Simplicity vs. flexibility: 3 ways modern business workflow technology achieves both goals

Simplicity vs. flexibility: 3 ways modern business workflow technology achieves both

July 31, 2018 Advertising

In the modern business world, effective employees – no matter their rank – handle many moving parts simultaneously on a day-to-day basis. It's for this reason they want to make their key responsibilities easier to manage, to avoid mental exhaustion or frustrations in the workplace. At the same time, their companies often seek flexibility: specifically, the ability to tackle disparate work functions across a single platform, thus optimizing efficiency across the enterprise and all workers. 

"20% of businesses using workflow management software reported cost savings."

At first glance it might seem like these are conflicting goals. But in truth, this doesn't have to be the case. Through the advent of an efficacious business workflow management platform like AppWright, companies can achieve a workable balance between their desires for flexibility and simplicity. Let's take a look at three of the reasons why this works: 

Creating opportunities to save resources

Time is money, and vice versa. When employees experience difficulties completing assignments, their time feels wasted and, and if this becomes a consistent problem, it adversely affects overall productivity and revenue. The same issue arises with inflexibility, when staff are constantly moving back and forth between different software programs, while the business pays for several different workflow programs without really needing to.

Simplicity vs. flexibility: 4 ways modern business workflow technology achieves both goalsEffective business workflow management solutions can provide an user-friendly and multi-functional experience.

An integrated solution can preemptively nip this problem in the bud. After all, managing schedules, workflow, orders and various other internal processes all at once means everyone wins. There's data to back this up, too: A study by Cognizant found that 20 percent of businesses using workflow automation and management tools reported cost savings of 15 percent or greater, along with significant improvement in the next three to five years. 

Seizing the capability for customization 

Unless a company has the budget and resources to devise proprietary software, they'll buy a vendor's solution – and will have less control over available features. However, this doesn't pose a problem when organizations carefully research and select suites with optimal customization abilities.

The most easy-to-use options, like AppWright, allow for tweaks to the program so each tier of a company's staff can fulfill their responsibilities without being digitally cluttered or given to many technical responsibilities. Entry-level and mid-level analysts need access to essential work functions, for instance, like managing all communications for a given project. At the same time, though, they don't need auditing powers to keep tabs on an entire team's process as managers their do. As such, flexibility and ease of use are simultaneously mastered. AppWright stands out among the crowd by offering both of those functions as well as control over who can access what at any given time.

Seeking efficiency through integration 

Employees in just about every contemporary business are engaged with a handful of different programs, web pages and interfaces during the course of their workday. Getting locked into one more may lead to distraction and resultant in dips in productivity. If this is happening regularly, at some point it's going to start showing up in key performance indicators of the organization's overall success. 

The solution to this lies in a workflow management platform capable of inbound and outbound API-based integration with all major line of business tools being used. This allows employees to import and export files and media as needed, for instance, making the job easier while also improving the breadth of functions that can be handled. Thus, the company and those who keep it running can consider the birds of simplicity and flexibility killed with one stone.