Automate This! How to Increase Productivity from Your Business Processes
By Sam Marzianno of Blinds.com
“Why does it take SO LONG to get something done around here?”
It’s happened to you hasn’t it? Those days when you realize that you do not have to work for the local courthouse to get caught in the layers of a complex red tape web – which, really, is just a polite way of saying bad business practices.
It’s no wonder there are so many ways to trip up. Business Processes by nature are complex creatures, requiring a series of actions or steps to produce a specific product or service.
Even the act of hiring a new employee is an inter-departmental Business Process landmine. You know the drill – after interviews and the flush of success of an accepted job offer, every new employee needs to be entered into payroll, assigned a computer with the appropriate software, have a working phone, scheduled for training and so on. This process spans several departments.
Let’s face it, we’re human and can easily make mistakes and miss even the most basic tasks at times.
The power of Business Process Automation
When it comes to increasing the efficiency of your Business Processes, the magic word to remember is ‘automation’.
This means automating communications between departments, and sending “work items” to the necessary person at the appropriate time; all with minimal human interaction. But how does this automation work?
Let’s look at a real-life Business Process Automation example from the e-commerce company I work for, Blinds.com. We realized that our customer service team processes varied widely from agent-to-agent. This inconsistency created additional work for employees and resulted in spotty communications with our customers. Not optimal!
While training is always the first line of defense in maintaining consistency and customer satisfaction, we took our desire for automation one step further and invested in a tool called Interaction Process Automation (IPA), an Interactive Intelligence product. We chose IPA because of its simple implementation, robust out of the box features, and the ability to integrate with other programs (Sales Force, Great Plains, even our web-based back-end).
The process automation software automatically handles the ‘busy work’ that was keeping our customer service agents off of the phones, like calling the factories for the status of an order. Instead of our agents using sticky notes as reminders to email their customers the status of their orders, our customers are automatically updated by an email with the status of their request whenever there is an update to share. IPA also emails our factories service requests and even follows-up with them should we not receive a response within a pre-determined time frame.
Now, customer emails very rarely (if ever) read, “Where are the parts I requested?” They now read, “Thanks for the update!” In fact, we see that our agents have each gone from averaging 25 to 30 calls per day, to averaging 40 calls per day.
The process that had the most impact on our customer service team’s productivity was ordering parts from the factory. IPA allows the agents to see pictures of the parts so they can be confident that they are getting customers the correct parts. The program then e-mails the factory a part request, and emails the customer a confirmation of the parts they ordered. When the factory confirms, via e-mail, that the order was filled and shipped, IPA emails the customer to let them know that their parts are on the way and a general idea of when to expect them.
Okay, enough about automation at Blinds.com, what can automating your Business Processes do for you? Here are 5 benefits to whet your appetite:
1. Less imperfect human interaction. Free your employees to do higher level tasks and automate the routine day-to-day stuff. Reduce human error and get your team focused on what really matters – the customer.
2. Increase in productivity. Everyone spends less time on the manual process because BPA is handling the time-consuming work. This translates to:
a. More time for other tasks
b. Decreased work after the call
c. Increased call volume per agent
d. For processes that span departments, the user simply fills out the information presented to them by the BPA software. They no longer have to remember the next step, or worry about getting it to the next person in a timely manner. It’s all automated
3. Consistency. Automating a process creates consistency, as your automation software does each step of the process exactly as you program it. There are no deviations or distractions.
4. Training. Using forms to walk the user through a process, like an installation wizard, eliminates the need to teach them all of those little nuances that can muck up manual processes. Prompt the user only for the information that is absolutely necessary and let your automated program do the rest.
5. Customer satisfaction. What if you received an email after the plumber came out to stop your leak, asking you if everything is okay? Just the thought alone is nice, but what if something is still leaking and that email also offered you the option to click a link and have someone call you? Wow! Your imagination is the limit, and your customers are your inspiration.
Today’s customer expects more from your business than ever before. The challenge is in meeting the increased demand without increasing costs. Let Business Process Automation be one of the tools that offer you that balance and keeps your customers returning again and again.