer service processes.
- Production Processes.
- Distributing processes.
Support Processes
Support processes enable core processes. While not directly producing revenue, support processes remain vital components of business operations.
They should not be disregarded as essential functions.
Support processes within an organization provide more excellent value for those within than for customers from outside it.
Such support often occurs using software solutions tailored specifically for various departments within an enterprise - like accounting programs, HR applications or ITSM applications.
Support processes can be broken down into:
- Human Resources processes.
- Financial processes.
- It processes.
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Long-tail Processes
Long-tail processes address needs that need to be met by existing components. A CRM might automate sales pipeline stages but not data entry between unintegrated apps or onboarding processes.
An additional example includes financial applications that lack vendor approval automation or HRIS systems that don't include ways of automating new hire requests, which often need customization or changes, as they tend to involve lengthy procedures.
Low-code business process automation software can streamline every stage of any process - from core to support and extended tail operations.
Business Process Automation: Advantages
Greater Efficiency
Automating business processes can significantly boost efficiency. Software solutions and robots can easily be programmed to do things faster and more accurately than humans.
Automating processes will increase productivity while decreasing costs. Robots or software can run 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with little supervision from employees compared to these robotic solutions.
Consider automating business processes to increase productivity.
Reduce Errors
Software and robotic solutions employed for automating business processes follow their programming, eliminating human error from consideration altogether.
BPA comes equipped with an audit trail so businesses and organizations can keep tabs on everything being done, quickly detecting any error that arises and correcting it as quickly as possible for maximum productivity.
More Agility
Business process automation enables greater agility. BPA can easily be altered or adjusted when necessary since it forms one part of an organization or business's overall system.
Businesses can now more efficiently assess and adapt to automated efforts without unnecessary downtime.
People Power: A More Innovative way to use it
We have also highlighted the power of people. Implementing BPA into your business will enable your staff to focus on more valuable activities rather than repetitive, often dull operations.
Employees will have more time and attention available for tasks that add value to the organization as a whole and to them individually.
Automating promotional email distribution to employees allows them to focus on other creative endeavors without wasting time sending promotional mail out individually.
Business automation software enables more effective management of employee, partner and customer relationships - leaving more time for creative pursuits!
Employee Engagement can be Improved
Unengaged employees will not produce as efficiently. Your workforce will become less motivated and efficient without your engagement.
Employee performance will directly reflect how productively employees contribute to your company. You can improve engagement among workers by encouraging them to focus on productive tasks instead. Engaging employees effectively results in higher productivity levels that improve business operations overall.
Greater Customer Satisfaction
Customer satisfaction is vital to any successful business; your enterprise can survive and grow with customers. Automating business processes will enhance customer satisfaction by allowing them to interact with you faster, simpler and more effectively than before.
Add a virtual assistant or chatbot to your support team, and provide customers with faster ways to solve problems - which will have an enormous effect on customer satisfaction and your company.
Read More: Enhancing Business Process Automation with Automation Tools
Standardization of Processes
Every business operates differently. Even though businesses attempt to standardize the entire process, not all employees comply.
Employees may alter processes based on personal preferences; however, there might be better results. Automated processes simplify standardization by performing as expected and fulfilling their purpose without disruptions or exceptions.
Support for Business Continuity
Business process automation provides continuity support. BPA allows businesses to bolster their Business Continuity Plans with software and robotic solutions explicitly designed to handle tasks usually provided by external services when these become unavailable; BPA serves as an emergency generator.
Business Process Automation: Disadvantages
Uncertainty About the Future of your Job
Uncertainty regarding your future job can be one of the primary determinants to business process automation, given its ease of implementation today and consequent worker displacement concerns.
Businesses and operations will no longer need additional workers to keep pace with an ever-increasing workload. BPA should be considered a source of concern even though it cannot replace humans as a source of sustenance.
Can Hinder Business Improvements
BPA can be a precious tool in improving your business if implemented effectively and used to its maximum capacity.
But only proper execution will do. Automation may adversely impact business improvement if implemented appropriately or prioritized unsuitably.
BPAs that must be documented, managed and appropriately overseen could impede rather than expedite business progress.
When automating your business processes, you must know where, how, and when to start.
Costs
BPA can also help businesses reduce expenses, but only when automated correctly. Before automating inefficient business processes, evaluate their current state to assess if optimization or reengineering is needed.
Otherwise, automating such ineffective methods might prove counterproductive and cause more headaches for you than necessary.
Cost increases may result since automation of inefficient processes requires upfront expenses and a redesign to increase their effectiveness, followed by a repeat of the automation process and redesign process to revamp them for greater efficiencies and restart the automation process.
Lack of Automation
Noting the following. "Before Players Arrive (BPA) isn't about collecting points; rather, it provides a holistic strategy."
Be mindful when implementing BPA into your business that there may still be processes that need to be automated; consider this as BPA has yet to take hold fully.
Be wary when taking this step.
Use Cases and Examples of Business Processes
BPA can be applied to various processes and departments within an enterprise, providing the flexibility that facilitates orchestrating processes across an organization's processes and departments.
BPA may even be implemented across departments to increase productivity!
Finance and Procurement
BPA is used by finance and procurement teams to automate incoming items like purchase approvals and reimbursements, speed up credit approval processes, enforce compliance standards and security requirements, as well as for processes including purchasing, receivables management and expense reimbursements.
Sales & Marketing
BPA boosts revenue through more efficient marketing and sales processes. The time required to fulfill marketing requests is reduced significantly while onboarding new customers is expedited quickly.
BPA integrates seamlessly into existing CRMs for sales automation and quickly fills any process or process gaps. BPA offers an efficient alternative to enterprise CRMs for developing and overseeing sales pipeline stages.
People Ops/HR
One of the primary focuses for any HR department should be creating an enjoyable candidate and employee journey, from recruitment through onboarding.
BPA assists this goal by decreasing hiring times and lengthening onboarding processes; it integrates seamlessly with numerous HR systems and apps - automating processes like recruiting, employee onboarding and request management to achieve this aim.
What is The Difference Between BPA and RPA?
Robotic and business process automation often need clarification, yet each has distinct nuances that should be considered.
RPA (Robotic Process Automation) refers to using bots or programming codes to automate repetitive tasks at keystroke levels, similar to human action.
A bot might, for instance, copy and paste data from one computer system into an app or spreadsheet.
BPA differs from RPA in several crucial respects:
- BPA focuses more on end-to-end processes than RPA, which is focused only on specific tasks.
- BPA software is based on a common code framework that reduces the coding needed to automate or optimize processes. Low-code BPA offers a user interface with graphical elements that do not require end users to know how to code.
- BPA provides several features not available in RPA. That includes features to support process modeling, improve collaboration and give data and insight into the performance of processes.
Your best way of telling RPA from BPA lies within its automation scope; RPA may be implemented if an automation solution can be isolated.
BPA could involve multiple steps of an automated action process simultaneously.
BPA and BPM the Same Things?
Business process management (BPM) is another term commonly associated with BPA.
BPM (Business Process Management) is an approach or strategy focused on modeling, monitoring and improving business processes.
BPM also emphasizes orchestrating various processes so they are completed efficiently, doing work that makes sense in terms of people involved with them, systems used and data which may impact.
Think of BPA and BPM regarding their respective goals: BPA aims to optimize and create an efficient process layer by integrating and automating.
While for BPM it should ensure the layer helps meet business goals.
BPA (Business Process Automation) is one of the components of Business Process Management. BPA tools offer many features designed specifically to support BPM implementation; for example, customizable reporting and process modeling features are essential elements required by this approach.
Read More: Business Process Automation Using Custom Software
What is Business Process Automation Software?
Business Process Automation software, commonly called BPA, provides technology for planning, implementing, and monitoring process automations.
BPA may also be known as a platform, solution, tool or framework; low-code automation refers to BPA used with low-code frameworks.
Low-code software automates workflows and business processes while empowering teams without programming knowledge to take charge and model their processes.
The Low-code Platform seamlessly integrates into existing stacks to orchestrate business processes, eliminate data silos and increase consistency.
The Best Business Process Automation Solutions
Business Process Automation Solutions promise to ease, streamline and enhance the efficiency of your organization.
While these promises might sound appealing on paper, many find their efficacy lacking when presented as actual products of technology.
Consider this: Many organizations are exploring how they can incorporate automation technologies at least partially into their operations.
Business Process Automation solutions could make the workplace more effective, just like big data analytics did for marketing and sales in recent years; to ignore such opportunities would be foolish.
We will examine what a business process automation solution has to offer regardless of your organization's size, industry or revenue stream.
What are Business Process Automation Solutions (BPA)?
Business Process Automation Solutions are designed to streamline parts of a business process driven by logic or rules, such as approvals or data flow.
By eliminating manual errors and speeding up processes, these software tools help increase business process management efficiency and drive more fantastic cost-cutting results.
Automation can:
- We can help you move from slow and error-prone paper forms to seamless digital ones.
- Reduce errors and speed up repetitive tasks by removing the manual component.
- Employees can focus on tasks that need human intelligence and intervention.
- Assure that all data is stored safely and efficiently accessible
- You can quickly adjust your processes to market trends and changes.
Small businesses and large corporations can reap the rewards of business process automation, as shown below by these examples of such systems in action.
Furthermore, business process automation does not only apply to one particular company.
Three Real-World Business Automation Case Examples
Requests for Leave
Leave (time off management) can be an inherently tricky endeavor, often necessitating complex management strategies and tactics.
Why? This could be because, typically, an employee requiring time off requires signatures from multiple individuals - this might include their immediate superior, department head and any stakeholders associated with their project, in addition to members of HR's HR team - thus leading to communication gaps with combined emails, phone calls and texts.
Business process automation for leave management may provide the solution. Design a form that collects all required information before creating a process involving all staff involved - this system should run effortlessly while connecting seamlessly to payroll databases and attendance records.
Purchase Orders
Error-proof your purchase orders is critical to avoiding financial loss from unfulfilled and missed orders; unfortunately, organizations frequently face this dilemma with multiple POs being active simultaneously.
Automation helps eliminate gaps through which purchase orders may slip through and get lost so that all purchases can be fulfilled, rejected, or forgotten.
Please keep track of active and previous POs to address any potential problems before they arise quickly.
By employing a Business Process Automation (BPA) solution based on rules, purchasing orders (POs) with values exceeding an agreed-upon limit can be submitted for approval from your head of finance.
Sales and Marketing
No matter the product or service your business offers, sales boils down to finding quality leads, nurturing them into viable signups or contracts and turning those leads into successes.
Businesses face the daily struggle of winning new clients and keeping existing clients satisfied, which is where a business process automation system comes in handy.
A process automation system allows you to avoid losing out by creating dedicated apps such as Sales Invoice Approval or Discount Approval, updating CRM databases, or providing more efficient marketing campaigns through feedback loops with ongoing loops for effective feedback management and analysis.
Business Process Automation Solutions at Work
Cisin Process was developed to ease office automation. It offers simple yet straightforward solutions through customizable templates in its intuitive visual interface.
Automation solutions for business processes span all industries, regardless of your field or speciality. With Cisin Workflow, you can automate some or all of your processes, from global industrial mergers to rural farm goods shipments, with just a click! Take the free demo now to experience this powerful app yourself.
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Conclusion
BPA (Business Process Asset) Management, used effectively and implemented correctly by businesses today, is considered an indispensable way of driving success and expansion.
Importantly, remembering BPA only works appropriately and when all potential advantages and drawbacks of its implementation have been considered and assessed fully is vital for its effectiveness. Automating business processes to maximize efficiency and protect against BPA will bring better outcomes.
