Top Down Approach to Improving Document-Centric Processes

By Denise Davert, Elixir

Now more than ever companies are looking at ways to improve and streamline their business processes and high-volume, on demand document generation is as much a candidate as any.

If these types of improvements are an initiative in your organization, then consider two approaches you can take. Both require some investment, but one may make a lot more sense.

Bottom Up Approach

One angle is to look at a specific business activity and find a better way to accomplish the task. In the document generation world, that might mean looking into buying new document design software or related software application. This is definitely a good exercise and there can be many benefits realized if you select a system that better suits your needs.

Following are some considerations if you target mission critical business applications. The example is based on document design, but these factors would apply any time a major change is made to an existing business process.

-          Investment in Current Files
It’s not uncommon for even a mid-sized company to have thousands of documents. Most systems read and generate a proprietary format. Given that a document is designed once and edited multiple times, what is the impact of moving to a new software design system? If the new system does not easily import the new file format, then consider the short-term impact. The ROI could be there, but if your company needs improvements shown over months - not years - this might not be the best starting point to look for ROI.

-          Investment in Staff
New software affects a couple of things when it comes to the people doing the work. Obviously they need to learn the new application, which is an added expense. The other area, which I consider even far more important, is the negative affect to productivity when getting familiar with the new system. Any time you change a process, it slows things down. How does that factor in to the overall ROI?

Top Down Approach

This angle leaves mission critical applications intact with little to no disruption—thank you very much.

This approach takes a look from 30,000 feet to expose improvements that might be made while connecting and managing existing activities. Here are some potential areas for ROI:

-          Address Bottlenecks Between Systems
Are there specific headaches associated between systems that could be improved by adding a layer of workflow tools to facilitate certain processes?  Approvals, file sharing, and access.

-          Leveraging Information Across Applications
Perhaps there are resources, files, databases, or other elements that might be shared to reduce duplication of effort.

-          Automation
Look for areas where processes might be automated in some way for timely processing and increase efficiencies.

-          Control
Establishing and managing specific roles and responsibilities can streamline the who-does-what process. The right workflow system can distribute tasks across business systems, track progress, and make sure approvals are gathered along the way.

Taking this top down approach allows companies to streamline across the entire organization without disturbing the current activities. It can also provide valuable insight into how the systems work together, which could help in later projects when you do in fact want to look into the possibility of implementing a new system for a specific business process.

If it’s not broke—don’t fix it (but you might consider tweaking it a little!).

Contact Denise Davert at Denise_Davert@elixir.com. To learn more about Elixir >>>.