Automation and digital transformation: the key to growth

No doubt, by now, you've seen and heard people talking about their fervor for the digital revolution. If it's not the buzzword of the decade, it's certainly in the top ten. Automation is another candidate for the top spot. But if they are both about making business operations more efficient, what exactly is the difference?

<<< Digital revolution: The competitive advantage of adapting >>>

Digital transformation or automation: is there a difference?

While the terms "automation" and "digital transformation" are often used interchangeably, they have very different meanings. Automation involves the application of technology to make processes run on their own, making those processes more efficient and increasing transparency and reporting capabilities. In short, automation is a means to an end, and the desired end is digital transformation.

<<< Process design: 5 steps to increase the productivity of your area >>>

Gartner argues that digital transformation requires not only making existing processes more efficient but also creating or unlocking new value for customers.

Indeed, customer expectations are constantly evolving with emerging technologies, and companies are heavily embracing digital transformation in an attempt to continue to meet those expectations.

However, this is a somewhat limited view of digital transformation, as it excludes any digital transformation gains that do not directly benefit the customer, such as transforming company culture by providing employees with greater job satisfaction by allowing them to focus on more interesting projects than repetitive administrative tasks.

So what is digital transformation?

Digital transformation is the practice of using technology to radically change your business to pursue new revenue sources and business models and avoid disruption.

Digital transformation involves more than just moving everything to the cloud and adopting a variety of digital processes. According to George Westerman, author of Leading Digital: Transforming Technology into Business Transformation, digital transformation involves a "radical rethinking of how an organization uses technology, people, and processes to fundamentally change business performance."

Digital transformation is not an isolated IT project. Instead, it's the combination of numerous projects that transform every aspect of your organization.

Let’s look at some of the ways this can be carried out:

• Upgrading your underlying technology (renovation or replacement of systems).
• Changing the way you serve your customers (increasingly through mobile devices or on several different channels).
• Automating your processes for greater efficiency.
• Integrating with third parties to offer better customer experiences.

True digital transformation is about taking advantage of all the digital tools at your disposal, including automation and data analytics capabilities, to fundamentally transform the way your business operates and makes decisions.

This includes fostering a culture of innovation and continually iterating your offerings and even your business model to deliver the best possible version of your product, not only for your business but also for your industry.

Successful digital transformation is proactive rather than responsive: it is the territory of companies leading the charge in their industry, not simply responding to disruption.

The companies that are always cited as pioneers of digital transformation are companies like Netflix and Uber that completely disrupted their industries by using available technology and data to reimagine their products and address needs customers didn't even know they had.

To stand a chance of doing the same in your industry, even on a smaller scale, you must have your finger on the pulse of it and its customer relationships, for which the insights offered by data analytics are indispensable.

Process automation is the key to digital transformation

Process automation is a necessary step towards digital transformation. Deploying and socializing automation across the business means entire teams benefitting from the newly streamlined workflow, not just IT.

Automating daily workflows is at the heart of a successful digital transformation. If your business doesn't already have a simple workflow automation solution, it's a good idea to start looking for one now.

With such a platform, you can digitize employee and customer forms automate your routine processes and measure their effectiveness. With this data, you can reduce pain points to drive genuine change and improve business performance in myriad ways.

Without workflow automation, you would still be dealing with manual processes, in which case the threat of being interrupted and becoming irrelevant is real.

While optimizing how work gets done to improve productivity and efficiency is desirable in and of itself, for best results, automating your processes needs to align with a broader business strategy.

What do you want to achieve through automation? How will automation add value to your customers? Can you go one step further and offer value that truly sets you apart from your competitors or completely changes the parameters of your industry?

Here are some ways automation can help put you on the path to true digital transformation:

Provide world-class customer service

Excessive customer service is the single most important thing you can do to increase revenue. If you don't, today's consumers will quickly move on to the competition.

Today's customers are used to being able to interact with organizations online at any time. If they need information from your business and it's only available during business hours, they'll be frustrated and uncomfortable. Automation ensures your customers have a seamless experience by allowing them to access information when they need it.

When employees waste time on manual tasks like chasing internal approvals, they have less time to focus on providing great customer service, while automated approvals free up their time so it can be spent on what's important: customers.

Increase efficiency and accuracy so employees can focus on the tasks that matter

Automation can allow you to significantly speed up operations while reducing errors by taking over all the repetitive manual tasks previously done by people. With increased efficiency, capacity also increases, making it easier for operations to scale as the company grows.

What would the modern, transformed business application look like? Undoubtedly:

• Automate forms and workflows so there's no need to print, sign, and scan.
• Integrate systems and databases to reduce tedious manual data entry.
• Intelligently send documents to the right person at the right time to ensure business restrictions are met.
• It automatically supports all mobile devices and speeds up the approval process by providing 24/7 access from anywhere.
  
  

More rewarding work, better work culture

Automation frees up your staff to do more challenging or creative tasks, which is ultimately more rewarding and leads to more satisfied and engaged employees. When your people are engaged, they care more about the work they do, which translates to business success.

You can also make life easier for your developers by using a workflow automation solution with a visual, low-code approach, which enables you to provide business functionality in web applications and spread that development to more people: the "citizen developers" in your organization. This, in turn, relieves pressure on IT teams and frees them to focus on more important business needs.

Facilitate teamwork by breaking down silos

Built-in automated workflows can bridge gaps and break down silos to promote collaboration between different teams and parts of the business, facilitating cross-functional cooperation.

By exposing your workers to different functions, you allow them to obtain a greater vision of the business as a whole, creating a favorable climate for innovation.

With a process automation solution with the right integration capabilities, you can automate workflows across functions such as marketing, customer relationship management, sales, support, and finances.

Improve transparency and strategic oversight

When you automate business processes, you gain access to a wealth of data that you weren't necessarily tracking before. This offers greater visibility into which processes are successful and which could be further optimized.

Analyzing all this data also enables better strategic positioning and risk assessment, allowing you to get ahead of the curve and develop value propositions that lead you to digital transformation.

Increase security and compliance

Automation can contribute to security and compliance in several ways. In a recent RedHat survey, 47% of companies said that improving security and compliance were the top drivers for implementing automation tools.

Automation makes it easy to identify vulnerabilities and implement solutions, allowing companies to be proactive and address vulnerabilities before breaches occur. Smart software can also learn what constitutes normal use and automatically detect risks, such as security policy violations.

Reduce costs

Automation can help reduce waste, so to speak. By digitizing and automating processes such as data entry, document management, financial processes, and approval workflows, you not only save hundreds of hours but also save money by reducing waste, including but not limited to paper and ink.

While automation itself does not equate to digital transformation, it is a critical part of the process.

Business process automation tools are the first step in your digital transformation journey.