Why is it that in our always on, always connected world where we take fully automated self service consumer experiences for granted – everything from online shopping, to banking, to theatre and movie ticket reservations – that we’re happy to function in manual mode in the workplace?
What about internal business processes such as onboarding employees, reconciling time and attendance data with payroll, or managing your invoicing and accounts?
Doesn’t it seem incongruous and out of place that your working life is hampered by slow, manual processes?
If you or your employees are spending (wasting) a large number of hours each week on manual processes, then it’s a direct drain on your productivity. It’s no oxymoron to work less and get more done. It should be a way of life. It should be how you run your business.
It’s a matter of automating all those manual tasks in your business and freeing yourself and your employees from time sapping drudgery. With the rise of cloud computing, automation is not just for big businesses anymore. You can achieve business process automation both quickly and inexpensively.
Where to start?
First, you simply need to evaluate where you currently spend the most time on manual processes. If you’re like most small businesses, you’ll find that you’re spending large amounts of unproductive time handling the admin side of your invoicing and accounting, payroll as well as workforce management processes.
So make these your priority.
There’s a large number of business productivity and accounting tools in the cloud. This means you don’t have to worry about finding a consultant or funding expensive business process automation tools. Nor do you need to plan for a lengthy technology rollout.
In many cases, you can replace manual labour intensive work tasks with efficient self-service and automated processes practically overnight.
Fast and simple
With accounting and payroll, moving to a cloud-based accounting system, you can expect to save days each month by replacing the need to manually raise invoices and chase payments with features that let you convert estimates to invoices in one click and easily reconcile money in and out of your business account.
At the same time, using automated and centralised workforce planning tools like Deputy, you can minimise the time you spend on time and attendance management and rostering, to free yourself up to do more strategic tasks.
With labour being a major cost for most businesses, ensuring that the right resource with the right skills is scheduled at the right time can greatly improve your workforce utilisation and therefore your profitability. With Deputy, you can tightly manage this process, and do so effortlessly.
Wouldn’t you like this level of control without the rostering and work scheduling pain?
As the year end fast approaches, it’s a great time now to start thinking about how you can work less and get more done. Take a trial of Deputy now and put your business on a really strong footing as we head into 2015.
